The Roommate Pact: No Strings Attached

Ten years ago, they buried me alive. My fiancé Jake and my adoptive brother Alon had me committed, framing me as insane to cover up his affair with my family's long-lost biological daughter, Corina. They erased me from their perfect lives, painting me as a danger to myself and others. While I was left drugged and broken in a psychiatric facility, he married her, securing his connection to our family's power and launching his political career. But I survived. I rebuilt a quiet life from the ashes, finding peace in a small bookstore by the sea. This was my sanctuary. Until today. They walked through my door, shattering a decade of silence. Jake, now a powerful District Attorney aiming for the Senate, stared at me, his composure cracking. "Chandler?" I met his gaze, my voice cold and steady, the voice I used for any stranger. "Can I help you?"

Three years in gilded-cage Florence. Now I was back in Napa Valley, clutching my wedding invitation. My adoptive parents had exiled me with a brutal command: "Don't come back until Ethan is purged from your heart." I was here to marry Noah Williams, Ethan's best friend, proving I had moved on from my devastating, unrequited love for my adoptive brother. But then I saw him, at his family vineyard, his new, very public actress girlfriend, Brooke, clinging to him. He smirked, pulled her into a passionate kiss right in front of me, then scoffed when I presented my invitation. He ripped it to shreds, calling it a "pathetic stunt" to get his attention. From that moment, his cruelty, fueled by Brooke's manipulative games, became relentless. At poolside parties, at my final dress fitting, they mocked my engagement, fabricating lies, even allowing Brooke to physically harm me. He believed every accusation, every feigned sob, leaving me injured and humiliated. "Stop the theatrics, Ava," he'd sneered, ignoring my bleeding arm, rushing Brooke to safety over a minor scratch. My own adoptive parents silently approved of my torment, concerned only with their perfect family image. How could the boy who once protected me become this cold, heartless stranger? Why did he refuse to believe I had moved on? Every act of cruelty, every dismissal, twisted the knife of a love I was desperate to bury. My past with him was a nightmare that wouldn't end. On my wedding day, just before the ceremony, he abandoned me yet again for Brooke's false emergency, convinced I wouldn't go through with it. But as his car pulled away, a quiet resolve settled within me. His final act of abandonment was my true release. I was finally free. And he would never have power over me again.

I was the black sheep of the wealthy Jenkins family, the villain in my adopted sister Jami's perfect story. Everyone adored her, the sweet, innocent heroine. I was just the difficult one. Then, a system uploaded itself into my brain, showing me the script of my life. It wasn't just a story where I was the bad guy-it was a detailed blueprint for my entire family's destruction, all orchestrated by Jami. The script showed how she would drive one brother to suicide, frame another for a crime he didn't commit, and leave me for a gruesome "accidental" death, making her the sole heir to their fortune. My family saw her as an angel. They were completely blind, worshiping the very monster who was plotting to bury them all. But the system that showed me this horrifying future also gave me a weapon. It let me hear their thoughts. And then, at the family gala, I realized something even better. They could hear mine.

I was arranging white lilies on the cold marble of my husband's grave when I saw a ghost. Walking through the cemetery gates was a man who looked exactly like my dead husband, Dante. Logic said it was his twin brother, Matteo. But a wife knows the slope of a man's shoulders. She knows the arrogant tilt of his chin. My husband hadn't been blown up in a car bomb three years ago. He had faked his death to steal his brother's rank, his fortune, and his mistress. For three years, I had forced our son, Leo, to kiss a photograph goodnight. We lived in a damp, peeling apartment, surviving on the "charity" of the Family. Meanwhile, Dante was living in a mansion, driving cars that cost more than my life, playing house with another woman. When he came to our cramped apartment to drop off the monthly "pension" money, pretending to be Uncle Matteo, he didn't look at me with love. He looked at his watch. When Leo ran to hug him, shouting "Papa," Dante peeled the boy's small arms off his expensive suit like he was removing a piece of lint. "Don't call me that," he snapped. "I am your Uncle." My grief turned into ice. He chose another woman's comfort over his own son's hunger. I grabbed Leo's hand and walked out the door. "You walk away, and you get nothing!" Dante shouted after me. "You'll be on the street!" I didn't stop. I walked straight to the black SUV idling at the curb. The window rolled down, revealing Salvatore Vitiello. The Don. The most lethal man in the city. "Get in, Elena," he commanded. I opened the door and slid onto the leather seat next to the devil himself. As we drove away, leaving my husband in the dust, I realized I had just traded a liar for a killer. And I didn't regret it for a second.

My husband crushed the metacarpals of my left hand—my drawing hand—with a heavy leather-bound book. This was Punishment Ninety-Six. The offense? I had missed a single phone call from my stepsister, Joyce. According to Don Austen Ballard, ignoring the woman who allegedly saved his life fifteen years ago was akin to high treason. "Discipline is the highest form of love, Alana," he whispered, watching the violet bruise spread across my skin. He calls shattering an architect's hand "love." He believes Joyce dragged him from a burning building when he was a boy. He treats her like a living saint and me like a punching bag to pay his life debt. But it is all a lie. Fifteen years ago, Joyce was at a cheerleading camp three towns away. I was the one in that crawlspace. I was the one who found the bleeding boy in the dark. I was the one who called him "Stellen" because he was too terrified to tell me his real name. He has spent our entire marriage torturing his true savior to please a fraud. Tonight, the pain finally burned away my fear, leaving only cold resolve. I didn't cry. I waited until the house was silent, then I retrieved a burner phone hidden in a false bottom of a box in the bathroom. I dialed the number of his sworn enemy, Don Dalton Underwood. "I have the blueprints," I said, my voice steady despite the agony in my hand. "And I have the controlling shares of Ballard Industries. I'm ready to burn his kingdom to ash."

For seven years, I was the perfect girlfriend to Hollywood star Ethan Cleveland. I put my life on hold, baked his favorite pastries, and silently endured the online hate from fans who wanted him with his co-star, Keira. Then came my 29th birthday. He said he had a late-night script meeting, but I discovered the truth: he was at a private clinic, comforting Keira as she confessed her feelings for him. He publicly defended Keira from online harassment, calling for kindness. But when I received death threats from his fans, he called me "dramatic" and "insecure." He was capable of empathy and protection, just never for me. The man who claimed to love me was systematically destroying my self-worth while playing the hero for the world. So I left. And when he finally tracked me down, trying to reclaim what he'd lost, I did something I never thought I would. I turned to the new man by my side-the one who truly saw me-and kissed him right in front of my ex.

Her fiance and her best friend worked together and set her up. She lost everything and died in the street. However, she was reborn. The moment she opened her eyes, her husband was trying to strangle her. Luckily, she survived that. She signed the divorce agreement without hesitation and was ready for her miserable life. To her surprise, her mother in this life left her a great deal of money. She turned the tables and avenged herself. Everything went well in her career and love when her ex-husband came to her.

Katherine endured mistreatment for three years as Julian's wife, sacrificing everything for love. But when his sister drugged her and sent her to a client's bed, Katherine finally snapped. She left behind divorce papers, walking away from the toxic marriage. Years later, Katherine returned as a radiant star with the world at her feet. When Julian saw her again, he couldn't ignore the uncanny resemblance between her new love and himself. He had been nothing but a stand-in for someone else. Desperate to make sense of the past, Julian pressed Katherine, asking, "Did I mean nothing to you?"

Ten years ago, Elizabeth Kaiser was abandoned by her biological father, cast out of her home like a stray dog. A decade later, she returned as a decorated general of Nation A, wielding immense power and wealth beyond measure. The onlookers waited eagerly for her downfall, only to watch in shock as the elite families of Capitol City bowed before her in reverence. Elizabeth smirked coldly. "Want to chase me? Better ask my fists for permission first!"

I sat on the cold tile floor of our Upper East Side penthouse, staring at the two pink lines until my vision blurred. After ten years of loving Julian Sterling and three years of a hollow marriage, I finally had the one thing that could bridge the distance between us. I was pregnant. But Julian didn't come home with flowers for our anniversary. He tossed a thick manila envelope onto the marble coffee table with a heavy thud. Fiona, the woman he'd truly loved for years, was back in New York, and he told me our "business deal" was officially over. "Sign it," He said, his voice flat and devoid of emotion. He looked at me with the cold detachment of a man selling a piece of unwanted furniture. When I hesitated, he told me to add a zero to the alimony if the money wasn't enough. I realized in that moment that if he knew about the baby, he wouldn't love me; he would simply take my child and give it to Fiona to raise. I shoved the pregnancy test into my pocket, signed the papers with a shaking hand, and lied through my teeth. When my morning sickness hit, I slumped to the floor to hide the truth. "It's just cramps," I gasped, watching him recoil as if I were contagious. To make him stay away, I invented a man named Jack-a fake boyfriend who supposedly gave me the kindness Julian never could. Suddenly, the man who wanted me gone became a monster of possessiveness. He threatened to "bury" a man who didn't exist while leaving me humiliated at his family's dinner to rush to Fiona's side. I was so broken that I even ate a cake I was deathly allergic to, then had to refuse life-saving steroids at the hospital because they would harm the fetus. Julian thinks he's stalling the divorce for two months to protect the family's reputation for his father's Jubilee. He thinks he's keeping his "property" on a short leash until the press dies down. He has no idea I'm using those sixty days to build a fortress for my child. By the time he realizes the truth, I'll be gone, and the Sterling heir will be far beyond his reach.

Yelena discovered that she wasn't her parents' biological child. After seeing through their ploy to trade her as a pawn in a business deal, she was sent away to her barren birthplace. There, she stumbled upon her true origins-a lineage of historic opulence. Her real family showered her with love and adoration. In the face of her so-called sister's envy, Yelena conquered every adversity and took her revenge, all while showcasing her talents. She soon caught the attention of the city's most eligible bachelor. He cornered Yelena and pinned her against the wall. "It's time to reveal your true identity, darling."

Gabriela learned her boyfriend had been two-timing her and writing her off as a brainless bimbo, so she drowned her heartache in reckless adventure. One sultry blackout night she tumbled into bed with a stranger, then slunk away at dawn, convinced she'd succumbed to a notorious playboy. She prayed she'd never see him again. Yet the man beneath those sheets was actually Wesley, the decisive, ice-cool, unshakeable CEO who signed her paychecks. Assuming her heart was elsewhere, Wesley returned to the office cloaked in calm, but every polite smile masked a dark surge of possessive jealousy.