His Anonymous Obsession

I've been hiding my face from the world for seven years. He's been hiding his heart for just as long. When Grammy-winning musician Dante Rivers offers me $150,000 to be his fake girlfriend for six months, I should say no. I'm Veil-the anonymous digital artist with millions of fans and a face no one has ever seen. I don't do cameras. I don't do crowds. And I definitely don't do fake relationships with devastatingly private men whose studio walls are covered in my artwork. But my father's last dream is slipping away-and this contract is the only way to save it. The rules are simple: No real feelings. No crossed boundaries. No falling for Dante Rivers. Except nothing about him is simple. Not the way he shields me from paparazzi like I matter. Not the way his music sounds like secrets meant only for me. Not the way he looks at me like he sees through every wall I've built. What he doesn't know is that I'm already part of his life. I'm the anonymous artist behind his album covers. The one he's trusted with his most private thoughts. The ghost he's been searching for without ever meeting. And now I'm falling for him twice- once as the girl in his guesthouse and once as the mystery he doesn't know he's already holding. When the truth comes out, it won't just break the contract. It might break us.

Chapters

Chapter 4

"Look at me." Giovanni's voice cuts through the panic. "Just me. Not them. Me."

But I can't. The cameras. The flashes. The college quad overlaying this restaurant until I don't know what's real anymore. My chest is a vice. Lungs refusing to work. Throat closing.

I'm dying. I'm actually dying this time.

Giovanni moves. Suddenly he's beside me instead of across from me. His body blocks the window. Blocks the cameras. Blocks everything except him.

"Breathe with me." His hands are steady on my shoulders. Grounding. "In for four. Hold for four. Out for four. Can you do that?"

I shake my head. Can't. Can't breathe at all.

"Yes, you can." His voice is calm. Too calm for someone watching a stranger fall apart. "Look at me, Hae. Focus on my voice. In for four."

He breathes in. Slow. Controlled. I watch his chest rise.

"Hold for four."

I try. Manage two seconds before I'm gasping again.

"That's okay. Try again. In for four."

His hands slide down my arms. Not restraining. Supporting. His thumbs make small circles on my wrists. The touch is gentle. Careful. Like I'm something that might break.

I focus on those circles. The pressure. The rhythm. Try to breathe with him.

In. Hold. Out.

Slowly-so slowly-my vision clears. The quad fades. I'm back in the restaurant. Private room. Giovanni blocking the window. Marcus on his phone, probably dealing with the paparazzi.

"There you go." Giovanni's voice is soft. Almost tender. "You're okay. You're safe."

I'm not okay. I'm mortified. I just had a panic attack in front of Giovanni Rivers and his manager during what was supposed to be a professional meeting. They probably think I'm insane.

"I'm sorry." My voice is wrecked. "I should go. This was a mistake. I can't-"

"Stop." His hands tighten fractionally on my wrists. "Don't apologize. And don't leave."

"You don't understand. I can't do this. I can't be your fake girlfriend or go to public events or have my picture taken. I can barely leave my house."

"I know." He says it simply. Like it's a fact, not a judgment. "That's why Marcus chose you. Because you won't want the attention. Won't seek it out. You'll do the minimum required and nothing more."

I laugh. The sound is bitter. "You just watched me fall apart because of cameras. How is that the minimum?"

"I get panic attacks too." His admission stops my spiral cold. "After my mom died. During performances. In the middle of interviews. The label makes me take pills. Makes me hide it. Makes me pretend I'm fine when I'm drowning."

I stare at him. Search his face for the lie. Find only truth. Raw, painful truth.

"You're the first person I've told," he continues quietly. "Because you're the first person who might actually understand."

Something shifts in my chest. Not the panic this time. Something else. Something dangerous.

"We're leaving." Giovanni releases my wrists. Immediately I miss his touch. "Back entrance. Marcus, handle the vultures."

Marcus nods, already moving toward the front. Giovanni shrugs into his leather jacket, then does something unexpected. He takes off his baseball cap and puts it on my head. Pulls it low over my face.

"Keep your head down. Stay close." His hand finds the small of my back. The touch is possessive. Protective. "I've got you."

We move through the restaurant. Staff parts for us. Giovanni's presence commands space in a way I never could. We slip through a door marked 'Staff Only,' down a hallway, through the kitJiao where chefs don't even look up, and out into an alley.

A sleek black car idles at the end. Different from the SUV that brought me. Giovanni opens the passenger door. "Get in."

I hesitate. "Where are we going?"

"Somewhere safe." His eyes meet mine. "I promise."

I should say no. Should call my own car. Should put distance between myself and this man who makes me feel too much too fast.

But his hands on my shoulders are still warm on my skin. His voice in my ear still echoes: You're safe.

I get in the car.

Giovanni slides into the driver's seat. Not a driver. Him. He's driving. The intimacy of it-just the two of us in this small space-makes my pulse spike for entirely different reasons.

He pulls out of the alley. Takes side streets instead of main roads. No one follows. After several minutes of silence, he speaks.

"You don't have to do this." His voice is low. "The arrangement. I'll find another way. You shouldn't have to torture yourself for money."

"What if there is no other way?" The words escape before I can stop them. "What if this is my only chance to save something that matters?"

He glances at me. "The store?"

"My mother died three years ago. Cancer. The medical bills..." I swallow hard. "The store is all my father has left of her. Every record, every memory. If we lose it, he loses her all over again."

Giovanni's hands tighten on the steering wheel. "I'm sorry. About your mother."

"Me too." I trace the window with one finger. "About yours."

His jaw tightens. "How did you know?"

"I googled you. Last night. After Marcus called." I risk a glance at him. "You mentioned her in an interview. Two years ago. You cried during your Grammy speech."

"The label said it was good for my image." His laugh is hollow. "Humanized me. Made me relatable. They had no idea I was actually breaking."

We drive in silence. I study his profile. Strong jaw. Straight nose. The kind of face that belongs on screens and magazine covers. But there's pain in the lines around his eyes. Exhaustion in the set of his shoulders.

He's not what I expected. Not the arrogant celebrity or damaged artist the media paints him as. He's just... a person. Broken in the same places I am.

"Where are we going?" I ask again.

"My place. Private. Gated. No cameras. I want to show you something. Then you can decide." He pulls onto a highway heading west. "About the arrangement. About all of it."

I should be scared. Should demand he take me home. I don't know this man. Don't know if I can trust him.

But I've read his messages for three years. Know his grief and his hope and the way he sees beauty in broken things. And right now, sitting beside him in this car, I feel safer than I have in seven years.

Which is exactly what makes him dangerous.

We turn into the Hollywood Hills. The houses get bigger, more private, surrounded by walls and gates. He stops at one-massive iron gates with a security panel. Types in a code. The gates swing open.

The driveway is long. Winding. Trees on both sides creating a tunnel of green. Then the house appears.

Modern. Glass and steel. Beautiful in a stark, lonely way. And beside it, a smaller building. Guest house, maybe.

He parks. Kills the engine. Sits in silence for a moment before turning to me.

"Before we go in, I need to tell you something." His eyes are serious. "I know this is insane. The whole arrangement. Asking a stranger to pretend to be my girlfriend. But I'm desperate, and you're desperate, and maybe that makes us perfect for each other."

"Or maybe it makes us both idiots," I counter.

His lips quirk. Almost a smile. "Also possible." He opens his door. "Come on. I want to show you where you'd be staying. If you agree."

I follow him out. The air is cooler here. Cleaner. I can see the city sprawling below, glittering in the afternoon sun. It's beautiful. Isolated. Safe.

Everything I need. Everything I fear.

But instead of going to the guesthouse, he stops at another door. The studio.

"I want to show you something first." He opens the door.

I step inside and my heart stops.

Continue to next part

On my husband Heath's birthday, I sent him a gift: the preserved embryo of the child I had just aborted. It was my revenge. He had framed my father, driving him to prison and my mother to her grave, all for his mistress, Ember. When he stormed into our apartment, his face twisted with rage, he slammed me against the counter. "You monster! How could you destroy our child?" "You forfeited that right the moment you chose Ember over us," I spat back. But my defiance only led to more horror. He had me committed to a mental asylum where Ember, the architect of my family's ruin, tortured me with electroshock therapy, trying to break my mind. I feigned submission, then fought back, throwing both of us out of a third-story window. I survived; she was left in critical condition. Lying in my hospital bed, Heath came to me not with remorse, but with a chilling demand. "Ember needs a tendon graft. You're a match. The surgery is tomorrow." He thought he had me trapped, that he could force me to sacrifice a piece of myself for the woman who destroyed me. But as he left to comfort his mistress, I made a call. The next morning, as he begged me not to go through with the "surgery," I walked away, leaving him in the ruins of the life he had shattered. He didn't know this wasn't a surgery. It was my escape, and the beginning of his end.

Horror Modern Romance

8.6

Contract With A Monster: The Heiress's Revenge

8.6

It was my birthday, but instead of celebrating, I was bleeding on the floor of my own bedroom. My sister Serena had just smashed a champagne bottle over my legs, her eyes filled with a dark madness because our father allowed me to wear the family diamonds. To escape her, I bolted into a pitch-black guest suite, only to be grabbed by a man who felt like a wall of solid muscle. He was drugged, unstable, and pinned me against the wall, his teeth sinking into my neck in a primal claim that left a permanent mark. I managed to flee, but the nightmare was just beginning. My father didn't care about my injuries; he only cared that I had "insulted" the man in that room—Delos French, the most powerful CEO in New York. He threatened to stop paying for my mother’s critical care facility unless I went to Delos and begged for his forgiveness. My brother Julian was even worse, intentionally pouring scalding coffee over my bandaged wounds just to see me flinch. They forced me into a revealing gold dress, treating me like a high-priced commodity to be sold to the highest bidder to save their failing company. I didn't understand how the people who were supposed to love me could be more predatory than the monster in the dark. I had spent my life fixing their scandals, yet they were ready to throw me to the wolves the moment I became useful as a pawn. But when I stood before Delos French at his gala, he didn't see a trophy. He recognized my scent, my touch, and the fire in my eyes. He trapped me in his private lounge, kneeling to clean the blood from my injured feet. "Marry me," he whispered, his voice a low, terrifying growl. "And I will give you the power to burn your family to the ground." I looked into the eyes of the man who had hunted me and realized he was the only one offering me a weapon to destroy the people who had broken me. "Okay," I whispered.

Action Billionaire Horror

8.6

Debt of Desire

8.6

Amara believed marriage would finally give her the peace she had spent her whole life praying for. But after years beside Ayo-her charming, unpredictable husband-peace becomes the one thing she can never hold. Their home is filled with longing for a child Amara cannot conceive, and every month of disappointment pulls her further into despair. Then the unexpected happens: Tina, a girl Ayo once denied ever caring about, returns pregnant... with the child Amara had spent years begging God for. The betrayal cuts deep-but the wound it opens is older, darker, and rooted in secrets Amara never knew she inherited. Strange visions begin to haunt her. A mysterious man appears with warnings she does not understand. Shadows gather around her marriage. Doors she did not open start to creak. And everywhere she turns, she feels watched-not by a person, but by something ancient, patient, and owed. Amara soon learns that her battle is not just with a husband's infidelity or a rival's pregnancy... it is with a spiritual debt tied to her bloodline. A debt demanding payment. As her marriage crumbles and the supernatural closes in, Amara must confront the truth about herself, her past, and the unseen forces shaping her destiny. Because in a world where wombs can be exchanged and fates can be manipulated, love alone is not enough to survive. And the child she has always prayed for... may carry the key to either her redemption or her ruin.

Fantasy Horror Mystery Romance

8.2

Falling For My Dead Husband's Ghost

8.2

To save my brother's life, I married a dead billionaire. My new home was a freezing, high-tech mausoleum where I was ordered to hold a year-long vigil beside Byron Hyde's cryogenic pod. But I wasn't alone in the dark. Every night, a terrifying shadow smelling of whiskey and sandalwood pinned me to my narrow bed. It tore my clothes and brutally claimed my body, leaving me bruised and trembling until dawn. When I begged the housekeeper for help, showing her my torn skin, she just smiled cruelly. "It seems the master's spirit has accepted you." I thought I was being haunted by a vengeful ghost, until Byron's arrogant nephew broke into the tomb to assault me. His tampering triggered the life-support system, and the heavy lid of the pod hissed open. Byron Hyde sat up, his eyes lethal and his skin shockingly warm. He was alive. Looking at his broad shoulders, I caught the faint scent of whiskey and sandalwood. The horrific truth hit me like a physical blow. My nightly tormentor wasn't a ghost. It was my living, breathing husband. When I confronted him, his eyes were cold and clinical. "That was a necessary test. I had to know if my wife would break." A white-hot rage choked me, but I didn't scream or run. He slipped the priceless, heavy sapphire of the family matriarch onto my finger, offering me absolute power over the treacherous relatives who wanted us both dead. To fight a monster, you can't be a victim. I looked into his deep, dangerous eyes and accepted the ring. If this was a cage, allying with the keeper was the only way to find the key.

Horror Modern Romance

9.1

His Orchestrated Love, My Shattered Life

9.1

After a brutal assault cost me my fiancé, my childhood friend swooped in to save me. He married me, cherished me, and I fell in love with the perfect life he built. I thought I had finally found my happy ending. Then, pregnant with our child, I overheard him confessing to my half-sister. He had orchestrated the entire assault. He married me just to stay close to her. In the hospital, she staged an attack, claiming I tried to kill her and her unborn baby. My husband shoved me against the wall, roaring at me as he rushed to her side. "I'll kill you for this!" As I lay bleeding on the cold floor, losing my own child, not a single person looked back. I was just a necessary casualty in his game. But I had recorded her gloating confession. I faked my death and fled to my billionaire mother. He would find out the truth, and I would be the ghost that haunted him to his grave.

Horror Modern Romance

9.8

I Found My Replacement's Rotting Hair On The Alpha's Pillow

9.8

After years of loyalty, a Luna discovers a horrifying truth: her Alpha mate has been harboring a secret lover. The betrayal turns gruesome when she finds the decaying remains of her supposed replacement scattered across their shared bed. As the stench of rot fills their home, she must confront the twisted reality of her partner's infidelity and the dark, supernatural obsession that led him to keep a literal corpse in their inner sanctum.

Horror Romance Werewolf

His Anonymous Obsession

Chapter 4

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