Bound to the Bastard Alpha
They gave Fiona to the crippled bastard as a cruel joke-the adopted daughter married off to the wheelchair-bound outcast nobody wanted.
Her real crime? Existing when the true heiress returned. Her mate rejected her for her manipulative sister. Her family cast her aside. And her forced husband? He's cold, cruel, and makes it clear he despises this arrangement as much as she does.
But something's not adding up. The man in the wheelchair spends money like he owns the world. He stands up for her when no one else will. And there's something disturbingly familiar about his voice, his touch, the way he looks at her.
Then one night, he stands up from that wheelchair, and Fiona realizes she's been played.
Her husband isn't a helpless outcast. He's the most powerful Alpha in the country, and he's been hiding in plain sight.
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Chapter 4
Adam's POV
A distant sound pulled me slowly from sleep, something I couldn't quite place in my foggy mind.
I squinted against the light trying to invade my eyelids, then shut them again and stretched with a deep yawn.
Lying there, memories of last night flooded back like a movie on repeat.
I reached out tentatively to touch her smooth skin, still able to smell that soft feminine fragrance that made me crave her all over again.
But my hand met only the softness of empty sheets.
My eyes snapped open immediately.
Where was she?
I sat up fast, looking around with startled confusion. She didn't seem like the type to bail without even a goodbye, but her things were completely gone. Those feisty auburn hair and seemingly green eyes behind that mask.
I shut my eyes in pure frustration.
She didn't just run away from me.
Now I'd be left with nothing but memories of how she smelled, how she felt beneath my hands, and the sounds she made. Hell, I didn't even know her name to begin with.
I ran my fingers through my messy hair and clenched my teeth so hard my jaw ached. "Damn it," I muttered under my breath, fuming.
Then something caught my eye and I looked again just to make sure I wasn't seeing things.
No way in hell did this mysterious woman leave me cash on the shelf!
What did she think I was, some kind of male prostitute?
Those neatly stacked bills were more humiliating than her running away. Was she trying to pay me off like I was some hired entertainment?
I let out a bitter laugh of frustration.
Looking at the bed where she'd lain beside me, I noticed tiny drops of dried discolored liquid on the sheets. My stomach dropped.
Is that what I think it is?
I lifted the sheets to examine it closer and my fears were confirmed.
Blood.
Fuck.
Don't tell me she was a virgin.
I did not just have a one night stand with a virgin.
No wonder she left. She was probably too terrified to face me after last night, so she ran before I could wake up.
Wait.
She wasn't a minor, was she?
I knew she looked mature with her body and everything, but you could never really tell a woman's true age these days.
I was completely done for.
I ran my fingers through my hair again, fighting the overwhelming urge to punch something just to vent the frustration building like pressure in my chest.
Then my supernatural instincts caught hints of someone walking hastily toward my door and I braced myself.
It had to be her. She was coming back. She must have realized she wasn't supposed to run from me.
I raised my eyes in anticipation as those hasty footsteps drew closer and closer.
The door swung open with such force it startled me, and then I let out a frustrated sigh.
It wasn't her.
"What are you doing still in bed?" Lucian demanded and I sighed again but kept quiet.
"Go get yourself in your tux, man. You're late for your own wedding." He scowled at me with his huge arms folded across his chest. My best friend was clearly pissed.
I glanced at my alarm clock and realized that annoying sound that woke me up was the alarm itself. I was running late.
"Okay, okay," I said resignedly, frowning hard.
"You know everyone is waiting for you," Lucian continued. "Hell, your father is threatening to disown you if you don't show up and hold up your end of the agreement." My best friend and beta reminded me, beyond pissed now.
I let out another heavy sigh.
The fucking agreement.
I rolled my eyes. My morning was just getting worse and worse.
"Why do you even let them do this to you?" Lucian asked, not caring that I'd been silent this whole time. "You know very well this is all your stepmother's handiwork, but you keep letting them use you like some puppet."
I looked away because I knew he was right.
"She knows getting you mated with some insignificant bride will further prove your supposed weakness. Yet you let them do it when you're more than capable of stopping it all." Lucian's teeth were gritted in anger.
This was why I loved my beta and best friend. He knew and fully understood my pain. What he didn't understand was why I was doing any of this.
"Lucian," I began.
"Why don't you just call it all off? I'll help you. Let's get rid of everything and everyone who's trying to control you." His suggestion was deadly serious.
I let out a small smile. "There will be no calling off the marriage ceremony. I'll marry my bride." My tone was resolute, a knowing smile playing on my lips. "No matter what, I have to continue my life this way. At least for now."
I was also trying to convince myself. It was all just a process I had to endure.
Lucian sighed in resignation because he knew I was a stubborn asshole who never changed his mind once it was made up. "Then at least make it to the wedding if you want to go through with this shitty agreement." His voice had a sharp edge.
I nodded.
"I'll wait outside," he said and turned to leave.
Then a thought struck me. "Lucian, wait."
He turned back.
"Last night, the woman I was with... can you help me find her?" I tried to hide my desperation but failed miserably. Those auburn hair and green eyes were the only things I could remember about her.
"I'll try my best," my best friend said and left.
I let out another sigh.
"Can I get my suit and wheelchair, Atticus?" I said aloud, sensing my butler's presence at the bedroom door.
"Yes, sir," Atticus responded immediately, wheeling in my wheelchair along with the neatly ironed black tuxedo.
A few hours later, Atticus was wheeling me toward the venue.
I sat with my knees cramped uncomfortably in the wheelchair as we approached the hall where I'd be wedded to my bride. I wore my wedding suit perfectly and my hair was styled sleekly back. The blue bow tie accentuated my sea blue eyes nicely.
I smiled bitterly.
I was the perfect weakling groom.
My bride was probably some unfortunate woman who had no other suitors and was left with no choice but to marry the ugly, crippled, illegitimate bastard of the Blackwood pack.
She was definitely unlucky.
I must have been too deep in thought because someone was standing in front of me covered with a shawl, clearly wanting to speak with me. But I was already wearing the mean and arrogant exterior I used to protect myself, so I ignored whoever it was as Atticus wheeled me right past them.
This was what I did. Protected myself from everyone's rashness and pity.
Seeing as I was crippled, they all tried to sympathize with me.
And I was not some pathetic charity case who needed anybody's pity!
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8.9
Debora went to prison to protect the man she loved, only to end up a paroled convict living under the roof of her abusive foster parents.
When they found her positive pregnancy test from a one-night stand, they threatened to kick her out and send her straight back to a cell.
Just as they were about to report her, the stranger from that dark hotel room suddenly appeared.
He paid her foster parents one million dollars to marry her and take her away.
Debora thought she was finally safe.
But the moment they were alone, he looked at her with pure, venomous hatred.
He didn't want a wife; he wanted a prisoner.
He believed Debora was the ruthless murderer who had destroyed his life in a car crash, and he planned to make her suffocate in her own despair.
He didn't know she was just a scapegoat.
To survive and protect her baby, Debora found a job at a bridal shop, only to run into the real culprit—the man who actually drove the car and framed her.
He was now happily engaged to a wealthy heiress.
They deliberately ruined a priceless wedding gown and blamed it on her.
"Kneel on this floor and apologize, or I'm calling the police to revoke your parole!"
Why did she have to rot in hell for his sins, while the man she married wanted to destroy her?
Just as her trembling knees were about to touch the cold marble floor, the heavy glass doors were violently shoved open.
Her billionaire husband strode in like a force of nature, his eyes locked onto the wealthy couple with a terrifying, destructive rage.
8.7
For three years, I played the perfect, submissive housewife to billionaire Julian Harrison.
But right after an intimate night together, he coldly threw a divorce agreement onto the bed.
"Scarlett landed an hour ago. I need my single status restored to welcome her back."
That same night, I ended up in the emergency room and discovered I was pregnant with twins.
When Julian found out, he didn't show a shred of joy. Instead, he stormed into my hospital room, threw a blank check directly at my face, and ordered me to get rid of them.
He accused me of using the babies as a sick game to trap his assets.
Then, his ruthless lawyer kicked me out of our penthouse, confiscating the jewelry he gifted me and tossing my worn-out notebook onto the floor like garbage.
Standing in the freezing rain, my heart completely died.
I had swallowed my pride, managed his life, and cooked his meals to his exact standards for three years, only to be thrown away the second his first love returned.
But he didn't know that the notebook his lawyer discarded contained the secret formulas of Aura Beauty, a billion-dollar empire I built in the shadows.
I tore his check into pieces, blocked his number, and left in a Maybach sent by my associate.
Logging into my global CEO database, I looked at his company's fragile stock chart with a predatory smile.
The docile Mrs. Harrison died in the rain. It was time to crush his empire.
8.3
Lucas Vane was my ruin. My first love, my greatest regret, and the man who shattered my life before disappearing into the shadows. I thought I had finally escaped his reach, until a desperate debt forced me into a cold, clinical contract with the one man I should have feared more.
Victor Vane. The powerful, terrifying patriarch who doesn't know the girl he just bought was once his son's greatest obsession.
Now, I am trapped between two worlds. I am the wife of the father, bound by a signature and a ring, yet I am pursued by the son who is determined to reclaim what he lost. As the lines between hatred and desire blur, I find myself craving the touch of the man who owns me, and the man who broke me.
Secrets can only stay buried for so long. What happens when the King finds out his Queen belongs to the Prince?
9.0
To save her dying mother, Adaline walked into the Waldorf Astoria to deliver a shirt to her fiancé.
She didn't know her stepsister, June, had swapped her keycard. Adaline stumbled into a pitch-black suite and was brutally assaulted by a stranger in the dark.
The nightmare didn't end there. June paid off the only bone marrow donor for Adaline's mother to flee the city, and stole Adaline's fiancé. Bankrupt and desperate, Adaline was forced to sell herself into a loveless marriage with the ruthless billionaire Ferris Finch just to secure a medical team.
But when Ferris saw the dark, violent bruises covering her body, his eyes filled with absolute disgust.
"You make me sick. Pack up your cheap tricks."
He mocked her, calling her a filthy woman who couldn't even wash her lover's marks off before crawling into his house.
Adaline swallowed her pride and endured his cruel humiliation. When June publicly taunted her about the hotel assault, Adaline finally snapped, ending up handcuffed in a freezing police cell.
She thought she was completely out of moves, waiting to rot in prison while her new husband despised her.
But back at the estate, Ferris had just pulled the hotel's security footage.
Staring at the screen, the arrogant billionaire's face turned completely ashen.
He finally realized that the innocent woman he had destroyed in the dark that night, and the wife he was currently torturing, were the exact same person.
7.9
I went to the City Clerk's office for a routine copy of my marriage license to finalize a trust fund audit. I expected a simple piece of paper, but the clerk's pitying look told me my entire life was a lie.
"The license was never finalized, Ms. Oliver. In the eyes of the state, you are single."
The three-hundred-guest wedding at the Plaza and the Vogue features meant nothing. My husband, Gray Cooley, had intentionally filed the documents with a "procedural defect" so he could discard me without a legal divorce. Moments later, an iCloud invite titled "Our Little Secret" popped up on my screen. It was a photo of my best friend, Brylee, holding a positive pregnancy test at our Hamptons estate.
Gray's text to her was the final blow:
"Happy anniversary, babe. This baby is the best gift. Once the trust unlocks today, we're done with the charade."
I soon discovered they were even stealing my career, reassigning my architectural masterpiece to Brylee while preparing my eviction notice. Gray's mother called me a "barren mule" in a leaked recording, mocking the infertility I suffered after saving Gray's life in a construction accident. I wasn't a wife; I was a three-year placeholder used to secure his inheritance.
How could the man I bled for treat me like a disposable prop? How could my best friend carry his child while pretending to comfort me through my darkest moments? The betrayal burned until it turned into a cold, hard stone of fury.
I didn't cry. Instead, I walked into the penthouse of the Barretts, the Cooleys' most powerful rivals. I signed a marriage contract with Kane Barrett, the man the tabloids called the "Beast of Wall Street."
"I want a wedding," I told his father, my voice steady and lethal. "Bigger than the one I had with Gray."
If they wanted me gone, they would have to watch me become the woman who owns their world.
7.9
Erin woke up in her luxurious Fifth Avenue penthouse, three days after returning from the cold, sterile psychiatric hospital where her husband had locked her away.
On the night of their third anniversary, Crockett Winters came home smelling of his mistress's perfume, expecting his docile wife to serve him.
Instead of playing the obedient fool, Erin calmly exposed the million-dollar diamonds he had just bought for his lover.
Furious at her sudden defiance, Crockett tried to physically intimidate her, pinning her against a wall to reassert his dominance.
When his aggression failed, he threw a brutal divorce agreement on the table.
"Sign it, and you walk away with nothing. You can't survive without me, and you know it."
He sneered, convinced the ironclad prenup would terrify her. He thought her rebellion was just a pathetic, jealous tantrum, a desperate play for his attention while he continued to pamper his mistress.
He truly believed she was just a beautiful canary who would eventually crawl back to her gilded cage in tears.
But Erin didn't cry, and she didn't sign the papers.
Instead, she locked him out of the master suite and pulled out his unlimited Centurion card.
In a single night, she calmly spent ninety million dollars of his money to buy up prime real estate and hidden assets, taking the first step to build an empire that would completely destroy him.