Contract Marriage To My Boss's Rival
For seven years, I was Grant Charles’s shadow—his top executive assistant by day and the woman in his bed by night. I managed his billion-dollar empire and handled his every crisis, believing our bond was the one thing his money couldn't buy.
Everything shattered when I walked into his penthouse and found Aimee Austin sitting on his lap, wearing nothing but his favorite white dress shirt. Grant didn't even look guilty; he just stared at me with cold, arrogant eyes and told me I was dripping rain on his expensive Persian rug.
When I tried to resign, he showed me exactly how cruel he could be. He knew I had drained my life savings to pay for my mother’s specialized care for her dementia. "Without my salary and the foundation subsidy, she’ll be on the street in a month," he whispered, his voice dripping with malice. "Is your pride really worth her life?"
He didn't stop there. He tried to break my spirit by publicly humiliating me at a high-end restaurant, orchestrating a "setup" to show me that without his protection, I was nothing more than a common servant. He wanted me to realize that without him, I was a nobody with no future.
I couldn't believe the man I had protected for nearly a decade was weaponizing my dying mother to keep me as his subordinate. He thought he owned every inch of me, and he was waiting for me to come crawling back on my knees to beg for my old life.
But Grant made one fatal mistake: he assumed I was a charity case. He had no idea I was the secret heir to the billion-dollar Klein Trust, currently frozen behind a single marriage clause. I didn't need his money; I just needed a husband.
Instead of begging for my job, I walked straight into the office of the only man Grant feared—the ruthless litigator Julian Vance. I threw a marriage contract on his desk and gave him an offer he couldn't refuse. It was time to stop being a shadow and start a war.
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Chapter 2
The drive to Brooklyn was a blur of red taillights and smearing wipers. Darian's hands gripped the steering wheel of her ten-year-old sedan so tightly her knuckles turned white.
She parked two blocks away from the grim brick building that housed the St. Jude's Long-Term Care Facility. It wasn't the luxury sanitarium Grant had threatened to cut funding for-she had moved her mother three days ago, in secret. It was clean, but it smelled of industrial bleach and boiled cabbage.
Darian walked through the quiet corridors, nodding to the night nurse. She stopped outside Room 304.
Through the observation window, she could see her mother, Martha. She was sitting in a wheelchair by the window, rocking back and forth. She clutched a ragged doll to her chest, whispering to it.
Martha Klein. Once a socialite, now a shell of a woman whose mind had fractured under the weight of the family's collapse.
"She's been asking for you," a voice said from the shadows.
Darian turned. Her Aunt Vivian stood at the end of the hallway. Vivian was seventy, dressed in a Chanel suit that was at least twenty years out of date but impeccably preserved. She looked like a ghost of old New York money.
"I came as soon as I could," Darian said.
Vivian handed her a thick manila envelope. The wax seal on the back was broken. It bore the crest of the Klein family-a hawk clutching a key.
"We're out of time, Darian," Vivian said, her voice clipped. "The liquid assets are gone. I sold the last of my jewelry to pay for this month's stay here. After that..." She gestured helplessly to the bleak hallway.
"I have some savings," Darian said, though she knew it was a lie. Grant was right; she had drained everything.
"Pocket change," Vivian scoffed. "We need the Trust."
They walked out to the small courtyard garden. The rain had slowed to a drizzle. Vivian lit a slim cigarette, the cherry glowing in the dark.
"The Klein Trust," Vivian said, exhaling smoke. "One billion dollars in offshore accounts. Frozen since your father's suicide. It unlocks on your twenty-sixth birthday."
"I turned twenty-six last week," Darian said.
"Under one condition," Vivian interrupted. She tapped the envelope. "Read Clause 7, Section B."
Darian pulled out the yellowed legal document. She squinted in the dim light of the security lamp.
The Beneficiary must be in a state of lawful matrimony to a spouse of good standing and financial independence, to ensure the preservation of the family legacy against fortune hunters.
Darian lowered the paper. A bitter laugh escaped her lips. "You have to be kidding me. Grandpa put a marriage clause in his will?"
"He was a traditionalist. He didn't trust a single woman to manage a billion-dollar empire," Vivian said dryly. "The irony is rich, isn't it? You just left the most powerful bachelor in New York, and now you need a husband to save your life."
"I can't just... get married, Aunt Viv. To who?"
Vivian reached into her purse and pulled out a stack of photos. "I've taken the liberty of compiling a list. There's a tax attorney in Queens, a widowed dentist in Jersey..."
Darian flipped through the photos. They were ordinary men. Decent men. Men who would be crushed by Grant Charles the moment he found out.
"No," Darian said, handing the photos back. "Grant will destroy anyone he thinks is weak. If I marry, it has to be someone untouchable. Someone who hates Grant as much as I do."
Vivian raised an eyebrow. "That is a short list, darling."
Darian looked out at the wet pavement. Her mind raced through the rolodex of names she had memorized over seven years as Grant's shadow. Competitors. Enemies. Rivals.
One name stopped the spinning wheel in her head.
Julian Vance.
Top corporate litigator. The only man who had ever beaten Grant in court. He was ruthless, cold, and notoriously single.
"Julian Vance," Darian whispered.
Vivian choked on her cigarette smoke. "Vance? The shark? He eats people like us for breakfast. Why would he agree to marry you?"
"Because he wants the Charles merger files," Darian said, her mind sharpening. "And I know where they are. Besides," she added, a flicker of memory in her eyes, "the Vances and the Kleins go back. Your father set up the Trust with Julian's grandfather, Alistair. It's shielded by layers of attorney-client privilege so thick even Grant couldn't pierce them without a key. Julian might be the only man in New York who can even find the door, let alone open it."
Her phone buzzed again. She looked down. Grant Charles.
He was calling. Again.
Darian pressed the 'Block Caller' button. It felt good. A tiny reclamation of control.
"Are you sure you're over him?" Vivian asked, watching her closely. "Love makes people do stupid things."
Darian looked back at the window where her mother was rocking the doll.
"Love is a luxury, Aunt Viv," Darian said, her voice cold. "I can't afford it. But I can afford a business partner."
She pulled out her phone and dialed a number she had saved years ago under 'Emergency Legal'.
"What are you doing?" Vivian hissed.
"I'm calling a matchmaker," Darian said. "But not for a date. I need a meeting."
Back in the Charles Tower penthouse, Grant stared at his phone. The call went straight to voicemail.
He threw the device onto the sofa. It bounced and slid onto the floor.
Aimee walked in, holding a glass of water. "Is she still ignoring you?"
"She's playing games," Grant muttered, pacing the room. "She's trying to make me worry. She thinks if she disappears, I'll realize her value."
"Well, do you?" Aimee asked, her voice light, teasing.
Grant stopped. He looked at the empty spot on the rug where Darian had stood. The wet footprints had already dried, leaving faint outlines.
"I realize she's an employee who walked off with sensitive knowledge," Grant lied. "Get security on the line. I want to know where she is."
Aimee smiled, but her eyes were cold. "I heard a rumor, Grant. From my friend at the agency. Darian contacted a high-end matchmaker tonight."
Grant froze. The ice in his glass settled with a clink.
"A matchmaker?"
"Desperate, isn't it?" Aimee laughed. "Trying to find a sugar daddy to pay Mommy's bills."
Grant felt a surge of heat in his chest that had nothing to do with anger and everything to do with possession.
"She wouldn't dare," Grant whispered.
But Darian was already in her apartment, stripping off her wet clothes. She stood before the mirror, looking at the scars on her soul. She wiped off her smeared mascara.
Tomorrow, she wouldn't be Darian the Assistant. She would be Darian the Commodity.
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9.7
Eliana Rivera is the firstborn daughter of business tycoon Cassian Rivera. When her father's company falls into debt, he marries her off to the arrogant and ruthless billionaire, Alexander Grayson, as part of a business contract and under the threat of blackmail.
Alexander, the billionaire CEO, never planned to marry, but the pressure of blackmail forces him into a union with a woman he barely knows. Although Eliana doesn't see Alexander as her ideal partner, she agrees to the marriage out of a sense of duty.
Once engaged, however, he barely acknowledges her presence and harbours disdain for her because of her father's actions and their relationship. But as they navigate their newfound relationship, the unexpected desire for each other's touch ignites-a twist neither of them planned, leading them toward an unforeseen love.
9.6
Minutes before announcing her grand engagement, Darla caught her fiancé sleeping with her stepsister.
She publicly exposed them and canceled the wedding on the spot.
Furious, her adoptive mother demanded Darla marry a fifty-five-year-old predator to save their broken business deal.
"If you don't do exactly what I say, I'll let your father rot in prison for the rest of his life."
Desperate to escape her family's control, Darla grabbed a massive, intimidating hotel security guard she bumped into in the hallway.
She shoved all the cash in her purse at him—eight hundred dollars—and begged him to fake-marry her.
They signed the papers at City Hall that same day.
But the nightmare didn't end.
That evening, Darla received a cold phone call from the state penitentiary.
Her father had been found dead in his cell, and her company, owned by her ex-fiancé's family, fired her immediately.
They had taken everything from her, leaving her completely broken and sobbing on the floor of her tiny apartment.
She thought she had nothing left but a broke, fake husband to keep her company.
She had no idea that the "poor security guard" holding her in his arms was actually Anson Prince, a ruthless billionaire CEO.
And he was already making the calls to tear her abusers' empires to the ground.
7.6
My father raised seven brilliant orphans to be my potential husbands. For years, I only had eyes for one of them, the cold and distant Damien Paul, believing his distance was a wall I just had to break through.
That belief shattered last night when I found him in the garden, kissing his foster sister, Eve—the fragile girl my family took in at his request, the one I had treated like my own sister.
But the true horror came when I overheard the other six Fellows talking in the library.
They weren't competing for me. They were working together, orchestrating "accidents" and mocking my "stupid, blind" devotion to keep me away from Damien.
Their loyalty wasn't to me, the heiress who held their futures in her hands. It was to Eve.
I wasn't a woman to be won. I was a foolish burden to be managed. The seven men I grew up with, the men who owed my family everything, were a cult, and she was their queen.
This morning, I walked into my father's study to make a decision that would burn their world to the ground. He smiled, asking if I'd finally won Damien over.
"No, Dad," I said, my voice firm. "I'm marrying Hunter Beach."
8.3
Adaline Whitmore becomes the price for her father's betrayal when she is forced to live under the roof of the ruthless billionaire Ronan Frost, the man who lost everything because of her family.
But neither of them knows one truth. She is the same girl who once saved him years ago.
As everything begins to change and secrets come to light, the line between punishment and desire fades. Now Ronan must choose between his need for revenge and the woman quietly stealing his heart.
8.4
Running from her father's rejection, Isabella arrives in London determined to start over, only to walk straight into temptation and danger. Her obsessive ex is waiting at the airport. And the stranger from her one reckless, unforgettable night in New York is now her new billionaire boss.
*************
"Hello, Isabella." Mateo Rossi's voice is low, smooth, and dangerously familiar, sending heat curling through her before she can stop it.
She freezes. He leans back, eyes dark and unreadable, lingering on her just a little too long.
"I never knew Nathan had a daughter like you," he says softly. "All grown up." Relief floods her.
He doesn't recognize her. Not the girl from that night. Not the one who lost control in his arms. Or he does, and he is choosing to pretend. Because Mateo watches her like she belongs to him. He tests her, corners her, pushes her past every limit she thought she had. Doors close.
Tempers snap. Boundaries blur. And Isabella realizes something far more dangerous than her past catching up to her. London was never her escape. It is his world. And this time, Mateo Rossi has no intention of letting her walk away.
9.2
Celestia woke up heavily sedated, her wrists bound tightly to the legs of a grand piano in a cold, opulent room.
Before she could even process the panic, a towering billionaire named Sterling Sinclair IV stepped in, looking at her like a possessed piece of art.
The head maid then handed Celestia a thick surrogacy contract with her perfectly forged signature.
"You are here to bear an heir for Mr. Sinclair," the maid stated flatly.
Celestia screamed that they had the wrong person, but her desperate cries bounced uselessly off the soundproof walls.
Stripped of her clothes, phone, and identity, she was trapped on an isolated island surrounded by high-voltage electric fences and armed guards.
When she furiously fought back, Sterling physically overpowered her, punishing her resistance with brutal, terrifying dominance until she lost consciousness on the marble floor.
She didn't understand who had kidnapped her from her normal life.
Why was her biometric data perfectly faked in a classified dossier?
Who had framed her as a willing, ten-million-dollar premium product for a ruthless billionaire?
Driven by pure survival, Celestia began aggressively consuming raw garlic and bathing in harsh white vinegar to destroy her fertility and repel his touch.
And when Sterling finally reviewed her bizarre, self-sabotaging dietary logs, the terrifying truth hit his calculating mind like a physical blow.
The broken, innocent woman he had been brutally tormenting all week was never his hired surrogate.