His Unwanted Wife: The Hidden Genius
For three years, June played the perfect, submissive wife to billionaire Augustus Pruitt, hoping a child would finally warm his cold heart and secure their marriage.
But when she cautiously suggested they have a baby, he looked at her with pure, unfiltered disgust.
"A woman who schemes her way into a marriage doesn't get to carry my blood."
He sneered, leaving immediately to lavish his mistress with diamonds. The nightmare only escalated from there. Augustus bought the one painting June desperately wanted—a piece she had secretly created herself—just to gift it to his mistress. He publicly outbid June at the gallery, mocking her lack of wealth, and left her to collapse in the freezing rain. When the storm gave her a severe 104-degree fever and she nearly died on their staircase, he didn't even stay by her hospital bed. Instead, he sent an assistant with a box of jewelry to buy her silence, then forced her to attend a family dinner where his mother and sister viciously mocked her barren womb and background.
Looking at Augustus, who sat there casually cutting his steak while his family tore her apart, the last flicker of hope in June's chest sputtered and died.
She finally understood that her three years of bleeding devotion were nothing but a pathetic joke to them.
She dropped her silverware, the sharp clatter silencing the entire room. She wasn't going to be their punching bag anymore. It was time to finalize the divorce papers, reclaim her hidden identity as the world-renowned artist 'mr.sun', and make them all regret it.
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Chapter 2
The coffee in her mug was cold. June hadn't taken a sip. She sat in the sunroom, the morning light streaming through the glass walls, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the air.
She hadn't slept. Sleep felt like a luxury she could no longer afford, a surrender she wasn't willing to make. Instead, a strange, brittle clarity had settled over her. The shock had worn off, leaving behind a quiet, unshakeable resolve.
On the tablet in her lap, she scrolled through listings for one-bedroom apartments in the West Village. Small, anonymous places with fire escapes and a view of a brick wall. They looked like heaven.
Her phone buzzed on the glass table beside her, the sound jarring in the morning stillness. An unknown number. She hesitated, then answered, her voice a little rough.
"Hello?"
"Am I speaking with Mrs. June Perez?" a man's voice asked. It was smooth, professional.
"This is she."
"Mrs. Perez, my name is Julian Finch. I'm the manager at the Elysian Gallery in SoHo."
June's posture straightened. A knot of unease tightened in her stomach. "Yes?"
"I'm calling about the piece you reserved two weeks ago. Metamorphosis." Julian's voice was laced with an apology she could already feel coiling around her. "I'm afraid I have some unfortunate news."
The tablet slid from her lap, landing with a soft thud on the Persian rug. The world, which had felt so sharp and clear moments before, went fuzzy at the edges.
"What do you mean?" she asked, her voice cracking. "I paid the deposit. We have a signed pre-purchase agreement."
"I know, and I am terribly sorry for this. It's highly unusual," he said, his practiced regret doing nothing to soften the blow. "Another client came in this morning. They made an offer... a very substantial one. One the gallery owner felt we simply could not refuse. We are, of course, prepared to refund your deposit and pay the contractual penalty fee."
Her heart, which had felt like a cold, dead stone in her chest since last night, started to pound. A frantic, painful rhythm. That painting wasn't just a piece of art. It was an anchor to a life she thought she'd lost. It was a promise she had made to herself.
"Mr. Finch," she said, forcing her voice to remain steady, to betray none of the panic clawing at her throat. "The price is negotiable. I will match their offer. That painting... I have to have it."
There was a pause on the other end of the line. She could hear him take a deep breath. "Mrs. Perez, I'm afraid it's not that simple. The buyer is... a very important client. We can't afford to alienate them."
A chill snaked down her spine. There were only a handful of people in New York City who could make a top SoHo gallery break a contract with that level of impunity.
"Who is it?" she demanded, the question sharp.
Julian hesitated. "Our client list is confidential..."
"Who bought my painting, Julian?"
He sighed, a sound of defeat. "The buyer was Mr. Augustus Pruitt, of the Pruitt Group."
The name hit her like a lightning strike. It was so absurd, so cruelly perfect, that she almost laughed. A hysterical sound bubbled in her throat, and she had to bite her lip to keep it from escaping.
Of course.
It wasn't a coincidence. It was a cosmic joke at her expense. Augustus had no interest in art. He wouldn't know a Monet from a street-art stencil. He hadn't bought it for himself.
He'd bought it for Herlinda.
The numbness that had encased her since last night shattered, and in its place, a white-hot rage erupted. It surged through her veins, burning away the cold, the shock, the grief.
"Are they there now?" she asked, her voice dangerously calm.
"Yes, Mrs. Perez. They're just finalizing the paperwork."
"Don't sell it. I'm on my way."
She hung up before he could reply.
For a moment, she just stood there, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. He had taken her dignity. He had taken her hope. And now, he was taking the last piece of her past, the one thing that was truly, wholly hers, and he was going to hand it to another woman.
No. Not this time.
She flew up the stairs, her movements sharp and efficient. She pulled on a pair of jeans and a simple black cashmere sweater, shoving her feet into leather boots. She grabbed her purse and the keys to her car.
The housekeeper, Maeve, saw her rushing toward the garage. "Mrs. Perez, shall I have the driver bring the car around?"
"No, Maeve. I'll drive myself." Her eyes were blazing with a fire Maeve had never seen before.
She didn't take the black Bentley Augustus insisted she use. She went to the far corner of the garage, to the classic, silver Audi TT she had bought with the prize money from her first art competition, years before she'd ever heard the name Pruitt. It was hers.
She slid into the driver's seat, the worn leather a familiar comfort. The engine roared to life with a satisfying snarl, the sound a perfect echo of the fury building inside her chest.
She slammed the car into gear and peeled out of the garage, the tires squealing in protest.
As she sped through the streets of Manhattan, a single thought repeated in her mind, a mantra of defiance.
He would not take this from her. He would not win. Not today.
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9.8
Four years ago, I was drugged on a luxury yacht and ended up pregnant with twins.
I raised them in secret, enduring my stepfamily's daily abuse, until the billionaire West family patriarch cornered us at the airport.
He instantly recognized my son's face—an exact replica of his ruthless grandson, Bernardo West.
My malicious stepmother and stepsister immediately leaked to the press that I was a delusional gold-digger using fake kids to trap a billionaire.
They wanted the West family to destroy me to save their own social standing.
Bernardo himself looked at me with pure disgust, demanding a DNA test.
"If you ever lie to me, I will take the children, and I will make you wish you were never born."
I didn't want his money. I was a victim of that night too, left with a crescent-shaped bite mark on my collarbone and zero memory of who set us up.
Why did someone drug us? And how could I protect my babies from a corporate predator who could crush me with a snap of his fingers?
But when the DNA test came back 99.9999% positive, I didn't cower.
I showed him the scar he left on me, looked the most dangerous man in the country right in the eye, and made my demand.
"If you want to claim your heirs, you have to marry me."
9.7
"Sign it. You're no woman if you can't give me an heir."
Niamh gave Marcus two years of her life, her unwavering loyalty, and her silent love. In return, the billionaire CEO served her divorce papers and a one-way ticket to the gutter.
Cast out into a rainy night with nothing but the clothes on her back and twelve dollars, Niamh’s story should have ended there.
Instead, she stumbled on a stranger in the rain.
In an attempt to save him, he kisses her senseless. He is the last Lycan King standing, and a man of terrifying power, yet he is haunted by a seven-century curse.
When the king has a taste of Niamh in the pouring rain, he knew he had to keep her for himself, even though she was human and it was against the laws of their kind not to mingle with humans.
The King needs her essence and Niamh realizes she could use her body to get what she wanted; revenge on Marcus and his mother for humiliating her and making her waste her time.
Now, the woman Marcus discarded is rising as a global conglomerate queen and a Divine Enchantress as assigned by the Moon Goddess.
While her ex-husband’s empire crumbles into bankruptcy and his body rots with a shameful curse, Niamh is learning that being "claimed" by the King is much more than the contract she'd initially made with him.
He wanted to use her as his cure. She wanted to use him for her revenge.
But in the Lumina Realm, the Goddess has other plans.
8.9
Debora went to prison to protect the man she loved, only to end up a paroled convict living under the roof of her abusive foster parents.
When they found her positive pregnancy test from a one-night stand, they threatened to kick her out and send her straight back to a cell.
Just as they were about to report her, the stranger from that dark hotel room suddenly appeared.
He paid her foster parents one million dollars to marry her and take her away.
Debora thought she was finally safe.
But the moment they were alone, he looked at her with pure, venomous hatred.
He didn't want a wife; he wanted a prisoner.
He believed Debora was the ruthless murderer who had destroyed his life in a car crash, and he planned to make her suffocate in her own despair.
He didn't know she was just a scapegoat.
To survive and protect her baby, Debora found a job at a bridal shop, only to run into the real culprit—the man who actually drove the car and framed her.
He was now happily engaged to a wealthy heiress.
They deliberately ruined a priceless wedding gown and blamed it on her.
"Kneel on this floor and apologize, or I'm calling the police to revoke your parole!"
Why did she have to rot in hell for his sins, while the man she married wanted to destroy her?
Just as her trembling knees were about to touch the cold marble floor, the heavy glass doors were violently shoved open.
Her billionaire husband strode in like a force of nature, his eyes locked onto the wealthy couple with a terrifying, destructive rage.
7.9
On my wedding day, my fiancé Connor received an urgent phone call.
He told me a D-list actress had broken her leg on set, then abandoned me right at the altar.
In my past life, I cried until my throat bled, begging him not to leave.
But my tears only brought endless humiliation. My mother and adopted sister mocked me, framed me, and forged my signature to steal my multi-million dollar trust fund.
They kicked me out of the family estate without a single dime.
I ended up freezing to death in the minus-twenty-degree New York blizzard, listening to my mother's voicemail telling me to die in the street as long as I didn't bleed on her carpets.
Until my last breath, I couldn't understand why my own blood relatives hated me so much, yet treated an adopted daughter like a precious princess.
The only person who showed me any mercy—draping his wool coat over my frozen corpse and giving me a proper burial—was Connor's ruthless, untouchable uncle, Harding Snow.
Opening my eyes again, I was back in the bridal suite, right as Connor was rushing out the door.
This time, I didn't shed a single tear.
I let him run to his actress, then walked straight into the VIP room to face the most feared billionaire on Wall Street.
"The wedding proceeds as planned, but the groom's name changes to yours."
8.9
For fifteen years, I thought my mother had died in a tragic fire.
Then the wealthy Ross family's butler knocked on my door, revealing she was alive—locked away in the psychiatric annex of their massive estate.
I rushed into the lion's den to save her, only to run straight into Graydon Ross, the ruthless billionaire CEO.
He looked at my cheap clothes with pure disgust, convinced I was a bottom-feeding scammer trying to extort his family.
"Throw this bitch out into the snow."
He ordered his armed guards to drag me away, completely cutting off my only chance to see my mentally broken mother.
But as he violently grabbed my collar to throw me out, I saw a custom eagle-head cufflink hanging from his coat pocket.
My blood turned to ice, and a wave of paralyzing terror crashed over me.
Eight months ago, I accidentally slept with a masked stranger in a pitch-black hotel room and fled before dawn.
That cufflink belonged to him.
The man who took my virginity—the Wall Street tyrant I had been hiding from—was Graydon Ross.
If he ever found out I was that woman, he would literally destroy my life.
But to save my mother, I couldn't be thrown out.
When his grandmother suddenly appeared, I dropped to the floor, exposed the dark bruises Graydon had just left on my wrists, and sobbed.
I framed the billionaire for assault to secure my place in the mansion, forcing myself to live right next door to the monster whose bed I had fled.
7.6
🔞🔞🔞🔞🔞🔞
Aria Bennett is the perfect daughter, a decoration in her father's massive business empire. But for one night, she decides to break every rule. At a secret underground club, she meets Adrian, a man who knows exactly how to please her and awaken desires she never knew she had. They promise each other nothing but one night of pleasure and desire.
But when Aria wakes up to find him gone, leaving only a cold note behind, she thinks the fantasy is over. That is, until she walks downstairs the next morning to see the same man standing in her driveway.
Now, the man who knows her darkest secrets is her father's new driver. Forced to face him every day while pretending they are strangers, Aria is caught in a suffocating game of cat and mouse.
Adrian on the other hand is dangerous, cold, and hiding a secret that could destroy her father's empire.
And the closer she gets to him, the more she risks losing everything, including herself.