From Fake to Real Marriage

My genius boyfriend, Colten, was my savior. I was the "slow" girl he single-handedly tutored into NYU. He built my entire academic future, and I thought our love story was a fairytale. But after I found another woman's birth control pills in his bag and caught him in lie after lie with his lab partner, Addisyn, I finally left him. The price was brutal: I failed every class and faced expulsion. Desperate to save myself, I went back. I played the part of his sweet, obedient girlfriend, using his tutoring to ace my retake exams while secretly planning my escape to a new program. The day my transfer was approved, he ambushed me with a public proposal. In front of a cheering crowd, he got on one knee with a diamond ring, ready to trap me in his perfect life forever. "Will you marry me?" he asked, his voice full of triumph. But before I could answer, a different woman stepped forward. It was Addisyn, and her hand was resting on her pregnant belly.

The morning sunlight streamed through my bedroom window as I stood before the mirror, smoothing down the front of my cream-colored sundress. Today was special—a day I'd been planning for weeks. My parents were finally meeting Colin's family at Griffith Observatory, and I wanted everything to be perfect. "What do you think, Mom?" I asked, turning to show off my outfit. "Is this okay for meeting the Wrights?" My mother, Eleanor Gardner, looked up from her teacup with a warm smile. "You look beautiful, honey. That dress is perfect." "Thank you." I adjusted my hair, tucking a strand behind my ear. "I just want everyone to get along. The Wrights are... well, they're different from us." "They're just people," my father, Robert Gardner, said firmly from behind his newspaper.

For three years, I endured being treated like a walking ATM and a maid by my husband's family, biting my tongue to keep the peace. Then, my husband's buddy suddenly dropped off a nine-year-old boy at my front door. The crumpled note from my husband casually explained it was his illegitimate son, blaming me for being barren and demanding I raise the kid as our own. My mother-in-law was absolutely thrilled, parading the boy around as the true heir at the dinner table. "Some trees just don't bear fruit, no matter how much water you give them," she sneered. My brother-in-law cheered, and my drunk father-in-law demanded I cook a feast to celebrate. They actually expected me to continue paying the mortgage, buying the groceries, and cleaning up their endless messes, all while raising the living proof of my husband's betrayal. I looked at the parasites who had drained me dry for years, acting like they were doing me a favor by letting me stay in a house that my money paid for. I didn't scream, and I didn't cry. I simply called my lawyer to file for an immediate divorce, froze every single bank account and credit card they relied on, and drove off to my grandmother's secluded cabin in the woods. Let them see how long they survive without my money.

Andrea was the very model of a Capital City heiress—disciplined, proper, flawless. But in this moment, she was lost in her husband’s relentless rhythm. Under the warm canopy of their curtained bed, Andrea’s eyes, hazy with pleasure, gazed up adoringly at William as he moved above her with a low groan. In the final instant, he raised his hands and covered her eyes. His whisper brushed her ear. “Be good. Give it to me.” Blushing, Andrea arched her back higher, offering herself to him completely. The next moment, a dagger plunged straight into her chest. William’s murmur turned vicious. “Be good! This time, give me your heart!” It was the eighth wound he had inflicted for Sandra’s sake. “Andrea, this is what you owe her. You have to bear it.” The haze in Andrea’s eyes vanished. She turned her face away, listening numbly to the flurry of movement in the room, her lowered gaze hollow with despair. Her voice came out flat. “Is that so? Then my debt is paid.” Whether it was the life he saved ten years ago, or the tangled disgrace from three. A decade past, during a city festival, William had rescued Andrea from a kidnapper’s grasp. Still a youth then, he’d been impatient with the little girl’s tears, yet he held her close, his voice gruff but steady. From that day, William was etched into Andrea’s heart. She watched him from afar at banquets, never daring to speak—because Sandra was always at his side. She saw him pick flowers for Sandra, tuck them into her hair. She saw him keep vigil all night in the Sanctum, praying for her protection. She saw him fly into a rage for Sandra’s sake, offend Prince Logan, and suffer injuries that kept him abed for half a year. Then, three years ago, a drugged William pulled a passing Andrea into a room. The girl’s secret longing was laid bare before the world. Everyone said the young miss of Andrea’s Family Estate was lovesick and desperate, that she’d used a vile trick to climb into the bed of the newly-engaged young marquis—forcing him to break his childhood promise and marry her instead. Even William believed it. He despised her utterly. So when Sandra collapsed, vomiting blood, during their betrothal ceremony, William drove a sword into Andrea’s chest without hesitation. A revered Sanctum seer had declared it her punishment for stealing another’s destined match; only a medicine from her heart’s blood could break the curse. And Andrea accepted it. Though none of it was her doing, the secret joy in her heart filled her with guilt. She thought one sword thrust had settled the debt. She never imagined it was only the beginning. Then came the second, on their wedding night. The third, at the Mid-Autumn banquet… up to this, the eighth. “Young Miss…” Her maid Layla’s voice, choked with tears, sounded in Andrea’s ear. Andrea turned her head, offering a smile uglier than any sob. “Tomorrow at the palace, I will ask Aunt Victoria to help me get a divorce!” From the day she met William until now—eight years. Three years, eight wounds. If one stab counted for each year, it was enough. Enough to cancel the past. *** The next morning, Andrea woke to find William sitting beside the bed, watching her with a complicated expression. “Sandra is well now. She…” Andrea hadn’t expected the first word from her husband to be that name. Three years of endurance shattered in an instant. “Sandra! Sandra! If your heart holds only Sandra, why did you marry me?” Her voice broke. “We are husband and wife! I… I’m in pain, too!” She tore the bandage from her chest, revealing the terrible lattice of scars beneath. William’s breath caught. He looked away, as if he couldn’t bear the sight, and carefully rewrapped the wound. “It won’t hurt anymore. Never again.” “Court Physician Patrick perfected an ointment. Next time, you won’t feel a thing.” Andrea’s voice died in her throat. She pushed William away and stared at him, perfectly still. Meeting her calm gaze, William felt a sudden, inexplicable pang of panic. “Get some rest.” He dropped the words and left. Andrea began to laugh—a raw, wrenching sound that twisted into tears. Why had she been foolish enough to believe William could ever ache for her? Even after three years of giving him everything he asked, managing his estate, enduring every slight—none of it equaled a single, careless glance from Sandra. Like last year’s harvest festival, when William gave her a bracelet. Sandra had merely glanced at it, and he’d immediately taken it from Andrea’s wrist—the very wrist he had placed it on. Andrea wiped her tears dry and called out sharply. “Layla, help me dress. We are going to the palace.”

During the summer break, my husband, Rio Hayes, and I took our son, Amos, overseas for a horse show. On the eve of the event, chaos erupted when a dozen horses unexpectedly stampeded towards the crowd. In my desperate attempt to shield Amos, I was knocked down, coughing up blood uncontrollably. Rio and the horse trainer managed to regain control and rushed me to the hospital immediately. Amidst my pain, I insisted he prioritize saving our son. But he held my hand, his voice steady as he informed me that Amos was already in the operating room. When I regained consciousness, before I could ask about Amos's condition, I overheard Rio and his bodyguard conversing in German. "Mr. Hayes, young master Amos didn't make it. But why did you intentionally create chaos to provoke the horses and endanger your own son?" Rio responded with a cold laugh.

Sloane Avery built her life on control — a rising tattoo artist in Austin, a stable boyfriend, a five-year plan pinned to her apartment wall. Then she catches her boyfriend cheating at their anniversary dinner, and the night spirals into the orbit of Rhett Caraveo — inked, magnetic, and the heir to a cartel empire she didn't know existed. Rhett doesn't ask permission. He doesn't negotiate. When he decides Sloane belongs in his world, he simply rearranges reality until she has nowhere else to go. But Sloane isn't the kind of woman who breaks — she's the kind who bends the cage until it fits her shape. As her ex-boyfriend becomes dangerously desperate to win her back and a rival family threatens everything Rhett has built, Sloane discovers that the most dangerous man in Texas has one weakness: her. The question isn't whether she'll survive his world. It's whether she'll want to leave it.