Beloved One
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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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His Beloved
"Love " one word which is so difficult to get. Yet so easy to throw. _______________ A beautiful and innocent girl running from her past met a sinfully handsome man whom she thought to be her saviour, but end up being her nightmare. She was running from her past nightmares but wasn't aware of
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Beloved Substitute
"One rainy night: Morris Shaw was chased and killed, accidentally hit Aria Rice, so, Aria took him home, escaped the robbery. Seeing him covered in blood, she thought he was a murderer, so she avoided him after that. MK Multinational Group: Without wealthy-family background, Aria was often bullied b
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The Billionaire's Beloved
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Betrayed By Her Beloved
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The Well-Beloved
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Soul of My Beloved
When I was being tortured to death, my daughter was preparing dinner for her mother-in-law. The last thing she said to me was, "Don't you know today is the day your mother is being discharged from the hospital?! Don't bring bad luck on this auspicious day!" One day later, the hospital received a b
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From Blame to Beloved
I'm going to die soon. That thought wasn't sad, just a simple fact as I called a late-night radio show, dedicating a song to my husband, Liam. Liam Hayes, the man who saw me only as a constant reminder of the car crash five years ago, the one that put his ex-girlfriend, Chloe, in a coma and left m
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My Beloved Stepbrother
The girl had liked a boy silently for two years. But fate said otherwise. A strange twist of fate makes Jonathan Flint and Alexa Kinsey be a brothers. But, while living in the same house and becoming closer as brothers, Jonathan helps Alexa fulfill her dreams. Alexa helps Jonathan find hope for h
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His Only Beloved.
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My Beloved Bastard
Vampire Romance 21+ "Don't let me find other men with you, or I'll kill them! your body is very seductive, play with me, my lady. " Said the man while holding her body tightly and kissing her innocent shoulder with her hands tied up. Cullen Kyleer, a man who is very arrogant and always acts as he
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Name of the Beloved
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MY BELOVED SUGAR MOMMY
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Bewedded, Not Beloved
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My Beloved Hated Wife
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Single Daddy's Beloved Wife
Alana Mendoza is a 22 years old cheerful girl from a middle-class family, she's loved by those around her Her parents spoiled her from birth and gave her whatever she wanted. After completing her university, Alana has plans to find a good job to provide for her family and become an independent wom
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My beloved can transform
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Billionaire's Beloved Pornstar
WARNING: THIS BOOK CONTAINS LOTS OF EROTIC AND STEAMY CONTENTS. IT IS STRICTLY RATED 18+ *** This book is about a young billionaire named Spike, who fell in love with his favorite pornstar, Tempting Lily. Even though Tempting Lily was a pornstar, Spike was ready to do anything for her; he was even r
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Beloved Old Lover
On the day Emily returned to the country, she received a request from her father: to flirt with her ex-lover to marry him and save the Wine company, which was on the verge of bankruptcy. In the flickering light of candles and melodious melodies surrounding them, Kevin used force to hug Emily's sma
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Reclaiming My Beloved Alpha
"You chose them over me. She became your focus because of the pup she was carrying! You ruined me! You broke me! Promises shattered!" Edeline yelled. "I had to protect my pup. There were wolves out to hurt him, and you were one of them! I didn't want to leave you, but you were a threat to my pup!"
