Lana Adler

Elizabeth Taylor gave Sofia Roth a subtle nod, as if to calm her, before turning her full attention to Cloe. Her gaze was sharp, unforgiving. "This is not your home, Cloe." The words slammed into Cloe like a blow, knocking the air from her lungs. She froze, her body stiffening as the weight of the moment settled over her. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Elizabeth cut her off, her voice like a blade slicing through Cloe's hope. "Meet Ethan's fiancée, Sofia." The words hit Cloe like a thunderclap, a shock so violent it felt as if lightning had struck her to the core. Her body stiffened, her eyes wide, her heart pounding so loud it echoed in her ears. Fiancée? Ethan's fiancée? Her eyes darted to Sofia, who stepped forward with a cruel smile, her voice dripping with satisfaction. "Yes. Fiancée. I'm pregnant with Ethan's child." Cloe's world shattered. The words slammed into her with the force of a thousand storms, and she staggered backward as if physically struck. Her knees buckled, her hands clutching her chest, her breathing shallow and ragged. Pregnant? With Ethan's child? -------- Cloe was not ready to give up. So she received a sex tape from Sofia Roth. A sex Tape The man's face was deliberately obscured, lying back on the bed, while Sofia's naked body moved atop him, her large breasts bouncing as she rode him with exaggerated enthusiasm. Sofia's face, however, was clear. Her eyes locked onto the camera with an unmistakable awareness of what she was doing. Her moans were loud, theatrical, and filled with purpose. She threw her head back, calling out, "Oh, Ethan... love it, babe." The hands of the man beneath her, though blurred and devoid of identity, reached up to grip Sofia's breasts, rolling her nipples between his fingers. Sofia's moans grew louder, her voice filled with pleasure as she called out again, "Ethan, baby... you're the best." ------ Three years later. She stepped cautiously into her apartment, her heart racing as she noticed the dark figure seated on the living room sofa. The shadows of the room made it hard to make out who it was. Her breath caught in her throat as she instinctively gripped her bag tighter. "Who's there?" she asked, her voice trembling slightly. The figure stirred, slowly rising to his feet. Ethan, unable to believe his eyes, stood frozen, his heart pounding in his chest. It was her. Cloe-his Cloe-right there in front of him. The woman he had thought lost forever. She took a step forward, her brow furrowed in confusion. "Who are you?" she asked again, her voice firmer now. Ethan felt like the world had stopped moving. The woman standing before him, looking at him as if he were a stranger-how could she not know? His emotions collided within him, confusion, shock, and an overwhelming sense of longing. "I... I am your husband," he managed to say, his voice hoarse with disbelief. She froze, her face contorting in shock. "My husband?" she repeated, disbelief lacing her words. She took a step back, her confusion deepening. "Who are you? And what kind of joke is this?" She refused to recognize him.

Armin Rodríguez Suegra is the only heir among one of the most powerful and rich Nobel listed families worldwide. When he was just three years old, he developed emotions for the breathtaking Seraphina Holland. Armin has given it much thought and decided that his best choice is Seraphina Holland. Armin was hopelessly smitten with Seraphina Holland all his life. Armin claimed Seraphina was meant to be his. Should I not have her, no one else can have her. Armin broke the family and everyone else to marry Seraphina and formally name her Mrs. Rodríguez. Armin's family was disappointed but was unable to inform him a big secret meanwhile. A few years later, to Armin's surprise, a gorgeous royal blood princess graced his life. But the shocking Truth was the royal princess was his real wife. Armin found the disclosure shocking and confusing. Armin already had too late to learn all his family had been keeping from him. Seraphina was never his wife? He was actually married to a beautiful princess? Armin found it shocking. He was depressed since he felt let down by all around him. The royal princess is indeed quite beautiful, unmatched. But the situation gets more worse when Armin's uncle, Ivan Anderson Suegra steps into The princess's Life without any notification. The jealousy mixed with anger consumed Armin. Who then was meant to be Armin's wife from birth? Beautiful and mysterious princess or Seraphina Holland? Who was really born to be mine? Claiming back his missing wife!

On my wedding day, my father sold me to the Chicago Outfit to pay his debts. I was supposed to marry Alex Moreno, the heir to the city's most powerful crime family. But he couldn't even be bothered to show up. As I stood alone at the altar, humiliated, my best friend delivered the final blow. Alex hadn't just stood me up; he had run off to California with his mistress. The whispers in the cathedral turned me into a joke. I was damaged goods, the rejected bride. His family knew the whole time and let me take the public fall, offering me his cousins as pathetic replacements-a brute who hated me or a coward who couldn't protect me. The humiliation burned away my fear, leaving only cold rage. My life was already over, so I decided to set the whole game on fire myself. The marriage pact only said a Carlson had to marry a Moreno; it never said which one. With nothing left to lose, I looked past the pathetic boys they offered. I chose the one man they never expected. I chose his father, the Don himself.

I was three days away from marrying the Underboss of the Fazio crime family when I unlocked his burner phone. The screen glowed toxic bright in the dark next to my sleeping fiancé. A message from a contact saved as 'Little Trouble' read: "She is just a statue, Dante. Come back to bed." Attached was a photo of a woman lying in the sheets of his private office, wearing his shirt. My heart didn't break; it simply stopped. For eight years, I believed Dante was the hero who pulled me from a burning opera house. I played the perfect, loyal Mafia Princess for him. But heroes don't give their mistresses rare pink diamonds while giving their fiancées cubic zirconia replicas. He didn't just cheat. He humiliated me. He defended his mistress over his own soldiers in public. He even abandoned me on the side of the road on my birthday because she faked a pregnancy emergency. He thought I was weak. He thought I would accept the fake ring and the disrespect because I was just a political pawn. He was wrong. I didn't cry. Tears are for women who have options. I had a strategy. I walked into the bathroom and dialed a number I hadn't dared to call in a decade. "Speak," a voice like gravel growled on the other end. Lorenzo Moretti. The Capo of the rival family. The man my father called the Devil. "The wedding is off," I whispered, staring at my reflection. "I want an alliance with you, Enzo. And I want the Fazio family burned to the ground."

My eyes struggled open, but a heavy weight held them shut. I was paralyzed, trapped in a cold hospital room, the rhythmic beep of a heart monitor a cruel reminder of my mother's death. I, Elena Vitiello, who controlled everything, was now helpless, reduced to a slab of meat. Then I heard his footsteps. Dante. My husband, my anchor. But his voice was chillingly devoid of warmth as he ordered, "Do not increase the dosage. I will not risk damaging the organ's viability." The organ. My mind went blank, ice filling my veins. Trapped and unable to move, I realized Dante saw me only as a "political placeholder," never loving me. He was having my kidney removed, carved from my body like livestock, to save his mistress, Sofia-the woman whose messes I'd cleaned for ten years. His hand, usually my comfort, smeared away my tear with sheer disgust. The scalpel tore into my flesh, a blinding, white-hot agony. Every tug and pull hollowed me out, stripping away my potential, my love, my future. How could the man I bled for reduce me to a mere object, a spare part for his true love? The sheer insult of it fueled a volcanic rage. As my kidney was lifted out, the final illusion of our marriage shattered completely. My fear dissolved, replaced by a chilling, absolute calm. The darkness that embraced me was not defeat, but the coiling silence of a viper preparing to strike. This kidney was not a sacrifice. It was the down payment for Dante Moretti's life.

I stood outside my husband's study, the perfect mafia wife, only to hear him mocking me as an "ice sculpture" while he entertained his mistress, Aria. But the betrayal went deeper than infidelity. A week later, my saddle snapped mid-jump, leaving me with a shattered leg. Lying in the hospital bed, I overheard the conversation that killed the last of my love. My husband, Alessandro, knew Aria had sabotaged my gear. He knew she could have killed me. Yet, he told his men to let it go. He called my near-death experience a "lesson" because I had bruised his mistress's ego. He humiliated me publicly, freezing my accounts to buy family heirlooms for her. He stood by while she threatened to leak our private tapes to the press. He destroyed my dignity to play the hero for a woman he thought was a helpless orphan. He had no idea she was a fraud. He didn't know I had installed micro-cameras throughout the estate while he was busy pampering her. He didn't know I had hours of footage showing his "innocent" Aria sleeping with his guards, his rivals, and even his staff, laughing about how easy he was to manipulate. At the annual charity gala, in front of the entire crime family, Alessandro demanded I apologize to her. I didn't beg. I didn't cry. I simply connected my drive to the main projector and pressed play.

I was the dutiful wife of Julian, a ruthless Capo in the Chicago Syndicate. Six months ago, my convoy was ambushed by a rival cartel. While I lay bleeding out on the cold floor of the car, my husband was on the phone with his mistress, Mia. "Lock your doors, stay inside," he told her, never once asking if I was alive. I survived, only to watch him flaunt his betrayal. He brought his mistress into our home, booked her luxury suites in Tokyo, and bought her massive diamonds with Syndicate funds. When I refused to play the part of his obedient, blind wife, he publicly humiliated me and orchestrated rumors to isolate me. He thought I was just collateral, a powerless figurehead he could control and eventually discard to settle his debts. I had endured this loveless marriage to survive in the family, yet he treated me worse than dirt while elevating a mistress who knew nothing of our world. I was suffocating in a cage of neglect, enraged by the audacity of a coward who broke every sacred vow. So, I took off my vulgar wedding ring and left it on his bathroom sink. I picked up my phone and sent a message to Dante Falcone, the exiled heir who had stitched my flesh back together in secret. This time, I chose to burn my husband's empire to the ground.

For seven years, I was the architect of my fiancé's criminal empire and the strategist behind his every move. I was Dante Gallo’s unofficial Consigliere, his partner in everything but name. Tomorrow, I was finally supposed to marry him and take my place as the queen to his throne. But on the eve of our wedding, a single text message sent by mistake detonated my life. It was a photo from Dante, showing a platinum wedding band on his hand. The message read: “Married this morning. She’s safe now.” My gaze fell to the engagement ring on my own finger. It was the identical band, just smaller. The engraved initials ‘D.I.’ didn’t stand for Dante and I. They stood for Dante and Isabella—his childhood sweetheart. My entire relationship was a lie; I was just a shield to protect his one true love. He dismissed my discovery as a "tantrum." Then, his new bride began taunting me, sending a picture of them tangled in bedsheets with the caption: "Loser." They expected me to break. They thought I would shatter. They were about to find out just how wrong they were. I forwarded the picture to Isabella’s fiancé, a man far more dangerous than Dante. "Your fiancée is in Suite 8808 at the Grand Hyatt," I told him. "I'll meet you downstairs. We're going to crash their party."

What's more embarrassing than a butt dial? Butt dialing your boss... And leaving a dirty voicemail when you're uhh... "thinking" about them. Working as Ruslan Oryolov's personal assistant is the job from hell. After a long day spent tending to the billionaire's every whim, I need some stress relief. So when I get home that night, that's exactly what I do. Problem is, my thoughts are still stuck on the bosshole who's ruining my life. That's fine-because of all Ruslan's many sins, being gorgeous might be the most dangerous. Tonight, fantasies of him are just what I need to push me over the edge. But when I look down at my phone squished next to me, There it is. A voicemail for 7 minutes and 32 seconds... Sent to Ruslan Oryolov. I panic and throw my phone across the room. But there is no undoing the damage done by my very vocal O. So what can I do? My plan was to just avoid him and act like it never happened. Besides, no one that busy checks their voicemails, right? But when he schedules a one-on-one meeting with me for exactly 7 minutes and 32 seconds, One thing is for certain: He. Heard. Everything.

As I lay in the cold underground clinic, terminating the unborn heir of the city's most feared mafia underboss, my phone lit up. My fiancé of seven years had just publicly pledged his protection and a home-cooked meal to his ex-lover, moments after telling me to risk a deadly ambush by ordering takeout. When I returned to our penthouse, bleeding and broken, he didn't even notice. He gave my specialized prenatal milk to his ex because she had a "delicate stomach," leaving me only a hollowed-out egg white and dry crusts. When I begged him to stay, he violently kicked my packed suitcase across the marble floor. "Elena's medical needs take priority right now," he snapped, rushing out because his ex felt cold. He even blocked my secure number when I frantically tried to reach him one last time. For seven years, we had built an empire together. I couldn't understand how a past flame playing the fragile doe could make him discard my life and our child's existence so callously, treating me like worthless scraps. Sitting in the empty penthouse, I wiped my tears and opened the global Syndicate network. "My betrothal to Vincent is officially dissolved. Act accordingly." I powered down my phone, grabbed my tactical gear, and boarded a private jet to leave his territory forever.

My marriage to Joshua Caldwell was a prison sentence. I was a Hartman trophy, sold to the powerful family who had destroyed mine. Then I discovered he was cheating. His mistress was pregnant with the child he denied me, and he was stealing my secret song lyrics to build her career. When I confronted him, he called me a spineless liability and threatened to destroy what was left of my family. To make matters worse, a one-night stand with a stranger turned out to be with my husband's brother, Anthony Caldwell-the Don of the city. He knew all of Joshua's secrets and used them to trap me in a twisted game, seeing me as nothing more than an asset. They both thought I was a broken doll they could control. I wrote a song for his mistress, a beautiful execution with a single, impossible note I knew would destroy her voice. She sang it, and now her career is over. Now the Don has summoned me to Chicago, not knowing the woman he thinks is his asset is the one who just burned his brother's world to the ground.

Kelvin held her wrist and pulled her into a room in the hotel. "What are you doing?" Amelia asked, trying to tug at him. "Don't pretend you don't want this too." He said, rubbing his thumb at her hard nipples threatening to tear out of her dress, his eyes watching as her body responded to him. He held her neck in the most seductive way and pinned her against the wall. His hand went up under her black dress tracing her skin in a calculated path, as his fingers touched her already soaked pants, Amelia let out a soft moan and pulled him closer with a kiss. *** Amelia found herself getting married to her ex-fiancé's brother, it was an almost perfect revenge. Only to find herself wrapped deeper in the evil hands of the brothers. Would she ever be able to get her revenge and find her true love? Explore a tale of romance, suspense, treachery, and love. The fascinating novel 'For Her Sake' will have you reading until the very last page.