Escaping Into The Dangerous Devil's Arms
My father ordered me to marry into the cursed Vaughn family.
Their heirs were rumored to die young from a mysterious genetic agony. My sister Kayden laughed, saying she wasn't going to waste her youth planning a funeral. So, I became the sacrificial lamb.
When I refused, my father slammed his hand on the table and threatened to throw my dead mother's ashes into the city dump.
"You are a struggling actress with no money and no power. You have no choice," he told me coldly.
To make matters worse, my own agent drugged my drink at a business dinner, trying to sell my body to a sleazy investor just to secure project funding.
I was completely cornered, suffocating under the weight of their cruelty. I couldn't understand how my own flesh and blood could be so vicious, treating me like a worthless pawn to be traded and discarded.
But none of them knew that while escaping the drug-laced dinner, I crashed directly into the terrifying Vaughn heir, Algot.
When his glowing crimson eyes locked onto me during a violent episode of his cursed pain, we discovered an impossible truth: my physical touch was the only cure for his agony.
Looking at the dark bruises he accidentally left on my neck, I chose not to run. Instead, I pulled out the private business card he gave me and dialed his number.
"You need me," I whispered to the dangerous billionaire. "And I am going to use you to destroy them all."
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Chapter 3
The harsh fluorescent lights of the emergency room burned through Gianna's closed eyelids.
She groaned and turned her head. The pillow was stiff and smelled like bleach. Her throat felt like it was coated in dry sand.
She forced her eyes open.
A man was standing at the foot of her hospital bed. He was tall, dressed in a dark suit that looked entirely out of place in the sterile room. His hands were tucked into his pockets.
It was the man from the alley.
Gianna's breath hitched. She pushed her hands against the mattress and scrambled backward until her back hit the headboard.
"Who are you?" Gianna asked. Her voice cracked.
Algot did not move. His dark eyes studied her face with an intensity that made her skin prickle.
A doctor walked into the cubicle, holding a clipboard.
"You are awake," the doctor said. "You had a mild dose of a date-rape drug in your system. We flushed it out with IV fluids. You just need to rest."
"Is she going to have any lasting effects?" Algot asked.
Gianna looked at him, surprised. His voice was smooth, but it carried a weight that demanded answers.
"No," the doctor said. "She was lucky she did not ingest more. She can be discharged soon."
The doctor left. The silence in the room grew heavy.
Alex Stone walked in. He held a clear plastic bag containing Gianna's purse and her ID card.
Alex handed the bag to Algot. Algot looked down through the plastic. He saw the driver's license.
Gianna Romero.
Algot's thumb brushed over the plastic right above her name. A muscle feathered in his jaw.
He turned his head slightly toward Alex.
"I need a full background check on her," Algot said, his voice so low Gianna almost did not hear it. "Everything. Focus on her medical history and any connection to the Conrad family."
Alex nodded once and stepped out of the cubicle.
Algot walked around to the side of the bed. He picked up a plastic cup of water from the tray table and held it out to her.
Gianna hesitated, then took it. Her fingers brushed against his. A jolt of electricity shot up her arm. She pulled her hand back quickly, spilling a few drops of water on her blanket.
"I am just a guy who was in the right alley at the right time," Algot said. It was an answer to her earlier question.
Gianna took a slow sip of the water. The memories of the car ride crashed into her brain. The heat. The desperate touching. His fingers.
A deep, burning flush crept up her neck and covered her cheeks. She looked down at her lap, unable to meet his eyes.
"Thank you," Gianna mumbled. "For getting me out of there."
"Who drugged you?" Algot asked. The question was flat, but it felt like an interrogation.
Gianna gripped the plastic cup tightly. The plastic crinkled under her fingers.
"It was a business dinner," Gianna said carefully. "My agent set it up. It went wrong."
Algot watched her. He saw the way her knuckles turned white. He knew she was holding back, but he did not push.
"What do you do for a living?" Gianna asked, trying to shift the focus away from herself.
"I run a business," Algot said.
Gianna looked at his expensive suit, his custom watch, and the cold authority in his posture. He did not look like a regular businessman. He looked dangerous.
Algot's phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and walked toward the curtained doorway.
Gianna strained her ears.
"Sir," Alex's voice came through the phone. "I'm still digging, but initial records show she is Desi Conrad's eldest daughter. There are rumors floating about a marriage arrangement with our family - something about Prescott."
Algot stood perfectly still. He looked back over his shoulder at Gianna sitting in the hospital bed.
"Keep digging," Algot said quietly. "I want the full picture before I make any decisions."
He ended the call and slipped the phone back into his pocket. He walked back to the bed.
"Have you ever heard of the Vaughn family?" Algot asked casually.
Gianna's stomach dropped. Her heart skipped a beat. Why was he asking about them?
She forced her face to remain blank.
"I have heard the name," Gianna lied smoothly. "They have a lot of money, right?"
Algot stared at her. He saw the tiny pulse beating rapidly at the base of her throat. She was lying.
"Right," Algot said softly.
"I want to go home," Gianna said, pushing the blankets off her legs. "I hate hospitals."
"I will drive you," Algot said.
Gianna wanted to say no. She wanted to run away from this man who made her feel entirely too exposed. But her legs were still shaking, and she had no money for a cab.
She nodded.
The ride to her apartment was silent. Gianna sat in the passenger seat, staring out the window. Every time the streetlights illuminated the inside of the car, she stole a glance at his sharp profile.
He pulled up to the curb outside her rundown apartment building.
Gianna opened the door and stepped out. The cold air felt good. She turned back to look at him.
"I never got your name," Gianna said.
Algot did not answer. He just looked at her for a long moment, his eyes dark and unreadable. Then he pressed a button, and the tinted window rolled up, cutting off her view.
The black car pulled away from the curb, leaving Gianna standing alone on the sidewalk, her heart pounding in her chest.
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9.7
For three years, I hid my identity as the sole heiress of a multi-billion dollar tech empire to live in a cramped apartment and support my boyfriend, Ben.
But the day before our engagement, I stood outside a meeting room and overheard him talking to his wealthy boss, Haylie.
"She's just a stepping stone," Ben laughed, his voice full of contempt. "A poor, ambitionless distraction while I work my way up to where I really belong."
He mocked the cheap silver ring he gave me, calling it a necessary prop to keep a naive fool happy.
He bragged about the multi-million dollar merger proposal he was presenting, planning to use it to secure his promotion and build a future with her.
He had no idea that I had secretly negotiated that entire deal using my real connections just to give him his big break.
I had sacrificed my family's comfort, my true identity, and my own career just to watch him rise.
I poured my heart and soul into our humble beginnings, only to realize he saw my love as a pathetic joke and me as disposable trash.
I calmly picked up a pen and voided the merger agreement, tearing my hard work into tiny pieces.
I went home, slid the cheap ring off my finger, and dropped it into his mug of cold coffee.
"Soon, you'll find out exactly who is nothing."
Walking out the door, I pulled out my phone and texted my billionaire father.
"I'm in. Announce the merger."
7.4
Four years ago, to protect the man I loved from losing his billionaire empire, I drugged his drink, told him I only used him for his money, and vanished.
Now, at a high-society gala, Callum Wyatt is back. He isn't just a CEO anymore; he's a ruthless predator, and the second his eyes lock onto me, I know I am his prey.
When my wealthy half-sister publicly humiliated me, calling me the cheap bastard child of a homewrecker, Callum stepped out of the shadows. He nearly snapped her wrist in half and declared to New York's elite that anyone who touched me would be dismantled.
In the back of his Maybach, he pinned my arms above my head, his eyes burning with psychotic obsession.
"If you run again, Aubrey, I will burn your entire world to the ground just to keep you."
My heart bled. I had spent four grueling years tearing myself apart to keep him out of my messy, blood-soaked revenge against the family that watched my mother die.
But his terrifying protection only made my biological father's family target me harder, using their massive capital to buy out my movie set and crush my acting career.
They thought I would cower.
But as I walked onto the soundstage, facing the heiress trying to steal my role, I took off my sunglasses. I wasn't running anymore; it was time to make them pay.
8.6
I was the untouchable Mafia Queen, but my reign ended in the blood-soaked depths of a damp dungeon.
My half-sister, Kelsey, drove a rusted, sharpened spoon into my chest, screaming about the unfairness of fate.
In my past life, my father sold me to the ruthless Don Dante Blackwell as collateral to pay off his debts.
To survive, I took a black-market fertility drug, birthed his heir, and clawed my way to the throne through sheer ruthlessness.
But in the mafia world, a pregnant woman isn't a queen; she's a walking target.
I survived countless bombings and poisonings, only to be betrayed and slaughtered by my own family.
Until my last breath, I couldn't understand. I had sacrificed everything to secure our survival in the empire. Why did my blood and tears only earn me a rusted spoon to the heart?
Opening my eyes again, I am seventeen, sitting in my father's drawing room.
Two black velvet boxes sit on the mahogany table.
Kelsey greedily snatches the box containing the fertility drug, her eyes gleaming with feverish triumph.
"I'll take this one, Papa."
She thinks she is stealing my golden ticket to the crown, completely unaware that she just chose a death sentence.
I lower my gaze, letting my eyelashes mask the cold, lethal amusement pooling in my eyes as I take the remaining box.
Inside is the detailed psychological profile of the Don's dead fiancée.
This time, I won't be a breeding mare fighting off assassins. I will dissect the devil himself.
9.7
I was an intern nurse working exhausting shifts, yet my mother constantly forced me into blind dates with wealthy, arrogant men to secure our family's social standing.
During a terrifying hospital lockdown, an assassin disguised as a doctor held a scalpel to my throat. I was almost killed, but a high-ranking military colonel threw his own body down a flight of concrete stairs to shield me.
I survived with cuts and bruises, but when I went home, my mother didn't care about my near-death experience. She was only furious that I had rushed out on my blind date with Preston, a rich financial analyst.
She forced me to meet him to apologize. When Preston grabbed my arm, bruised me, and mocked my attack as a pathetic lie, my mother still took his side.
"Men get angry," she told me coldly. "It's your job not to provoke them. You will beg for his forgiveness, or you are no longer welcome in this house."
I had narrowly escaped an assassin, yet my own family was willing to feed me to a monster just for a fat paycheck and neighborhood gossip.
My heart went completely dead.
So, when the intimidating Colonel appeared, offering me maximum military protection through a sudden marriage, I didn't hesitate.
I walked back into my parents' house and calmly slapped a crisp marriage certificate onto the coffee table.
"I won't be apologizing to Preston. I got married today."
8.3
Imogen Montgomery was the perfect billionaire heiress, deeply in love and ready to marry her fiancé, Clark Ellis.
That all ended the night her cousin Kathleen ripped the sapphire pendant from her neck and pushed her into a pool of toxic chemicals to die.
Two years later, Imogen's eyes snapped open. But she didn't wake up in a hospital. She woke up tied to a stained mattress, trapped in the battered body of Briana, a teenage girl from the slums who had just been sold to a local trafficker.
After violently fighting her way out of a cheap motel, she discovered the horrifying truth. Kathleen had taken over the Montgomery Group. She had locked Imogen's grieving parents away in a psychiatric facility as prisoners.
And worst of all, Kathleen was now flaunting her stolen wealth online, preparing to marry Clark.
A wave of pure, white-hot rage boiled in her blood. Kathleen had murdered her, stolen her family, and was playing the perfect grieving cousin. How was she supposed to fight back? She was just a runaway nobody now. If she tried to expose the truth, Kathleen's security would shoot her dead in the street.
She needed a weapon. She needed a shield. She needed the one man Kathleen feared.
Covered in mud and blood, Briana intercepted Clark's car in the freezing rain. She was going to infiltrate his home as his vulgar, unhinged fake mistress, and she would drag Kathleen straight down to hell.
9.0
My father was dying in the ICU, and our family company, the Martin Group, was on the verge of total collapse.
While I was desperately trying to sign the consent form for his life-saving surgery, my fiancé, Eston, sent me a text.
"I told you not to be stubborn. The company is mine by Friday. Beg me, and I might pay for the funeral."
He had been secretly looting my family's assets from the inside, waiting for me to break so he could steal everything. He thought I would crawl back to him in absolute despair, surrendering my father's legacy just to survive. The sheer weight of my helplessness crushed my chest as the heart monitor next to my father's bed let out a frantic, high-pitched scream.
The betrayal tore through me, but the despair quickly hardened into a cold, sharp stone.
Why should I let the man who ruined me dance on my family's grave? Why should I let him walk away with everything while I lost the only family I had left?
I wiped away my tears and blocked his number permanently.
Then, I stepped out into the freezing Manhattan rain and went straight to the top floor of the Maxwell building.
I threw my remaining shares onto the desk of Ellwood Maxwell—the apex predator of Wall Street, and Eston's untouchable, ruthless uncle.
"I want you to marry me," Ellwood said, pushing a marriage contract toward me. "That is the only way your company survives."
I picked up the pen. If Eston wanted to destroy my life, I would become his aunt and make him bow.