A Billion Tears
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The Hockey Prince's Secret Ice Queen
All I wanted was to find a computer genius to process the non-linear dynamic equations for my ecological model. Instead, I found myself cornered by Julian Andrews, the university's hockey prince, trading a public, staged kiss for his academic support. To finalize our "deal," I was dragged to the campus ice rink. The cheerleaders and puck bunnies immediately swarmed him, mocking my plain clothes and treating me like a pathetic joke. Brooke, the head cheerleader, even set up a figure skating competition with a date with Julian as the grand prize. She performed a basic spin, blew him a kiss, and smugly waited for me to fall flat on my face and humiliate myself. His hockey teammates laughed from the sidelines, watching me try to support Julian as he stumbled around the ice like a newborn giraffe. But as I held his warm hand to keep him from falling, I couldn't help but feel something was terribly wrong. Why was a top-tier athlete faking such awful balance? And why did his ice-blue eyes stare at me with such knowing anticipation, as if he already knew about the professional figure skating past I had spent years trying to bury? "Just let go and skate." He whispered, slowly releasing my hand. I took a deep breath, glided to the center of the rink, and landed a flawless double Axel. As the entire rink fell into a dead, shocked silence, I realized I had just exposed not only my own hidden past, but also the biggest secret of the campus god.
Chapter 1 No.1
Sage POV:
"Let me kiss you."
The request was a low, hurried murmur—warm, quiet, and laced with the faintest edge of mortification.
Stunned, I snapped my head up toward the sound.
Julian Andrews filled my vision. He easily towered a head over me, his lean, athletic frame silhouetted against the bright morning glare, casting a long shadow across the cobblestones. Briar University's star forward. Team captain. The athletic department's untouchable golden boy.
Campus rumor had it that Julian was notoriously indifferent, never sparing anyone a second glance.
Behind him, a solid wall of navy-and-gold varsity jackets blocked the brick path. His teammates were whistling, shoving each other, and effectively cutting off my only exit.
The sudden commotion immediately bottlenecked the morning foot traffic. Whispers rippled through the crowd, and within seconds, a dozen students reached into their pockets out of sheer muscle memory, black camera lenses catching the light as they aimed squarely at us.
Julian's sharp eyes tracked the movement, his jaw tightening into a hard, irritated line.
Before I could take a single defensive step back, he closed the distance between us. Leaning down into my space, his broad shoulders shifted in a subtle, fluid maneuver—throwing up an impenetrable physical wall that completely shielded my face from the intrusive glare of the cameras.
His sharp, striking face hovered breathtakingly close. His deep baritone brushed against my ear, lost to the autumn wind, meant for me alone:
"Sorry to drop this on you," he whispered, his pale blue eyes disarmingly earnest, holding a quiet heat that sent a tremor straight down my spine. "The guys backed me into a locker-room dare... but I'm not here to use you as a joke. We can fake it. Angle it so it looks real—whatever you're comfortable with. Just help me get them off my back, and I owe you one."
It was only then that my brain finally rebooted.
What on earth? He's actually trying to kiss me?
A sharp flare of pure absurdity hit me, and my gaze dropped to my reflection in the dark glass door of the adjacent building: an oversized, faded gray hoodie that swallowed my frame whole, soft, thin jeans worn at the knees, bare-faced dark circles carved beneath my eyes from forty-eight hours of non-stop coding, my dark hair hastily twisted into a cheap plastic claw clip, and a pair of oversized, thick black-rimmed glasses sitting heavy on the bridge of my nose, completely hiding my face.
I looked like a refugee from an all-night disaster. How had Briar's golden prince ended up in front of me?
When I looked back up, my breath trapped in my throat anyway. He was too close, his clean scent of winter mint and cedar wrapping around my senses. Having those pale blue eyes staring straight down at me made my chest tighten in a way I really didn't want to acknowledge.
"Clock's ticking, Cap!" Landon howled from the sidelines, hands cupped around his mouth as the rest of the players lost their minds laughing. "Plant one on her, or enjoy the five-AM bag skate!"
A raucous chorus of barks and chest-thumping went up from the team.
A few yards away, two girls heading toward the dining hall froze in their tracks, pointing their phones.
"Wait, who the hell is that?" one of them laughed loudly, zooming her camera in on my face. "She looks like she just crawled out of a dumpster. There's no way Julian's actually kissing her. Post it on Sidechat right now—this is going straight to number one."
The cruel words hit like a splash of ice water, snapping me out of my daze and instantly killing the stupid flutter in my chest.
I hated the attention.
Four years ago, after my family and my former training partner framed me and destroyed my competitive skating career, I swore I would never be public entertainment again. I buried my name, switched majors, and hid behind oversized fleece and thick glasses just to live an invisible life. If I ended up on the campus forums with Julian Andrews, the internet vultures would dox me before noon—and drag up the toxic scandal I had bled to walk away from.
My research was already on the verge of falling apart. I didn't have time for this circus.
I locked my grip around my heavy binders, my knuckles straining white.
"Find someone else for your dare, Andrews," I said coldly, taking a step back to put distance between us, my voice tight with adrenaline. "I'm not interested in being part of your game. Move."
I kept my head down, attempting to brush past him.
"You're Sage Kelley, right?"
The sound of my name brought my boots to an immediate halt.
I blinked up at him, caught completely off guard.
"Professor Beaumont's senior research student," Julian straightened up slightly, his cadence measured and even, carrying an intellectual sharpness that seemed impossible beneath a varsity jacket. "I saw your Havenwood Creek senior capstone proposal sitting on his desk over Sunday dinner."
My heart gave a hard, hollow thud. Professor Beaumont was my academic advisor—and the guardian of the final research endowment my late father had left behind.
Julian leaned in slightly, his voice dropping to a near-whisper against the whistle of the wind. "I spent an hour going over your codebase."
My lips parted. "You... read my proposal?"
"Your simulation keeps crashing because your core fluid algorithm strategy is flawed," Julian murmured, his pale blue eyes deadly sharp. "And Uncle Des mentioned that if you don't deliver a working version by this Friday, the department is pulling your grant—which means you don't clear your senior thesis, and you don't graduate in May."
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
Friday was the deadline. If the funding was pulled, the project died, my senior capstone failed, and I would be forced to stay another semester without my degree. Worse, my father's final ecological legacy would be reduced to scrap paper.
I had been panicking over that exact deadline for two days straight, and Julian had just laid it out like it was nothing.
Worse, I couldn't even brush him off. I had heard the rumors about Beaumont's nephew—the CS prodigy everyone in the department talked about. I just had never realized it was him.
"I know how to fix your algorithm," Julian stated plainly, laying his cards on the table, his gaze locking onto mine with an unshakeable, quiet certainty. "Help me get through this bet. In return, I'll rewrite your boundary calculations tonight. Deal?"
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Tears Of A Mistress
"Yes, let's say I fucking love it." he said making me smile. We stayed in that position for a while and I shivered again for the second time. he changed our position so he was on top again. He put his hand on my side and moved freely on top of me. "Ohhh! Fa-Faster please." "I can't hear you, baby?"
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A Lycan's Tears
Vishiea and Darius were originally childhood lovers. They grew up together until they found out they were mates. But as days passed, Darius slowly fell out of love. He secretly cheated. Until one time, Vishiea captured him making love with someone else. She was heartbroken and confronted him. She
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TEARS OF A LUNA
"What do you want, Victoria?" Victoria walked closer to Vega, her eyes held hatred in them. "Look, let me warn you, don't even dare try to ruin my marriage, or else I will make your life a living hell!" "You knew he wasn't your mate, and you let him mark you, didn't you?" Vega asked with anger brewi
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A Hundred Billion Bride
"Don't make me angry, Khione. Do as you're told." Then he stormed out of the dining room. I snapped back to reality when I heard the last girl being called before me. I couldn't shake off what happened before I got here. I'm backstage now, trying to be brave just for tonight. "Three hundred fifty
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A Billion Desires 1
Julian "Jules" Ashford was born to wear a suit, walk the shiny halls of power, and marry the perfect woman - even when he's lied his entire life to everyone, including himself. Closeted, bullied by father Stephen Ashford Sr., and stuck in a copycat marriage to political heiress Camille "Cam" Stratto
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A Billion Desires
Starting from a small incident that happened to Barbara, Anna Asmita was invited to dinner by Jake Batara Luciano. Unfortunately, when Anna came home, she was followed by Milo Durran - her ex-boyfriend - who accused her of having a rich boyfriend. Anna agrees to let Milo go. But Milo forced Anna to
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Love's Shadow, A Billionaire's Tears
He broke my heart ninety-nine times, but it was the last one that finally killed my love for him. At his family's party, his new girl theatrically stumbled, pulling us both into the pool. My heavy gown dragged me down, and I gasped for air, reaching for him. But he shoved right past me. He saved h
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In a billion$ of $tar
My name is Joshua, I used to be a simple man living in my own small world with my foster parents but that world collapsed when I found out my true parentage, the only child of a very famous and rich business. In time I found out that my real parents were murdered by those that claim to be the 3 most
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HER TEARS
"C-Cashren ..." "Cervin ..." I was shocked when I saw Cervin and ... Cashren on the veranda of our house. I was already staring at my stand while looking at the two of them. There seemed to be thousands of needles stuck in my heart and suddenly it hurt badly. The speed of its pulse and it was as
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Ocean's Tears
Washed off ashore with no bearing memories of where she came from. Ocean, or at least what they named her after not being able to recall even her name. However, she didn't expect to stray to a peculiar place where the inhabitants could transform into giant wolves ruled by a brutal alpha. As soon as
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Broken Tears
Warning:(18+) She had watched her mother being bullied, maltreated, and belittled all in the name of love, so she hated anything that has to do with relationships and love. When she thought she was finally free from the cruel hands of her father's ill-treatment, life happened and she became traumati
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Tears' Curse
"Why do we need to protect mortals? They're living in the 21st century. They no longer believe in us!" "Because this is our oath." Xue'er, a thousand-year-old white dragon from Long Sheng Jie, is sent to the mortal world to protect it from evil forces. Taking on the name Miracle Watson, she begin
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A Billion Reasons for Revenge
Scarlet's life takes a dark turn when she discovers Aiden, her boyfriend, has been secretly dating her stepsister Evelyn. Heartbroken and betrayed, she finds herself in the arms of Sebastian Hawthorne, a mysterious billionaire with a hidden agenda. As Scarlet becomes entangled in Sebastian's danger
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A Debt of Time and Tears
The flickering cursor on my screen was the only constant; my life, a developer' s dream turned broke reality, spiraled with every line of code that built debt instead of worlds. My wife, Chloe, a sharp, cold woman, shared my last name but not my life, her presence in our sterile home a constant remi
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No Pity For A Mother's Tears
The old engine purred under Alex Stone' s skilled hands, a familiar comfort in the dusty garage that was his sanctuary. Suddenly, a sleek Bentley pulled up, an unwelcome intrusion, and two impeccably dressed strangers, his biological parents Richard and Catherine Davies, stepped out. They claimed
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A Pack Of Vows and Tears
In the seductive follow-up to A Pack of Blood and Lies, Ness Clark’s heart and legitimacy are again put to the test. She thought the fight was over, but it was only just beginning. At the end of the trials, Ness Clark has earned her spot in her all-male pack and has won over her new Alpha, Liam Ko
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Bloody tears of heart
Its based on true story of general fictional character .the character building is created from one event which is the main character have been victim of early marriage and sexually abused and she became pregnant and deliver the baby ,but after this she will develop a cope up mechanism to be a succes
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Auctioning Ava: A Billion-Dollar Betrayal
My husband, Ethan, the charming CEO of Hayes Innovations, and I were the picture-perfect couple at our anniversary gala. I wanted a sapphire necklace for our milestone, a glimmer of hope for my struggling family art gallery. But then Chloe Vance, Ethan’s young intern who always seemed to be by his s
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Rain and Tears.
I looked at him terrified, "W-What are yo-you d-doing?" I stuttered, he smirked and unfastened his belt, "What they do with a whore like you." Isabella Whites, a beautiful daughter of successful businessman Jason Whites. She was naive and kind girl not a brat like other billionaire's daughters.
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Tears Of Betrayal
"Where did that go?" I asked myself again. We're not friends but we're pretty close to each other, and I know he rarely goes out or leaves his office. "Maybe it's just there." I answered myself again and then searched. The whole library is spacious because this school is also large. Some students
