Framed By Love, Unleashed By Vengeance
I was a top patent lawyer until my husband and his lover framed me, destroyed my career, and sent me to prison. For seven years after, I was presumed dead, living as a ghost in a warehouse.
Then, they found me. My ex-husband, Edgar, and our son, Kody, showed up, shocked to see me alive.
They lured me to Kody' s 18th birthday party, but it was a lie. The party was a surprise engagement celebration for Edgar and Celena, the very woman who ruined my life.
In front of everyone, Edgar told me to "let go."
My own son even begged me.
"Mom, please," he cried. "Just say you're sorry."
Sorry? For what? For surviving the car crash they orchestrated to kill me?
I looked at the boy I once loved more than life itself. In the sudden silence of the ballroom, I smiled and asked, "Kody, do you remember the night Celena asked you to slash my tires?"
Chapters
Share
Chapter 1
I was a top patent lawyer until my husband and his lover framed me, destroyed my career, and sent me to prison. For seven years after, I was presumed dead, living as a ghost in a warehouse.
Then, they found me. My ex-husband, Edgar, and our son, Kody, showed up, shocked to see me alive.
They lured me to Kody' s 18th birthday party, but it was a lie. The party was a surprise engagement celebration for Edgar and Celena, the very woman who ruined my life.
In front of everyone, Edgar told me to "let go."
My own son even begged me.
"Mom, please," he cried. "Just say you're sorry."
Sorry? For what? For surviving the car crash they orchestrated to kill me?
I looked at the boy I once loved more than life itself. In the sudden silence of the ballroom, I smiled and asked, "Kody, do you remember the night Celena asked you to slash my tires?"
Chapter 1
Abigail Cardenas POV:
The familiar scent of damp cardboard and recycled plastic filled my lungs, a scent I' d come to associate with my new reality. Seven years. Seven years since I was Abigail Cardenas, the sharp-witted patent lawyer, whose life had been surgically removed and replaced with this monotonous routine. Now, I was just Abigail, a ghost in a warehouse, sorting boxes under fluorescent lights.
A commotion near the loading dock pulled me from my thoughts. It wasn' t unusual for visitors, but the hushed whispers and sudden stillness suggested something different. I kept my head down, my hands moving automatically, taping another box shut.
Then I heard it. A voice. Deep, familiar, like a melody I'd tried to erase but was still etched into the deepest parts of my memory. Edgar.
My breath hitched. My body froze, a cold dread seeping into my bones. Seven years. He was supposed to be a phantom, a chapter slammed shut.
"Abigail?" The voice was closer now, hesitant, laced with a surprise that felt like a punch to my gut.
I didn't look up. Couldn' t. I just kept sealing the box, my movements stiff, robotic. My heart was a frantic drum against my ribs.
A shadow fell over me. A hand reached out, tentative, almost brushing my arm. I flinched, pulling back as if scalded. The touch would have burned me, branded me all over again.
Silence stretched between us, thick and suffocating. The warehouse noise faded into a dull hum, as if the world was holding its breath. Every fiber of my being screamed at me to run, to disappear back into the anonymity I had carefully built.
The fluorescent lights above hummed, casting a stark, unforgiving glow on the dust motes dancing in the air. The faint smell of exhaust fumes from a distant forklift suddenly felt overwhelming, making my stomach churn. I felt dizzy, disoriented.
"Abigail? Is that really you?" His voice was hoarse now, thick with disbelief. "They said... they said you were gone. Dead."
I remained silent. My jaw ached from clenching it so tightly. What could I say? That I wasn't dead enough? That I had survived the wreckage he and his lover had made of my life?
"We had a funeral," he continued, a strange mix of shock and relief in his tone. "Celena... she was devastated. Kody... he cried for weeks."
My blood ran cold. The names, uttered so casually, were like venom. Devastated? Cried for weeks? The hypocrisy was a bitter taste in my mouth.
Another figure moved beside him. Taller now, broader shoulders. Kody. My Kody.
"Mom?" Kody' s voice, a raw, broken whisper, tore through me.
My hands trembled, but I didn't stop working. I couldn't acknowledge them. Not here. Not now. Not ever.
"Why didn't you tell us?" Edgar' s voice pleaded, stepping closer. "We thought... we thought we' d lost you forever."
Lost me? They had thrown me away. I wanted to scream the words, but they stuck in my throat, choked by years of unspoken pain.
Kody stepped forward, his young face etched with an emotion I couldn't quite decipher. "Mom, please. Just... say something."
I closed my eyes for a fraction of a second, a sharp ache shooting through my chest. The word "Mom" felt alien on his lips. It belonged to a different life, a different woman.
"I'm sorry, sir," I finally said, my voice flat, devoid of emotion. "You must have me confused with someone else." Each word was a tiny chip off the wall I had built around myself.
Edgar reeled back as if I had struck him. "What are you talking about? It's me, Edgar. And this is Kody. Your son." He gestured to Kody, who looked ready to collapse.
Kody, who was supposed to be my son. The boy I had loved with every fiber of my being. The boy who had helped push me off that cliff.
"My son?" I laughed, a dry, humorless sound that felt brittle in the air. "I don't have a son."
Edgar stared at me, his eyes wide with a mixture of hurt and disbelief. He took in my work uniform, the grime on my hands, the exhaustion etched on my face. His gaze lingered on the worn-out sneakers, the faded denim. His face crumpled.
"Abigail, what happened to you? Why are you... here?" His voice was thick with what sounded almost like pity. "You look like you've been to hell and back."
"Where else would I be?" I shot back, my voice still devoid of warmth. "The life you left me, Edgar, it didn't exactly come with a golden parachute."
"But... why didn't you reach out? I could have helped you," he insisted, taking another step forward. "We could have fixed this."
Fixed this? There was no fixing what they had done. I looked at Kody, who was now openly weeping, his shoulders shaking. The sight did nothing to soften the concrete around my heart.
"You can't fix what is broken beyond repair," I said, my gaze hardening. "And you, Edgar, you left me with nothing but shattered pieces."
He opened his mouth, but no words came out. He looked defeated, his usual polished demeanor replaced by a raw vulnerability I hadn't seen in years.
"Please, Mom," Kody sobbed, reaching for me. "I missed you so much. We all did."
I pulled my hand away before he could touch me. "You have no 'Mom' here," I said, my voice a flat line. "And I have no son."
His face paled, the tears still streaming down his cheeks. "But... I'm Kody. Your Kody."
"That Kody died with Abigail Cardenas," I stated, my voice echoing hollowly in the vast space. "And neither of them are coming back."
A colleague, oblivious to the drama unfolding, called out, "Hey, Abigail! You done with that pallet?"
I turned away from their stunned faces. "Almost," I replied, my voice steady, putting the final strip of tape on the box.
Edgar tried to speak again, but I cut him off. "I have work to do. My shift isn't over."
He tried to take another step, but I held up a hand. "Leave. There's nothing for you here."
"Abigail, please," he began, "just talk to me. Let me help you."
I finally looked at him, my eyes like ice. "Help me? You think I need your help?" I scoffed. "The only thing you can do for me is disappear. Again."
He stood there, frozen, his face a mask of shock and pain. Kody, too, was rooted to the spot, his sobs now silent, replaced by a wide-eyed horror.
"We just... we wanted to see you," Edgar stammered, his voice cracking. "Kody's birthday is coming up. He wants you there."
My stomach lurched. His birthday. The reminder of what he used to be, what we used to be, was a cold knife twist.
"I'm busy," I said, turning my back fully and pushing the pallet toward the loading bay. "Tell Kody Happy Birthday. From a stranger."
The words hung in the air, a final, definitive severing. I heard Kody' s ragged gasp, but I didn't look back. There was nothing left to see.
You may also like
7.7
A deep bone-melting groan vibrates from his chest. "I want to see you malyshka.Every inch of you."
I shiver in anticipation as his fingers trail down my back, lowering the zipper of my dress, the fabric pooling at my waist. My tits come into view as cool air kisses my bare skin.
His sharp intake of breath makes my stomach flip.
"Damn," the word is rough, almost reverent as his large hand cups my left tit, squeezing softly. "They look even better than I had imagined." His grip tightens slightly. "A perfect fit for my hands."
☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎☦︎
Serafina had only one dream: to take center stage at the New York Opera. But if wishes were horses, even beggars would have a ride.Thrown into an arranged marriage, She is determined to hate him but soon discovers that there's a thin line between love and hate.
Adriko has no use for love. His focus is power, his goal is revenge. But what do you do when your greatest threat is your most sinful desire?
A pawn in the game...
A Bride for a truce...
9.7
When Dante Moretti discovers his arranged husband is the son of the man who massacred his family, he sees the perfect opportunity for revenge. Alessandro Santoro accepts the marriage as penance for sins he couldn't prevent, expecting nothing but the punishment he believes he deserves.
But living together reveals cracks in the story both families told. Alessandro wasn't the enemy Dante thought. Dante isn't the monster Alessandro feared. As they uncover the real conspiracy behind the massacre, they're forced to choose between the vengeance that's defined them and the fragile connection growing between them.
9.0
My boyfriend and stepsister murdered me for my inheritance, their celebratory kiss a final insult above my broken body on the rain-slicked concrete of the port.
As my soul floated inches from my own face, a tyrant the world knew only as a disfigured cripple, Charles Moses, arrived with a team of soldiers.
He ignored my killers, who were now begging for their lives. Instead, he fell to his knees in the mud and blood.
He cradled my lifeless head in his hands, and a gut-wrenching sob of pure agony tore from his throat before he carried my body into the black ocean.
As the water closed over us, I didn't understand. Why did this monster, a man I had never met, weep for me as if I was his entire world?
My eyes snapped open. I was five years in the past, coughing up water in a hospital bed. It was the night my family screamed at me for ruining my stepsister's dress after she'd tried to drown me.
When they offered to marry me off to the "crippled monster" Charles Moses to save my perfect stepsister from that fate, I didn't fight them.
I smiled and said yes.
This time, I would walk straight into the lion's den myself.
9.7
Amy has lived in the shadows of her twin all her life-unwanted by her parents, erased by lies, and forgotten by the only boy she ever loved.
Now, years later, she returns not as the broken girl they abandoned, but as a woman ready to fight. When she demands marriage from Lucas Tyson-her sister's powerful fiancé, but her first love-the world gasps.
To them, she looks greedy. To her, it is the first step in reclaiming everything stolen from her: her name, her dignity, and the one heart that belongs to her.
But Lucas remembers only betrayal, Ava will do anything to keep her lies hidden, and Amy is walking into a war she may not survive.
Who will win the love fight?
9.0
My fiancé, the Underboss of the DeLuca Crime Family, promised he would burn the world down for me.
But when my mother was dying in the hospital, he chose a ski trip with another woman.
It was that woman's dog that attacked my mother, but when I called him, shaking, he was annoyed. He was in Aspen with Isabella, and I could hear her laughing in the background. He dismissed my mother's injuries as a "minor scrape" and told me not to "make a big deal out of this."
While my mother's fever spiked, he ignored my desperate pleas. Instead, my phone lit up with an Instagram post of him and Isabella smiling by a fireplace, sipping hot chocolate.
My mother slipped into septic shock. That picture was a public declaration, a judgment on my mother's worth, and my own. A cold fury burned away every last bit of love I had for him.
She died at 3:17 a.m. I held her hand until it was cold, then walked out of the hospital and called the one number I was never supposed to use—the number for my father.
"She's dead," I said. "I'm coming to Chicago. I'm leaving this life, and I'm going to burn his world to the ground."
7.5
I didn't fall for him.
I crashed.
Liam Cage wasn't supposed to matter. He was just the arrogant stranger with a dangerous smile and eyes that undressed me in a single glance. Just a man passing through my life.
Until our parents got married.
Now he's everywhere, in the kitchen at midnight, leaning against doorframes like he owns the air I breathe. In the hallway, too close. Always too close. Every look between us feels like a secret. Every argument feels like foreplay. Every silence feels loaded.
We don't talk about it.
We don't have to.
Because the truth is there in the way my pulse stutters when he says my name. In the way he watches me like he's trying to decide whether to ruin me - or save me.
He's wrong.
For me.
For my family.
For my sanity.
But when he touches me, the world narrows down to skin and heat and the terrifying realization that some mistakes don't feel like mistakes at all.
They feel inevitable.
This story is about craving what you shouldn't, crossing lines you swore you wouldn't, and discovering that sometimes the most dangerous love is the one that feels the most real.