Marrying My Ex's Dangerous Billionaire Brother

I returned to a cold, empty mansion, my body still aching from the miscarriage I had just suffered alone. But the silence was broken by a delicate lace wrap on our couch. It belonged to Seraphina, my Alpha mate's childhood sweetheart. While I was in a hospital bed losing our pup, Archibald was bringing his true love into our home. A news alert flashed on my phone, showing him smiling tenderly at her at a luxury restaurant. When I handed him the official Rejection papers to sever our mate-bond, he didn't hesitate to sign. "I told you from the beginning, Bird. You were just a substitute," he sneered. Later, I overheard him telling his second-in-command that the child we just lost was nothing but an "unexpected nuisance." For three years, I had given up my Stanford research and my dignity, believing my total submission could earn his love. Hearing him dismiss our dead child so callously shattered the last illusion I had. My heart turned into a graveyard. To someone who doesn't love you, even your tragedy is just an inconvenience. I packed my worn clothes, took the fifty million dollar severance, and walked out of his life. I didn't cry or beg at his office doors like he arrogantly predicted. Instead, I took industrial shears to my priceless diamond wedding ring, snapped it in two, and walked into a rival tech firm to reclaim my genius.

Catalina woke up in the hospital with broken ribs after a horrific car crash, her only thought being her husband, Broderick, who had been paralyzed in a wheelchair for two years. Dragging her battered body to the adjacent VIP suite to check on him, she peeked through the door and saw her paralyzed husband standing perfectly straight, passionately kissing his ex-girlfriend. Broderick chuckled, bragging about faking his paralysis for two years just to secure his trust fund, mocking Catalina as a clueless, free nurse who fetched his water like a trained monkey. When Catalina refused to give up her own hospital bed for his mistress's fake migraine, Broderick flew into a violent rage, publicly humiliated her, and ruthlessly cut off all her credit cards to stop her medical treatments. "Since you are so independent, you can figure out how to pay for this room yourself. Let her rot here." Watching the mistress flaunt the Cartier diamond bracelet Catalina had bought with her own money, Catalina's heart didn't break, it turned into solid ice. She could not understand how she had sacrificed two years of her life serving a monster who treated her like disposable garbage. Discharging herself against medical advice, Catalina grabbed her crutch and headed straight for the lavish party Broderick was throwing at their estate, ready to expose his miraculous recovery to the world and burn his entire empire to the ground.

For three years, I played the perfect, uneducated housewife to my billionaire husband, Bradley. Then I received a photo of him sleeping in our custom bed, a woman's hand resting intimately on his bare chest. It was my half-sister. When I confronted him, he didn't apologize. He defended her, saying she was just scared of thunderstorms. "You are her sister. Why is your mind so dirty?" I handed him signed divorce papers, leaving with absolutely nothing. He sneered, pointing at the door. "A woman who didn't even finish high school? You will be begging on the streets in a week!" Later, he violently dragged me away from a friend's house, only to kick me out of his car on a freezing, pitch-black mountain road just because my half-sister called crying about a power outage. Standing alone in the dark with bleeding heels, the last ounce of warmth in my heart turned to solid ice. He truly thought I was a helpless nobody who would eventually crawl back to him in tears. He had no idea who he had really married. The next morning, I put on a tailored power suit, walked into the towering headquarters of MY Corporation, and took the Chairman's seat. It was time for him to meet Anna, the mysterious business tycoon he was about to go to war with.

I am an orphan taken in by the pack, and the powerful Alpha, Ryker, is my guardian. He is also my secret fated mate. But next week, he is marrying another woman for a political alliance. While I was forced to help his fiancé pick out her wedding gown, Ryker cornered me in a fitting room and aggressively marked my neck, claiming me as his own. When his fiancé almost caught us, his eyes turned cold. He shoved an unlimited black credit card into my hand, telling her it was just "charity" for his dead Beta's daughter. Then, they drove away together, leaving me to take a grimy public bus back alone. Back at the dorm, my roommate saw the unmistakable, possessive bite marks of an Alpha on my collarbone. Knowing my reputation was about to be ruined, I fled to a remote campus building to hide from them all. But my adoptive mother's maid suddenly appeared at my door. She didn't come to comfort me. Instead, she delivered a chilling warning. "Do not repeat the terrible mistakes of your family and the Blackwoods regarding the wrong kind of attachments." I froze, my blood running cold as I realized I was under constant surveillance. I thought Ryker's toxic obsession was my biggest nightmare. But what exactly happened between our families in the past, and why did everyone want me trapped in this beautifully decorated prison?

My wedding day was supposed to be the merger of two dynasties, the day I was handed over on the steps of City Hall like a lamb to the slaughter. Instead of a ring, my fiancé tore our marriage contract to shreds in front of the world's press. He screamed that my family was a "cesspool of lies" and that I was "damaged goods" he refused to accept. The cameras swarmed me, their questions like daggers. Was I mentally unstable? Did I know about the family's secret debts? Had my father disinherited me? I played the part of the broken doll perfectly, my shoulders shaking as I shrank into my white dress. Everyone saw a victim, a poor little rich girl publicly shamed and discarded. They thought my father's cruel world had finally crushed me. They had no idea I wrote the script. As the limo pulled away from the chaos, my driver caught my reflection in the mirror. The trembling bride was gone. In her place was a woman whose eyes held something he couldn't name. It looked almost like satisfaction. And my performance was just the opening act.

Before I died, I used my life's work in robotics to build a bionic replica of myself for my husband. She had my exact face and body, but none of my temper. She never threw tantrums, never picked fights, and never raised her voice. Yet my husband, Ethan, had no idea she was actually a machine. He despised "my" newly submissive and obedient attitude. To provoke me, he constantly brought women home, desperately trying to drive me mad with jealousy. But he never succeeded. Until one day, his first love—the one who had once walked out on him—threw a cup of scalding coffee right in "my" face. To Ethan's astonishment, not only did I not scream in pain, but my skin didn't even turn red. He finally realized that I was already dead.