Husband's Lies, Mistress's Son

My world crumbled when I saw my husband, Arthur, across the street with his mistress, Karin, and a son who was his spitting image. For years, he' d told me he wasn' t ready for a family. It was all a lie. But the true horror began at my own awards ceremony. Karin' s son, coached to hate me, rushed the stage and attacked me. The assault caused me to miscarry the baby Arthur swore he never wanted. As I lay bleeding on the stage, my husband didn't help. He shoved me aside, his eyes blazing with fury. "You monster!" he roared, scooping up his son and leaving me shattered in front of everyone. Later, Karin cornered me, her voice a triumphant whisper. "I made sure you'd lose the baby." Then, she pushed me off a cliff into the churning ocean below. But I didn't die. A fisherman pulled me from the water, broken but alive. As the world mourned the "accidental drowning" of Elenora Dawson, I made a call to the Vienna Conservatory. "I accept."

Chapters

Chapter 3

The doctor's words hung in the air, a surreal, impossible truth. Pregnant. My hand, almost unconsciously, went to my abdomen, flat and unchanging. A life, forming inside me. His life.

Tears, hot and unstoppable, streamed down my face. Joy, grief, anger, confusion-they all swirled into a nauseating cocktail. How could this be? After all his denials, all his excuses. Now, when everything was shattered, this.

I needed certainty. More than that, I needed absolute privacy. I made an appointment at a renowned private clinic across town, one known for its celebrity clients and ironclad confidentiality. I couldn't risk anyone-especially Arthur or Karin-finding out.

The waiting room was tastefully minimalist, hushed. I sat, my mind a storm of conflicting emotions, trying to decide what to do. A small hand tugged at my skirt.

"Ugly lady!" Leo. He giggled, a bright, innocent sound that now grated on my nerves. He had a juice box in his hand. Before I could react, he squeezed it, and a stream of sticky orange liquid splattered across my leg. Another ruined outfit. Another calculated humiliation.

Arthur, looking harried, appeared from an examination room. "Leo! What did I tell you about bothering people?" His tone was mild, a mere ripple on the surface of his composure. He glanced at me, a flicker of surprise in his eyes, quickly masked. "Elenora? What are you doing here?"

"Just a routine check-up," I replied, my voice devoid of emotion. I moved to leave, to escape the suffocating proximity of his double life.

But then I heard it. Arthur, speaking to a nurse, his voice low but clear. "My son, Leo, just a quick check-up. He's my only child, you know. My pride and joy."

"My only child." The words echoed in the sterile silence of the clinic, each syllable a shard of glass ripping through me. My hand flew to my belly, a protective, desperate gesture. He had a child. Our child. And he had just casually, brutally, disowned it.

A wave of nausea crashed over me, stronger than anything I'd felt before. I stumbled into the nearest restroom, barely making it to the sink before I retched. It wasn't just the morning sickness anymore. It was the sickness of his lies, the monumental scale of his betrayal.

When I emerged, Karin was waiting. She stood leaning against the wall, perfectly poised, a predatory gleam in her eyes. "Lost your lunch, Elenora?" she purred, her voice a cruel whisper. "Must be the stress. Or perhaps the realization that some people just aren't meant to have children. Arthur certainly doesn't want yours."

My breath caught in my throat. How-? She knew. She knew about the baby. The implication was horrifying. Had she been tracking me? Was this all part of her sickening game?

"You're a monster," I whispered, my voice raw.

She laughed, a low, throaty sound. "And you, Elenora, are a fool. Arthur is mine. Leo is his only legacy. You have nothing." She leaned closer, her eyes blazing with malice. "Consider this a warning. Disappear. Or I will make you."

I straightened my shoulders, a sudden, cold resolve hardening my spine. "You won't make me do anything," I said, my voice surprisingly steady. "I decide my future now." I walked past her, my head held high, leaving her standing there, her words echoing like a death knell for a life I once knew.

As I reached the exit, Leo's high-pitched voice sliced through the air. "Daddy says he doesn't want your baby, ugly lady!" The words, coached and weaponized, hung in the air, a public execution of my last shred of hope.

The pain was a physical entity, a black hole opening in my chest, swallowing everything. There was no future for this child. Not with Arthur. Not with Karin's monstrous shadow looming.

I would terminate the pregnancy. And then, I would divorce Arthur Beasley.

My lawyer, a formidable woman named Clara, listened patiently. "I want half of everything," I stated, my voice flat, devoid of emotion. "Every asset, every cent. I want to bleed him dry."

Clara nodded, her expression grim. "He won't see it coming."

My phone rang as I stepped out of her office. Arthur. The caller ID glowed, an ironic beacon. I answered.

"Happy Birthday, Elenora!" he chirped, his voice falsely bright. "Sorry I'm late. You know how it is. Politics never sleeps."

"Right," I said, my tone flat enough to cut glass.

"But I have something special planned for you tonight! A surprise. Just the two of us. To make up for everything." He sounded like a hopeful puppy, oblivious to the storm brewing.

"A surprise?" I repeated, a bitter, hollow laugh escaping my lips.

"Yes! So put on something nice. I'll pick you up at eight."

"I'll be ready," I said, ending the call.

A faint smile touched my lips. He had no idea. Not a clue. He thought he was orchestrating a grand gesture. He thought he was still in control.

Tonight, everything would change. And he would be utterly unprepared.

Continue to next part

In my past life, the Cerberus strain leaked, turning the world into a blood-soaked hell of rotting flesh and mutated monsters. I thought my boyfriend Declan and my best friend Hailee would have my back as we fled the quarantine zone. Instead, when the surging crowd of the infected cornered us, they didn't hesitate. They shoved me backward into the horde just to buy themselves three seconds to run. As I fell into the mud, I saw them fleeing without a single backward glance. "She's dead weight anyway!" Hailee screamed. "Just keep running, she'll distract them!" Declan yelled back. I was torn apart, feeling the agonizing tear of rotting teeth sinking into my neck and the hot spray of my own blood. Before the apocalypse, my greedy uncle had locked away my ten-million-dollar trust fund, leaving me with nothing but a fake boyfriend who only wanted me for my money. Until my last breath, I couldn't understand how the people I loved most could trade my life for a head start. Why did I blindly trust them? Why didn't I see through their perfectly choreographed lies? Opening my eyes again, the stench of decaying flesh vanished, replaced by the sterile smell of my college dorm room. Hailee and Declan were standing over my bed, faking tears of concern over my meningitis fever. I was back exactly seven days before the world ended, and my spatial vault ability had come back with me. This time, I'm extorting my uncle for every cent, hoarding the city's supplies, and leaving them all to rot.

Action Horror Modern Sci-Fi

9.3

Bound By His Obsession, Trapped Forever

9.3

My mate, Theron, was a powerful Alpha, and I, a scentless Omega, was his greatest prize. But beneath his adoring facade was a terrifying, possessive monster, revealed when he dragged me home and forced me into our bed after I was late to his challenge match. His golden eyes burned with chilling control, and he whispered a threat that turned my blood to ice. I'd been stuck on a forest road, my truck dead, racing to reach his challenge match. His mate bond panic had already frayed my nerves, but nothing prepared me for his rage. He'd publicly broken his opponent's shoulder, then stalked directly to me, ignoring the crowd. He marked my lateness with chilling precision, before dragging me away to our rooms for "punishment." Later, as he tried to force a ceremonial marking pendant on me, he promised, "If you will not accept my mark willingly, then I will wait for your Heat. I will fuck you until your body begs for it, and my wolf will hold you down while I bite." My gaze fell on his open journal, filled with frantic, scrawled words: "SHE IS MINE. PUNISH. CLAIM. MARK HER. BREED HER. MAKE HER UNDERSTAND SHE IS MINE. MINE. MINE." The man I loved, my only protection, was a captor in disguise, his devotion a gilded cage. Every gentle touch, every soft word, now felt like a brand of ownership, a tightening leash. The terrifying truth of his pathological obsession finally hit me. A fragile plan formed in the space between heartbeats: I would de-escalate, redefine, and survive, no matter the cost, before his possessive madness consumed me entirely.

Horror Romance Werewolf

9.5

Tethered Spirit: Bound To My Murderer Husband

9.5

My son was dying in my arms, and the man who should have been saving him was likely choosing an engagement ring for another woman. I rushed Jeremy to the Emergency Room, his small body heavy and limp against my chest. But the person blocking the sliding doors wasn’t a doctor. It was Yvonne, my fiancé Benedict's new lover. She looked at my desperate, rain-soaked face and sneered. "Don't ruin my night with your drama," she hissed. "Benedict is busy." She and her brother shoved me back onto the wet floor. My son died on the cold tiles of the entrance. My heart gave out moments later, unable to bear the grief. When Benedict finally walked past our bodies, he didn't even look at our faces. He crumpled up the note I had written begging for help and tossed it into the trash. "Unbelievable," he muttered. "She uses the kid as an excuse to interrupt my shift again." He stepped over his own dead son to go to a party. But I didn't disappear. I became a ghost, invisible and tethered to him by an unbreakable chain. I watched him laugh with the woman who killed us. I watched him live his perfect life while I floated in the void. Until he found the autopsy report. Until he saw the date of birth. Until he found the broken locket in the evidence bag engraved with *Benedict & Ava*. Now, he spends every night crying into the dark, begging for a forgiveness he will never get. He thinks he is simply haunted. He has no idea he is paying a blood debt that will never end.

Horror Modern Romance

7.7

The Cursed Story

7.7

During a college retreat, we hosted a storytelling competition. They just kept egging me on, completely oblivious to the terrifying disaster it would invite. I said, "The story I'm about to tell is a curse." "Everyone who has ever heard this story has died." "Are you sure you want to hear it?"

Fantasy Horror Young Adult

7.0

The Disposable Bride's Deadly Secret Identity

7.0

My debt-ridden uncle sold me to the Romero mafia family to save his own skin. I was forced to marry Emiliano Romero, a man known to the underworld as "The Ghost"—a rumored monster who supposedly tore his last two caretakers apart. My aunt and cousin delighted in my misery. My cousin came at me with a razor, leaving a nasty bruise on my face, while my aunt bleached my hair to make me look like a cheap, disposable doll. When the Romeros arrived, they didn't even pretend to want a daughter-in-law. "The Family needs a nobody whose death won't start a police report." They just wanted a clueless victim to sign a pre-nup and die quietly. They shoved me down a sterile hallway and locked me inside a fortified, padded cell with a man wrapped in heavy chains. They all thought they were sacrificing a helpless, terrified lamb to a madman. They laughed at my tears, completely convinced I was just gutter trash waiting to be slaughtered. But they had no idea I was a highly trained undercover operative. Listening to their arrogant whispers, the pieces finally clicked. Emiliano wasn't a deranged killer—he was a prisoner being drugged and framed by his own blood. I drained my uncle's bank account to buy a neurotoxin antidote, dropped my pathetic, trembling disguise, and stepped calmly into the monster's cage. I wasn't here to be their victim. I was here to save him.

Horror Mafia Mystery

7.4

The Genius Doctor's Perfect Fake Death

7.4

To escape my psychopathic, controlling lover, I faked my death in a Syrian war zone. Thirty-seven reconstructive surgeries later, the terrified girl he kept locked in a basement was gone. I returned to New York as an untouchable neurosurgeon, Dr. Alivia Clay. I only came back to save his grandfather—the one man who helped me escape. I thought my flawless new face was the perfect armor. But the moment Collis Duncan saw me, he cornered me against the hospital wall. He didn't recognize my face, but he recognized my panic. He trapped me in his arms, inhaling the faint scent of vanilla and orange blossom on my skin. "You smell exactly like a ghost I used to know," he whispered. Worse, a traumatized, mute little boy with Collis's exact gray eyes stumbled into me in the hallway. The boy clutched my white coat and handed me a flashcard with a crude drawing of a woman. "Mama." My blood turned to ice. Five years ago, I was told my newborn baby burned to ashes in that medical tent. How could this boy be alive? Why did Collis have my son while I mourned a pile of dust? Now, Collis is ordering a microscopic background check, desperate to tear my fake life to the ground and cage me again. But I'm not running anymore. Once I finish this surgery, I'm taking my son back.

Action Horror Modern

Husband's Lies, Mistress's Son

Chapter 3

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