He Chose Her Over Our Dead Child
Deidre went to the clinic and learned she was finally pregnant, but her failing heart meant carrying the baby would kill her.
Before she could process the grief, she received an anonymous photo of her husband, Danial, tenderly escorting a heavily pregnant woman into a VIP hospital.
The woman was his cousin, Daria.
Following them, Deidre overheard Danial call her a "sterile decoration," promising to get rid of her while securing a Cayman trust fund for his illegitimate child.
The nightmare only worsened when Daria gloatingly confessed to a horrifying truth.
Daria had stolen the credit for saving Danial in a fire—a heroic act that had actually destroyed Deidre's heart.
Even more sickening, Daria had bribed a doctor two years ago to fake Deidre's ectopic pregnancy, tricking Danial into authorizing the surgery that murdered their perfectly healthy baby daughter.
When a grief-stricken Deidre attacked the murderer, Danial furiously shoved his wife to the ground.
Ignoring her heart spasms and gasps for air, he threw her out into a freezing New York blizzard to die.
Lying in the snow, Deidre's love turned to pure ash as she realized she had sacrificed her body and her child for a blind monster.
But she didn't die that night.
Rescued by Danial's biggest Wall Street rival, Deidre marched into her husband's office the next morning alongside New York's most ruthless divorce lawyer.
"Sign it, or I'll freeze your offshore trust and burn your empire to the ground."
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Chapter 2
Danial's eyes stayed on the potted fern for two agonizing seconds. His jaw tightened, her body coiled like a spring ready to snap.
"Danial," Daria whimpered. She suddenly doubled over, her hands clutching her stomach. "Ow. It hurts."
Danial's focus shattered. He whipped his head back to her, his expression instantly shifting from suspicion to panic. He crouched down, his hands hovering over her belly. "What's wrong? Is it the baby? Should I get the doctor?"
Daria shook her head, biting her lip. "No, it's just a cramp. The baby is kicking too hard. I just need to sit down."
Deidre let out a shaky, silent breath. Cold sweat drenched her back, making her silk shirt cling to her skin like a second, freezing layer. She watched as Danial guided Daria to a plush sofa right across the lobby, just around the corner from where Deidre was hiding. If he turned his head even slightly, he would see her shoes.
Deidre tried to move. She tried to lift her feet and sneak toward the exit. But her legs felt like they were filled with wet cement. The adrenaline crash, combined with her failing heart, left her weak and trembling. She was trapped, forced to listen from the shadows like a ghost in her own life.
Daria leaned her head against Danial's shoulder, her voice a sweet, sticky purr. "I'm so tired, Danial. I just want this baby to be safe. I want to know he'll be taken care of."
"He will be," Danial said, his voice low and soothing. "I've already taken care of it. I had the lawyers set up an irrevocable trust fund in the Cayman Islands. Everything will be in his name. He'll want for nothing."
Deidre's heart skipped a beat, then crashed against her ribs. A trust fund. An irrevocable trust in the Caymans. That was something he had never even offered for their unborn daughter, Lily. He had never once spoken of trust funds or futures for the baby they had so desperately wanted. He was giving his illegitimate child a fortune while his wife was left with nothing but a dying heart.
Daria traced a finger down Danial's chest. "But what about Deidre? I hate feeling like this, Danial. I hate that our child will be labeled a bastard. I don't want to be a secret forever."
Danial went quiet. The silence stretched out, thick and heavy. When he finally spoke, his voice was devoid of any warmth. "Deidre is just a placeholder. A decoration to keep the Wall Street board happy. She's a Guthrie, and the alliance is useful for now. But her time is running out. I'll deal with her when the moment is right."
The words hit Deidre like a physical blow. A placeholder. A decoration. Her breath hitched in her throat. She pressed a hand over her mouth to muffle the sound of her breaking heart. It wasn't just emotional pain; it was a physical, crushing weight on her chest that made it impossible to draw a full breath.
Daria let out a soft, melodic laugh. It was a sound of pure victory. "You're so good to me. So much better than you are to her. I still remember two years ago, when she had that ectopic pregnancy. It was so hard on her, seeing her crying all over the house broke my heart. It's a shame it had to happen."
Danial's tone hardened instantly. "Don't bring that up. It was an unfortunate accident. I don't want to talk about it. It ruins the mood."
Deidre bit down on the inside of her cheek. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth. An accident. The loss of their daughter was just an annoying blip in his day, a mood ruiner. She swallowed the blood and the bile, her body shaking with suppressed grief.
Danial's phone buzzed. He pulled it out, glanced at the screen, and his expression turned to stone. "It's the board. There's an emergency meeting. I have to go."
Daria pouted, grabbing his tie and pulling him down. She pressed her lips against his, kissing him deeply, right there in the public lobby. It wasn't a quick peck; it was a claim of ownership.
Deidre's stomach he heave. She clamped her hand tighter over her mouth, biting back a dry heave. She watched her husband kiss another woman, the woman carrying his child, and felt a piece of her soul rot away.
"I'll come by your apartment tonight," Danial said, pulling back and stroking her cheek.
"Promise?" Daria whispered.
"Promise."
Danial stood up, adjusted his coat, and strode out of the lobby without a backward glance. The glass doors swung shut behind him, cutting off the cold wind.
The moment he was gone, Daria's soft, vulnerable expression vanished. Her face smoothed into a mask of cold arrogance. She pulled out her phone, her fingers flying across the screen.
"Keep watching her," Daria said into the receiver, her voice sharp and commanding. "I want to know every move she makes."
Deidre's blood ran cold. The anonymous text. It had been Daria all along. She had sent the photo to lure Deidre here, to torture her, to rub her face in the affair.
Daria stood up, smoothing her maternity dress. A burly bodyguard appeared from the hallway, escorting her toward the VIP elevator. The doors slid shut, and the lobby was finally empty.
Deidre's legs gave out. She slid down the wall, collapsing onto the cold marble floor. Her body felt hollowed out, a shell left to rot.
"Ma'am? Are you okay?" A janitor with a mop paused, looking at her with concern.
Deidre shook her head numbly. She forced herself to grip the wall, pulling herself upright. She didn't feel the cold of the floor, didn't feel the ache in her knees. She felt nothing at all.
She walked out of the hospital. The New York blizzard had arrived. The sky was a dark, churning mass of grey, and fat snowflakes were plummeting to the ground. The wind howled down the streets, biting through her thin coat.
Deidre didn't button her coat. She didn't put up her hood. She stepped out into the storm, letting the freezing snow hit her face, melting into her hair and running down her neck like icy fingers.
A placeholder. A decoration. I'll deal with her.
The words echoed in her mind, louder than the storm. She replayed the image of Danial kissing Daria, the promise to visit her apartment tonight.
A black Maybach sped past her, its tires splashing through a slushy puddle. Freezing, dirty water soaked the hem of her coat, but she didn't flinch. She just kept walking, a ghost wandering the streets of Manhattan.
Her hand drifted to her stomach. Underneath the layers of silk and wool, a tiny life was growing. A life she was supposed to terminate. A life she was supposed to sacrifice for a husband who saw her as nothing more than a temporary pawn.
A fierce, unfamiliar resolve began to burn through the ice in her veins. She stopped at a crosswalk, the wind whipping her hair around her face. She pulled her phone out of her wet bag. Her fingers were stiff, but she navigated to her notes app.
She had pages and pages of entries. Folic acid brands. Prenatal yoga classes. Baby name ideas. Months of desperate, hopeful planning for a child she thought she could never have.
Deidre highlighted them all. Every single entry. Every hopeful thought.
She hit delete.
The screen went blank. She stared at it for a long moment, then shoved the phone back into her bag. She looked up into the storm, her face set in hard lines. She was done being a placeholder.
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7.1
The last thing I remembered was the blinding flash of my starship crashing. But instead of a rescue crew, I woke up tied to a wooden post, surrounded by hostile beastmen.
My universal translator kicked in just in time to hear their priestess, Chelsea, declare that I was a cursed demon who ruined their hunt. To save the clan from winter starvation, I was to be burned alive.
The flames were already blistering my legs, and jagged stones hurled by the crowd gashed my forehead. I barely negotiated a three-day reprieve to find them food, venturing into the deadly primeval forest.
I found a massive supply of wild potatoes and even gained the protection of Bronson, a terrifyingly powerful saber-toothed tiger beastman.
But Chelsea wouldn't stop.
She labeled my food as poisonous, tried to sentence me to starve in a penitent's cave, and when my agricultural knowledge proved her wrong, she invoked an ancient law. She incited the tribe's savage warriors to fight over me, turning me into breeding property.
I was a scientist offering them endless food, yet their primitive ignorance and one woman's vicious jealousy kept pushing me toward a brutal end. I was terrified, completely powerless against their monstrous physical strength.
As five ruthless challengers drew their bone axes to claim me, I begged Bronson to leave me and run.
Instead, he pulled me against his scarred chest and kissed me fiercely in front of the entire clan.
"She is my mate," he roared, unleashing a soul-crushing aura. "Anyone who wants her, come at me together."
9.3
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."
9.1
Amélie Rousseau grows up believing that honesty, hard work, and faith will save her from poverty.
Paris proves her wrong.
Despite her brilliance, every door stays closed-until the day Clara Duval, the woman Amélie once helped, steals her future through lies, favors, and corruption. When Amélie dares to speak up, the system silences her and laughs.
That is when Monsieur Lefèvre offers her a way out.
Under his guidance, Amélie learns the true language of power-deception, loyalty, and sacrifice. One lie leads to another, and soon she rises in the same world that once rejected her.
But Julien Moreau, the man who loves the girl she used to be, watches her change.
At the height of her success, Amélie must choose: destroy Julien to protect her empire, or expose the corruption and lose everything.
Because in Paris, goodness is not free-
and survival always demands a price.
9.7
Giana woke up drugged and burning with fever in a luxurious hotel suite. Standing before her was Cornel Stark, the most ruthless billionaire in New York.
Memories of her past life stabbed into her brain. In that life, her adoptive family and her fiancé Gary had stolen her inheritance and left her to die a brutal, agonizing death.
She also remembered how fighting Cornel only made him more violent. So this time, she didn't scream.
She endured his brutal punishment, escaped the moment he let his guard down, and swallowed a Plan B pill on the freezing streets.
Returning to her adoptive family's mansion, she faced the people who had destroyed her. Her fiancé and her stepsister put on masks of fake concern, secretly mocking her.
Instead of throwing a useless tantrum like before, Giana deliberately threw herself down the steep wooden stairs.
She smashed her head against the marble floor, using her own blood to shatter their plans and win back her mother's trust.
She thought she had finally taken control. She was ready to crush the people who had betrayed her and live for herself.
But she didn't understand why the billionaire she had just escaped was suddenly turning her life upside down.
When she woke up in the hospital, her room wasn't filled with her family's fake tears, but an ocean of blood-red roses.
The heavy door swung open, and Cornel Stark walked in, his gray eyes locking onto her with a dark, predatory hunger.
"Remember this feeling, Giana. Every breath you take belongs to me now."
9.4
I married Alistair Montgomery out of duty, enduring five years of his coldness and his mother stealing my son, hoping my love would eventually warm his heart.
Then, his "dead" first love, Cordelia, returned.
The second he heard her voice on the phone, he ordered me out of his car on a deserted dirt road and left me in the dust to rush to her side.
She faked a suicide attempt and framed me. Alistair didn't even give me a chance to explain.
"If she doesn't survive this, I will destroy you."
He roared those words over the phone, openly declaring he would spend the night guarding her hospital bed.
The very next day, Cordelia's secret son publicly attacked me and my child at the kindergarten gates, pointing at me and screaming that I was a thief who stole his father.
For five years, I swallowed my pride and let his family strip me of my dignity, only to realize I was nothing but a temporary placeholder for a ghost.
He actually thought he could just toss me the empty title of "wife" while giving his heart and his nights to another woman.
I finally woke up from this pathetic joke.
I didn't shed another tear or beg him to look at me.
Instead, I calmly opened my tablet and searched for the most ruthless divorce lawyer in New York.
The war was about to begin.
7.3
I was summoned home from boarding school for a funeral, thinking my family finally wanted me back. I stood in the pouring rain, watching a mahogany casket disappear into the mud, while the silence in my head felt like it was drowning me.
That night, I hid behind a tapestry and listened through a vent to my father’s study. He wasn't talking about grief. He was talking about "tissue compatibility" and "near-perfect matches" with the family lawyer.
They didn't want a daughter; they wanted a donor. My father’s voice was devoid of emotion as he discussed "the harvest." My half-sister was dying, and I was the spare part they had been growing for years. They had even removed the lock from my bedroom door so I could never truly shut them out.
The realization shattered me. I was just a biological backup plan, a life deemed less valuable than the one they preferred. How could a father look at his own child and see nothing but a heart to be cut out and transplanted?
I didn't wait for them to come for me. I stuffed a backpack, flushed my SIM card, and climbed out the window into a thunderstorm. I caught a bus to the middle of nowhere, ending up in a seat next to a massive, predatory man named Hoyt who looked like he’d killed people for less than a seat preference.
He pinned my wrist with a grip like iron and growled, "Who sent you?"
I couldn't speak to defend myself, but as we rolled into a dying town called Blackwood Creek, I knew one thing for certain. I would rather take my chances with a stranger with a gun than stay another night with the family that wanted me dead.