He chose my stepsister. I chose his rival
Scarlet's world shattered the night she discovered her husband in her bed with her own sister.
The betrayal was brutal. The humiliation, unforgivable. And what hurt the most? Neither of them felt a single ounce of remorse.
Within months, her husband divorced her and married the very woman who helped destroy her life, her sister.
They thought she would break. They thought she would disappear quietly.
They were wrong.
Ryan Marchetti-cold, calculating, and dangerously powerful, has spent years waiting for the perfect chance to destroy his business rival. Marrying that rival's ex-wife is the ultimate move. Strategic.
For Scarlet, marrying Ryan isn't about love. It's about revenge.
A calculated alliance. A public statement. A promise that she will rise from the ashes they left her in. Together, they become the scandal that shakes empires.
But revenge is never simple.
Because behind Ryan's icy control lies a secret, one tied to her past, to her ex-husband, to the very marriage that ruined her life. A truth so explosive it could unravel everything she thought she knew.
Was she just a pawn in Ryan's war from the very beginning?
Or is the man she's slowly falling for capable of betraying her too?
In a game fueled by vengeance, power, and buried truths, Scarlet must decide:
Will she let betrayal destroy her again...
Or will she risk her heart for the one man who might truly love her?
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Chapter 4
Scarlet had been at the wedding hall just a few minutes ago, and now she found herself seated in the backseat of a black Mercedes-Benz SUV, with an unbelievably beautiful yet unfamiliar man seated right next to her.
She would have focused on how crazily attractive he was if she wasn't so scared of getting kidnapped at this moment.
"You better have a very good explanation for bringing me here, or else, I won't hesitate to report you to the authorities for dragging me against my will and forcefully making me sit in your car," she hissed, reminding herself that he was a stranger and that she might be getting kidnapped right now. "In case you don't know what that means, it means that I'll have you arrested for kidnapping," she snapped, watching him with curious eyes.
The car was parked in a space with dim lighting, so she couldn't make out his features as clearly as she wanted to. She could only pick up on the fact that he had short black hair and pretty green eyes, which she noticed when he dragged her from the hall earlier.
'Snap out of it, Scarlet! He's a kidnapper,' she reminded herself, still wondering why she was in this car with this strange man and why in the world he had brought her here.
He had a small smile tugging on his lips, and she didn't need anyone to tell her what that smile meant; it couldn't be anything else but confidence and top-notch cockiness.
"I sincerely apologize if I startled you, but please relax and be rest assured that I'm not kidnapping you. I just wanted to have a private conversation with you, and that is why I escorted you out myself so we could speak privately without any sort of interruptions," he explained, leaving her confused.
"What exactly do we need to talk about in private? Do you even know who I am? Have we ever met before, because I don't remember ever meeting someone like you, and I'm certainly not interested in having a private conversation with somebody that I don't know?" she retorted, folding her arms across her chest instinctively.
She could tell that he wasn't someone ordinary, which made it all the more surprising that he wanted to have a conversation with her. She was also quite surprised that he even recognized who she was.
"I just want to speak to you for a short while. I promise that I won't take up too much of your time," he responded, and she scoffed.
"If you wanted to speak to me, you should have used the right means instead of kidnapping me and forcing me here. You didn't make a good impression, so I'm not interested in speaking to you," she told him sternly.
She was carefully watching the expression on his face, waiting to see if he would look in any way aggressive at any point, just in case he was a dangerous person. Surprisingly, the expression on his face remained the same, and she suddenly started to feel a sense of superiority from him.
"Once again, I'm deeply apologetic for bringing you here without your permission and leaving a bad first impression. The truth is, I've wanted to speak to you for a while now, and I was planning to visit you much later, but after seeing you here, I decided it would be best to just speak to you now that I have the chance," he explained, worsening her confusion.
"You know who I am?" she asked.
"Yes. Scarlet Parker, isn't it?" he replied, and she was startled.
"How did you recognize me? Was it that obvious that I was the one behind the scarf?" she asked, horrified at the thought that everyone else had recognized her, and she was only fooling herself by thinking she was slick enough.
"Don't worry, you weren't obvious at all. The only reason I recognized you was because I had seen you earlier without the scarf when you arrived," he answered, and she let out a relieved sigh.
Her dignity was already so fragile, and it would have been completely shattered if it turned out that everybody in there knew who she was and that they were only watching her try to hide while mocking how much she'd hit rock bottom.
"So, if you know who I am, what do you want with me? I would have assumed you were a reporter looking to exploit my sad story for an interesting exclusive. But considering how expensive this car is and how you look, I'm pretty sure you're not a reporter, am I wrong?" she asked, sizing him up.
He didn't look like a reporter to her because he had this classy and expensive aura around him that just screamed that he was a rich individual.
He chuckled. "Your story is sad, isn't it?" he responded, taking her aback with his remark.
"I know that I mentioned that my story was sad, but I certainly didn't need you to repeat it to me," she hissed sharply, feeling slightly embarrassed by his remark.
She had never really spoken to anyone, except Isabella, about what happened with Emily and Henry because it was an embarrassing story for her. The fact that he just threw it back in her face that her story was sad made her feel embarrassed and annoyed.
"I apologize if how I said it offended you, but well, your story is one of the reasons I'm here today. But before I explain anything else, allow me to introduce myself. You may or may not have heard of me, but my name's Ryan Marchetti and I am the CEO of Marchetti Construction," he introduced himself, leaving her momentarily speechless.
For the first few seconds after he introduced himself, she couldn't say anything because she was in complete shock. She may not have recognized the face, but there wasn't anybody in the country who wouldn't recognize that name.
Ryan Marchetti of Marchetti Construction was a very famous man, known for his anonymous nature and his business ethics.
She had formerly worked as a project manager for an advertising company, and that was when she was first introduced to the name. She was later introduced to the name again after she married Henry because Marchetti Construction was like the powerhouse construction company in the country, putting Henry's company in second place, and Ryan Marchetti was Henry's worst nightmare.
"If you're really Ryan Marchetti, that's all the more reason for me not to want to talk to you. I mean, why would you, of all people, want to have a conversation with me? What business do we have with each other?" she asked, genuinely confused.
He chuckled. "I know you don't think we have anything to say to each other, but contrary to what you're thinking, we do have something in common currently, and I have a proposal for you that you might be genuinely interested in," he answered.
"A proposal? What do you mean?" she questioned, not sure if it was a good idea to keep asking questions. She should be refusing to say anything else to him instead of questioning him, but for some reason, she couldn't help her curiosity.
"It's simple, Scarlet. I want us to use each other. I'll use you for my plans, and you'll use me for your revenge. How does that sound?" he responded, leaving her even more bewildered.
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7.1
Aria Graves was the perfect Luna.
After seven years of a marriage built on lies, She didn't break when the truth surfaced-she burned. Her revenge was clean and her rejection final.
But fate wasn't done with her.
To protect his own secrets, her father used her mother's life as leverage and forced Aria to take her sister's place, sending her to the Silverfang Pack as a living offering to their ruthless Alpha King, Damien Rothwell.
Cold, commanding, and scarred by war, Damien should have killed her. Instead, he claimed her.
Yet the King is not the only one who wants her.
His half-brother, Ethan Rothwell, once the blind boy Aria taught to read, now returns a man who sees her more clearly than anyone else.
Now Aria stands between two brothers-one bound by duty, the other by love.
In a world where loyalty bleeds and desire burns, she must choose: the Alpha King who could ruin her, or the brother who would burn the world to save her.
7.7
The Cameron family clinic smelled like lemon polish and impending death. For three years, I'd been a vessel in a cold, forced marriage to Underboss Kade Cameron. But today, the doctor's words would shatter everything.
"No heartbeat," Dr. Finch declared, then, "Stage IV gastric cancer. Terminal." A double death sentence. As the world tilted, a news alert flashed: Kade, my husband, parading his mistress, Carla Shaw, across Europe-"a love that defies family lines."
Dying and carrying his dead child, I overheard nurses gossip Kade wanted me gone for his "true love." I chose to feel the D&C agony, cleansing him from my soul. Stumbling out, Kade accused me of killing his child, then rushed Carla, feigning illness, to OB/GYN, ignoring my bleeding and dying state.
Back at the mansion, I vomited blood, my body failing. Kade watched with disgust, dismissing my terminal diagnosis as a "performance." He called me "collateral," a "debt payment," then left me for his mistress. The last shred of loyalty shattered, replaced by chilling clarity.
I signed the divorce papers he dismissed as a "tantrum," leaving his ring. No longer a Cameron, no longer his possession. With Fluffy, I made one call, choosing to die on my own terms, finally free.
9.2
For four years, I was the Silvercrest Pack's biggest joke—a scentless, wolfless Omega who somehow became the Alpha's Luna.
I thought I was just naturally defective, until our fourth anniversary, when I overheard my husband Adrian talking to his Beta.
"I’ve been having the kitchens slip a silver-based compound into her meals since the day I marked her."
He confessed the poison was meant to suppress my inner wolf and keep my womb permanently barren. He only married me as a power play to make his highborn mistress, Seraphina, jealous. While I wept over my empty cradle and apologized to his family for my broken body, he was using pack funds to buy her custom luxury goods, tossing me the leftover wrapping paper. When I finally confronted him about the silver and tried to leave, he flew into a feral rage. He violently smashed my head against the marble vanity, leaving me bleeding on the floor, and locked the bedroom door behind him.
I lay there in the cold, staring at the pool of my own blood. My entire life, my endless pain, and my unborn pups were nothing but a cruel, calculated joke to the man who was supposed to be my Mate.
But Adrian didn't know I wasn't just a brainless Omega.
I wiped the blood from my face, climbed down the balcony trellis into the freezing rain, and pulled out an encrypted burner phone.
"The cage is broken. Initiate Phase Two."
7.3
I was never supposed to step into his world.
I was just a daughter trying to survive the wreckage of a father's mistakes. A quiet girl living a small, careful life-until one night shattered everything I thought I knew about fear, power, and possession.
They say the mafia doesn't forgive.
They say debts are paid in blood.
They never warned me that sometimes, the price is a woman.
Luciano De Luca.
The name alone makes men lower their voices and avert their eyes. A king without a crown. A devil in a tailored suit. He rules the underworld with calculated brutality, commanding loyalty through fear and obedience through bloodshed. To him, mercy is a weakness-and love is a lie told by foolish men before they die.
Luciano is not a man you reason with. He is power, violence, and control wrapped in a deadly calm. A mafia king who destroys without mercy and takes without permission.
When my father fails to pay his debt, Luciano takes me instead.
I become his collateral.
His punishment.
His possession.
Trapped in his world of blood and secrets, I am nothing more than a reminder of betrayal-kept under his watch, bound by his rules, and stripped of every illusion of freedom. Luciano made it clear from the start: I am not his guest. I am not his lover. I am not free. I am his possession. He watches me like a predator studying prey-cold, assessing, waiting for me to break. He expects fear to reduce me to nothing. He expects me to beg. To submit.
But I don't.
And that defiance ignites something far more dangerous than hatred in him.
But somewhere between the locked doors and the whispered threats, I realize something dangerous: the man who owns me is far more broken than he wants the world to know.
Luciano De Luca is ruthless-but he is not heartless. He is controlling-but barely. And every time I challenge him, every time I look him in the eyes without flinching, something dark and volatile stirs beneath his calm exterior.
Luciano doesn't love. He claims. He controls. He owns.
Yet the more he tries to crush my spirit, the more obsessed he becomes. His protection turns violent. His control turns suffocating. His eyes follow me like a promise and a threat all at once.
He says I am his weakness.
His mistake.
His curse.
Yet when enemies circle too close, it is Luciano who shields me with his body. When danger threatens, it is his voice that growls warnings, his hands that tighten possessively, his presence that promises violence to anyone who dares touch what is his.
Because once a mafia king decides you belong to him...
escape is no longer an option.
I am trapped in a golden cage built from power, luxury, and danger-but the greatest threat isn't the guns, the blood, or the men who would kill for him.
It's the way Luciano looks at me when he thinks I'm not watching.
The way his control fractures when I'm hurt.
The way his name feels dangerous on my lips.
Because loving a mafia king is not a fairy tale.
It's a war.
A war between survival and desire.
Between freedom and obsession.
Between the girl I used to be and the woman his darkness is shaping me into.
The deeper I fall into his world, the more I uncover secrets buried beneath his cruelty-betrayals that made him this way, scars that never healed, enemies that would destroy us both if given the chance. And as the line between captor and protector blurs, I'm forced to face a devastating truth:
The man who owns my body may soon own my heart.
But loving Luciano De Luca comes at a cost.
Because in his world, love is a liability.
And the moment he chooses me...
is the moment he paints a target on my back.
Will I escape the man who claims to own me?
Or will I surrender to the darkness that refuses to let me go?
In a world ruled by blood, power, and betrayal, one innocent woman will discover that the most dangerous thing of all...
is being loved by a ruthless mafia king.
7.7
Reborn: Lord of the Undead Dominion
Tagline: When a legendary necromancer returns to his childhood, the world that betrayed him will kneel.
Once a peerless human powerhouse on the cusp of ascending to the 12th Rank, Royan met a brutal end at the hands of treachery during his final transcendence. But fate granted him a second chance-he awakens in his five-year-old body, with a century of arcane wisdom, mastery of necromancy and alchemy, and the burning fire of vengeance in his veins.
In the magical world of Amelia, where races rise and fall by a millennium-old cycle, humans defied destiny to claim dominance. Now reborn, Royan hides his ancient soul behind a child's facade, wielding unmatched spiritual power and forbidden knowledge to rewrite his fate. He'll protect his family from the shadows, gather loyal warriors and fearsome undead companions, and unearth the conspiracy that cut his first life short.
From summoning skeletal legions to forging legendary artifacts, from outwitting scheming nobles to challenging the gods of old-Royan's path is paved with blood, bone, and unyielding ambition. The world thought him fallen, but the Necromancer Lord has returned. This time, he won't just survive-he'll conquer the dominion that was stolen from him, and reign over Amelia as its undead sovereign.
If you crave fast-paced action, epic world-building, and a protagonist who turns weakness into strength with wit and overwhelming power, this dark fantasy saga is for you. Dive in and witness the rise of a rebirthed legend-where death is just the beginning of conquest.
9.5
On her second wedding anniversary, Andrea Reed discovers the ultimate betrayal.
Her husband wants a divorce. Her stepsister is his mistress.And the family empire she protected is nothing more than a prize they've been plotting to steal. Before she can fight back, Andrea is pushed off a cliff-pregnant, broken, and filled with regret.
But death isn't the end. She wakes up five years in the past. Her father is alive. Her inheritance is still in her hands. And the man who killed her is smiling like he's in love.
This time, Andrea won't be naive. She plays the perfect fiancée while secretly collecting evidence, turns traps into public humiliation. She lets her enemies destroy themselves from within.
And when a powerful, dangerously enigmatic billionaire-Samuel Kingswell-crosses her path again, Andrea realizes something even more terrifying than betrayal: In her first life, she chose the wrong man.
In this life, she will choose power and revenge, make them beg before they fall. Because this time, the woman they tried to kill is no longer a victim.
She is the hunter.