Engaged To A Coldhearted Murderer

My fiancée smiled as she showed me the "intruder" she had dealt with in the ER. I looked past her to see my mother beaten unconscious on the floor. And on the gurney next to her lay my seven-year-old brother, cold, blue, and dead. Brittnie clung to my arm, beaming with pride. "I handled it, Cannon," she chirped. "That gold digger tried to claim this bastard was your son. But I made sure they wouldn't bother us again." My blood turned to ice. She was holding my mother' s emerald brooch, a family heirloom, convinced it was her engagement ring. Because of her delusion, she had refused to give my brother his EpiPen. She had watched him suffocate to death, thinking she was winning my heart. I looked at Gabe' s lifeless body, then at the woman I was planning to marry. I pulled out my phone and shoved a family photo in her face. "That gold digger is my mother," I whispered, my voice trembling with lethal rage. "And you just murdered my brother."

Chapters

Chapter 5

Eleanora Bryan POV:

The demand for public humiliation, for a fabricated confession of being a homewrecker and a secret mistress, ripped through me. It was a violation far deeper than any physical blow. It was an assault on my very soul.

"No," I whispered, my voice barely audible. "I can't."

Brittnie's face hardened, her patience wearing thin. She grabbed my arm, her fingers digging into my flesh, and twisted it, forcing me to my knees. The pain shot through me, a sharp, searing fire.

"You think you have a choice?" she snarled, her voice a low growl. She gestured towards Gabe with her free hand. "Look at him, Eleanora. He's almost gone. One more minute, perhaps two. You want to watch him die while you cling to your... 'dignity'?"

My eyes, swimming with tears, focused on Gabe. He was barely a shadow now. His small body was utterly still. There was no more fight in him. Just the faint, terrifying absence of movement.

Despair, cold and absolute, washed over me. I had no leverage. No power. Only a dying child and a monster holding his life in her hands.

Clabe stood a few feet away, his phone still recording, his eyes predatory and cold. The guards watched with detached amusement. Their gazes, vulgar and judging, stripped me bare, even though I was still fully clothed. I felt a primal urge to cover myself, to shrink from their leering eyes. I pulled my arms tighter around myself, trying to disappear.

Tears streamed down my face, hot and silent. This couldn't be real. This couldn't be happening.

Brittnie let out a short, sharp laugh. It was a sound of pure triumph, of unadulterated evil. "Tick-tock, Eleanora. The little bastard's time is running out."

My heart shattered. Cannon had always described Brittnie as ambitious, driven, a little high-strung, but ultimately kind, loving. He said she was misunderstood, that her intensity was just passion. Lies. All lies. This woman was pure venom, a viper disguised in scrubs. Every cell in my body recoiled from her.

"Come on, sugar mama," Clabe drawled, his voice thick with malicious amusement. "Give us a show. Make it good. Cannon's girl here will be very pleased."

Brittnie held up her phone, ready to record. "Your choice, Eleanora. Humiliation or death. For your 'son'." She emphasized the word "son" with a nasty sneer. "Thirty seconds."

The world tilted. My breath caught in my throat. I had no other option. My baby. My precious Gabe.

"Okay," I choked out, the word tearing from my broken throat. "Okay. I'll do it."

Brittnie's smile widened. "Good girl." She gestured to the floor in front of me. "Now, get on your knees. And start with the coat. We need to see that lovely emerald you stole."

My hands trembled as I fumbled with the buttons of my coat, the torn fabric where she'd ripped off the brooch flapping uselessly. I slowly peeled it off, the cold air hitting my exposed arms.

"Looking good, ma'am," Clabe snickered from behind his phone. "Looks like Cannon's got an eye for older women, after all."

My cheeks burned with shame. My eyes fell on Gabe again. His chest was motionless. No. Not yet. I had to believe there was still time.

"Save him," I begged Brittnie, my voice cracking. "Please. Just save him."

Brittnie rolled her eyes. "After the video. And make sure it's convincing. Every word." She angled her phone, making sure to get my face, my humiliation, in the frame.

"Now, the blouse," Clabe said, his voice a lewd suggestion. "Let's see what Cannon's been missing."

I flinched, instinctively pulling my arms across my chest. My mind screamed. This was too much.

Brittnie's face tightened. "Don't make me wait, Eleanora. Gabe won't." She grabbed my arm again, yanking it, forcing me to face her phone. "Show them what you are."

"Tell them you're a homewrecker," Brittnie commanded, her voice like ice. "Tell them you stole the brooch. Tell them Gabe isn't Cannon's."

Continue to next part

To save my family's dying company, I was forced to marry a billionaire I hadn't seen in fourteen years. But right outside the City Clerk's office, he tossed our marriage certificate at me like a cheap receipt and shoved a four-year-old boy into my arms. "Your new life has begun. You're on babysitting duty now." He sneered and left me stranded on the sidewalk. I realized with absolute horror that my new husband was Ellsworth Marshall, the sickly boy I had relentlessly bullied in middle school. He didn't spend five billion dollars to save the Bradford family. He bought me to execute a slow, suffocating revenge. He used his orphaned nephew as a pawn, explicitly threatening my father that if I failed to play the perfect, compliant nanny, he would instantly destroy our family's legacy. He even had his guards lock me out of his Long Island estate on my first night, forcing me to stand in the cold dark just to prove he owned me. I was trapped in a gilded cage, suffocated by the guilt of my past and the terror of my present. Why did he involve an innocent child in his twisted vendetta? How much humiliation was enough to pay for my childhood cruelty? Looking at the terrified little boy clinging to my skirt, I tightened my grip on my suitcase. If he wanted to destroy my will piece by piece, I had to find a way to survive the monster I created.

Horror Modern Romance

8.2

Falling For My Dead Husband's Ghost

8.2

To save my brother's life, I married a dead billionaire. My new home was a freezing, high-tech mausoleum where I was ordered to hold a year-long vigil beside Byron Hyde's cryogenic pod. But I wasn't alone in the dark. Every night, a terrifying shadow smelling of whiskey and sandalwood pinned me to my narrow bed. It tore my clothes and brutally claimed my body, leaving me bruised and trembling until dawn. When I begged the housekeeper for help, showing her my torn skin, she just smiled cruelly. "It seems the master's spirit has accepted you." I thought I was being haunted by a vengeful ghost, until Byron's arrogant nephew broke into the tomb to assault me. His tampering triggered the life-support system, and the heavy lid of the pod hissed open. Byron Hyde sat up, his eyes lethal and his skin shockingly warm. He was alive. Looking at his broad shoulders, I caught the faint scent of whiskey and sandalwood. The horrific truth hit me like a physical blow. My nightly tormentor wasn't a ghost. It was my living, breathing husband. When I confronted him, his eyes were cold and clinical. "That was a necessary test. I had to know if my wife would break." A white-hot rage choked me, but I didn't scream or run. He slipped the priceless, heavy sapphire of the family matriarch onto my finger, offering me absolute power over the treacherous relatives who wanted us both dead. To fight a monster, you can't be a victim. I looked into his deep, dangerous eyes and accepted the ring. If this was a cage, allying with the keeper was the only way to find the key.

Horror Modern Romance

9.6

My Death, His Ultimate Downfall

9.6

For a decade, I was the perfect wife to tech mogul Carson Jarvis. I cleaned up every scandal and endured every affair, trapped by my father's "poison pill" inheritance clause that would leave me with nothing if I divorced him. His latest mistress was pregnant, but that wasn't what finally broke me. It was when he shut down our mansion's power grid for their tryst-and turned off my grandmother's life support. He murdered her. At a charity auction days later, he paraded his new love while she announced her pregnancy. When I confronted her for stealing my money, Carson watched as his guards broke my arm, leaving me bleeding on the floor while he comforted her. He thought I was his unbreakable wife, a possession with nowhere else to go. He expected me to clean up this mess, just like all the others. He was wrong. As I watched him shield her during the chaos of an explosion I secretly arranged, I knew my old life was over. Tonight, the world would learn of my death. And with it, Carson Jarvis would lose everything.

Horror Modern Romance

9.7

Once His Nightmare, Now His Employee

9.7

He thought he had his life figured out until the boy he buried in the past walked back in. Dorian Keene was once the golden boy of high school-famous, feared, and cruel. And Caspian Vale? Just the quiet nerd with a birthmark... and a target on his back. But beneath Dorian's bullying lay a truth he couldn't face: he was terrified of how much he wanted the boy he was supposed to hate. Years later, Dorian's world is in shambles. Penniless, grieving, and sick, he lands a miracle job working under a Tech Mogul who turns out to be none other than Caspian. Only this Caspian is powerful, untouchable... and very much engaged to a woman. Dorian tries to keep his distance. Caspian, for all appearances, is straight. But fate has a twisted sense of humor, and buried sparks are reignited-this time under the harsh light of adulthood, secrets, and slow-blooming desire neither man can afford. As Dorian's hidden illness grows deadlier, and Caspian's mask begins to crack, a single kiss will force them to ask: Can a man who thought he was straight handle the truth of who he's always been... before it's too late?

Horror LGBT+Mystery Young Adult

9.3

Possessed by the Mafia Don

9.3

When her father's PTSD leads to a tragic accident, Aria Moretti does the unthinkable-she surrenders herself to Nico Romano, the ruthless man her father wronged. Known as the cold and feared ruler of Chicago's underworld, Nico is a man no one crosses and lives to tell the story. To him, Aria is a debt he intends to collect in full. But she isn't the fragile girl he expects.

Horror Mafia Modern

9.8

Runaway Nurse: The Mafia King's Remorse

9.8

For seven years, I served as the eyes for Dante Vitiello, the blind Capo of New York. I pulled him back from the edge of madness, tending to his wounds and warming his bed when everyone else had given up on him. But the moment his vision returned, the years of devotion turned to ash. In a single phone call, he decided to marry Sofia Moretti for territory, dismissing me as just "the maid's daughter" and a "comfort" he intended to keep as a mistress. He forced me to watch him court her. At a gala, when a chaotic accident caused a tower of champagne glasses to shatter, Dante threw his body over Sofia to protect her. He left me standing there, bleeding from the glass shards, while he carried her away like she was porcelain. He didn't even look back at the woman who had saved his life. I realized then that I had worshipped a broken god. I had given him my dignity, only for him to treat me like a disposable bandage now that he was whole. He arrogantly believed I would stay in the penthouse, grateful for his scraps. So, while he was out celebrating his engagement, I met with his mother. I signed the severance agreement for fifty million dollars. I packed my bags, wiped my phone, and boarded a one-way flight to Australia. By the time Dante came home to an empty bed, realized his mistake, and began tearing the city apart to find me, I was already a ghost.

Horror Mafia Modern

Engaged To A Coldhearted Murderer

Chapter 5

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