Faked Disappearance, Real Love's End
A month after my boyfriend "went missing," I unexpectedly bumped into him at a bar.
He was completely unharmed, bragging to his friends. "My girlfriend is way too clingy, so I needed to teach her a lesson. Plus, my best bro Keegan is playing along."
I didn't burst into tears, nor did I have a meltdown. Instead, I pretended I hadn't seen or heard a thing and quietly went home.
When Beckham called Keegan for an update, I was straddling Keegan's lap. "Focus, honey. Don't get distracted."
Keegan hung up the phone immediately.
As for Beckham? Let him stay missing—forever missing from my world.
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Chapter 8
Holly Baxter's POV
Keegan's body tensed. He reached up and covered the phone's microphone.
"Just a girl I know," he said, keeping his voice as steady as possible. "You don't know her."
"She sounded like Holly," Beckham's muffled voice filtered through.
Keegan hung up.
He pulled me close again. "Don't worry about him. I won't get distracted anymore."
I pushed lightly against his chest. "Do you think he'll come here?"
Keegan blinked.
"He's staying at his cousin's place by the lake, right? About a thirty-minute drive."
He narrowed his eyes. "How do you know that?"
"I know a lot of things, Keegan. Like the fact that Beckham was never missing. I saw him at a bar the other day."
His expression cycled through shock, guilt, and sudden realization.
"So you've known all along," he whispered. "This whole time."
"Yes."
"Are you mad?"
"I was. Very briefly. Then I realized he wasn't worth my anger."
When I spotted Beckham at the bar, I didn't yell or confront him.
Since he could treat my genuine feelings like a joke, he didn't deserve my love.
"Keegan, is there anything else you want to tell me?"
He was the only one who had hesitated, opposing the fake disappearance.
So why did he agree to help Beckham with his little "missing" game?
"I owed him a favor. A debt from years ago. He held it over my head." He spilled everything—Beckham's manipulation and his own reluctance. "I shouldn't have lied to you, Holly. I'm truly sorry."
"Don't apologize. Actually, I'm glad you were part of it."
He looked utterly confused. "Glad?"
I cupped his chin. "Keegan, are you willing to betray them? Are you willing to be my partner in crime?"
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7.5
While packing up her cheating ex-boyfriend's belongings, Giselle found an encrypted black smartphone hidden beneath his old textbooks.
Curiosity made her guess the passcode, only to uncover a horrifying secret.
Her ex had been using stolen lingerie photos of her beautiful roommate to catfish a man named "Oero" out of $1.5 million.
And Oero wasn't just a gullible sugar daddy. He was Dereck Campos, a ruthless Wall Street billionaire known for making his enemies permanently disappear.
The phone suddenly buzzed in her hand with a terrifying message.
"Don't be late. You know what happens when I'm kept waiting."
Giselle's blood ran cold. The lethal trap had snapped shut.
If she showed up, Dereck would see she wasn't the blonde in the photos and kill her.
If she ignored him, his private security would hunt her down anyway.
Her ex had drained the offshore accounts and fled, leaving her as the ultimate scapegoat to face a monster's wrath.
She was just a broke engineering student on a full scholarship.
She hadn't taken a single cent of that dirty money. Why should she pay with her life for a deadly scam she knew nothing about?
But Giselle wasn't going to just curl up and wait to die.
Her analytical mind kicked into overdrive. She sent him a voice note faking a severe illness, and deliberately refused his massive cash transfer to play the proud victim.
She was going to outsmart the most dangerous predator in New York, one calculated lie at a time.
8.9
I was tossed into a dark alley like rotting garbage, bleeding and grieving the child I had just lost.
When I was finally brought back to my fiancé Angelo's penthouse, instead of comfort, I was met with absolute disgust.
His family declared me "unclean" after the kidnapping. Angelo coldly announced he was burying the scandal by marrying my sweet, innocent cousin, Carissa.
When we were alone, Carissa stood over my bed, her voice dripping with venomous delight.
"My father arranged the kidnapping. And now, Angelo and I can finally be together."
Before I could react, she forced a silver letter opener into my hand, deliberately stabbed her own shoulder, and let out a bloodcurdling scream.
Angelo stormed in, struck me across the face, and gathered a sobbing Carissa into his arms, looking at me with absolute revulsion.
The family matriarch appeared at the door, her cold eyes sweeping over the scene before she gave a chilling order to the maids.
"Clean this up."
They pinned me down and brutally drove the blade directly into my chest.
I choked on my own blood, staring at the man who had promised me the world as he turned his back, calling my murder a "mercy."
As my heart beat its final agonizing rhythm, I made a silent vow to the shadows that if there was a next life, I would have my vendetta.
When I opened my eyes again, there was no blood, only the soft silk of my nightgown.
I had returned to the day before my eighteenth birthday.
This time, I wouldn't play the desperate victim. I was going to ally with the Devil of Chicago and burn them all to the ground.
9.2
Ami Cleveland's family empire was destroyed overnight by a malicious short-selling attack, leaving her mother facing federal prison and hunted by ruthless loan sharks.
To secure a hundred-million-dollar lifeline, Ami risked her life as a blindfolded co-pilot in a deadly cliffside street race, all just to get five minutes alone with Jerad Kidd, the elusive Wall Street titan she had accidentally slept with the night before.
But instead of saving her, Jerad completely crushed her dignity.
"What makes you think you are worth a hundred million dollars?"
He mocked her desperate pitch, calling her family's equity garbage, and coldly walked away. Two days later, he forced her onto his Miami superyacht as a political decoy, making her wear a backless silk gown that offered zero protection and throwing her into a sea of wealthy predators.
When a drunk tech billionaire pinned her against a sofa and tried to rip the thin straps of her dress, Ami screamed for help. She looked up at the VIP balcony in absolute despair, only to see Jerad looking away, treating her like she didn't even exist.
She didn't understand why he was torturing her. Why did he let her risk her life in his car, only to humiliate her and feed her to the wolves?
With no one to save her, Ami grabbed a whiskey glass and violently smashed it into her attacker's face.
She squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for the man's brutal retaliation slap.
But the hit never came. A large hand, wearing a heavy Patek Philippe watch, shot out of nowhere and clamped down on the man's raised arm like a steel vice.
8.8
Kaia was diagnosed with late-stage bone cancer, with only three months left to live.
She wanted to give up her family's entire trust fund just to have Gerrit play the role of a loving husband for her final days.
But before she could show him the biopsy report, he looked at her with absolute disgust, declaring that their three-year marriage made him physically sick.
He only loved Seraphina.
To force Kaia out, Seraphina constantly framed her. When Seraphina faked a fall, Gerrit pushed Kaia so hard she tore her waist open on a glass table.
When Kaia writhed in agonizing pain from her failing organs, he stood over her coldly, mocking her pathetic acting.
Even when Gerrit finally discovered Seraphina had hired a fake stalker and maliciously burned Kaia's skin with boiling tea, he still chose to protect his mistress.
"I already signed the divorce papers with Kaia. We are going to bury this story temporarily to protect the company."
Hearing those words from behind the wall, the last shred of hope in Kaia's chest completely died.
She had endured his cruelty for three years, only to realize his bias for another woman defied all logic and morality.
Lying in the bathtub, coughing up mouthfuls of dark blood that turned the water crimson, Kaia picked up her phone and dialed her lawyer.
"Julian, initiate the final plan."
Since Gerrit despised her existence, she would make sure he never found her body.
8.5
For five years, I was tech billionaire Alden Maxwell' s secret. A pretty accessory on his arm, a deal I made to save my father' s life. I played my part, quietly planning my escape for the day our contract ended.
But then his first love, Amanda, came back.
At a lavish auction, he spent ten million dollars to outbid me for my own mother' s heirloom bangle, only to place it on Amanda' s wrist, calling it a "token of his undying affection."
Later, he told me I was just practice. A "little bird" he could use to learn how to be gentle before he went back to his true love.
That' s when the last of my foolish hope died. I was never a person to him, just a transaction he could buy and discard.
So I disappeared. I took a five-year, off-grid research position and cut all ties. When he finally tracked me down, begging me to name my price, I faced him through the sterile glass of the facility and gave him my final answer.
"We' re done."
7.0
"Sign the divorce papers, Olivia... or I'll make sure you never wake up again."
I thought marriage meant love, loyalty, and forever. But the night I overheard my husband plotting my downfall with my sister-in-law, my world shattered. The man I had sacrificed everything for was only after my family's wealth and worse, he wanted me dead.
Drugged. Betrayed. Left bleeding while he ran to the arms of his ex. That was Marcus Thompson, the man everyone believed was the perfect billionaire husband.
But I won't go down quietly. With enemies in my own family and assassins at my doorstep, I must fight back. And when David, the man who risked his life to save mine, steps in, I begin to see what true love really feels like.
Now, I'm trapped between a husband who would rather bury me than let me go, and a man willing to risk everything to protect me.
In a world built on lies, betrayal, and deadly secrets... who can I trust when even love could be a weapon?