Jilted Heiress: Rising From The Ashes
I stood in the center of my Manhattan penthouse, staring at the empty satin hanger where my custom Vera Wang gown should have been. It was a masterpiece of silk and pearls that had taken six months to perfect for my wedding to the billionaire heir, Boston Travis.
Then my phone buzzed. Boston’s voice was a flat line, devoid of the love he’d promised me for four years.
"The wedding is off, Florrie. I’m marrying your sister, Asia."
He told me Asia was dying of Stage 4 cancer and her "final wish" was to be a bride—wearing my dress. He had sent his security team to my home with a spare key to steal the gown, claiming it was Travis property since his family accounts paid the bill. My stepmother texted me minutes later, demanding I vacate my own beach house so the "dying" girl could have a honeymoon.
When I tried to protest, Boston snapped at me.
"How could you be so heartless? She’s your sister. Have some compassion."
They expected me to play the part of the discarded woman while they paraded my life around as a PR stunt. I realized then that Asia hadn't just taken my dress; she had spent her entire life stealing my father's love and my peace, always playing the fragile angel while I was cast as the villain.
I didn't cry. I sat at my desk, opened my contacts, and relabeled Boston Travis as "TARGET."
If they wanted a tragic story, I would give them a massacre. I reclaimed my mother’s multi-million dollar trust, seized the deed to the beach house, and walked into Asia’s hospital room with a lit sparkler to expose the truth behind her "terminal" illness.
As I slapped Boston in the hospital lobby in front of a dozen recording iPhones, I realized I didn't need a husband. I needed a clean slate—and I was going to burn their empire to get it.
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Chapter 6
The VIP wing of Mount Sinai Hospital didn't smell like sickness. It smelled of fresh lilies and expensive coffee. The floors were polished to a mirror shine, and the silence was respectful, heavy with money.
Florrie's combat boots squeaked against the linoleum as she marched down the corridor.
She heard them before she saw them.
"I can't believe she did that to your pants, Boston! It's assault!" Deirdre's shrill voice drifted from Room 402. "And demanding the trust back? Arlin, you have to do something. Call the lawyers."
"I can't," Arlin Jefferson's gruff voice replied. "If she leaks that recording about the tax evasion, we're all finished. We have to let her have it."
Florrie paused outside the open door. Through the glass, she saw the tableau.
Asia was in the bed, propped up by a mountain of pillows. She looked pale, yes, but her hair was perfectly brushed, and she was wearing a silk robe, not a hospital gown. Boston sat by her side, holding her hand. He had changed into a pair of hospital scrubs pants-presumably borrowed from a doctor-which looked ridiculous with his dress shirt.
Deirdre was pacing. Arlin was rubbing his temples.
Florrie pushed the door open. It hit the stopper with a loud thud.
Everyone jumped.
"Did someone order a delivery?" Florrie asked.
She walked to the foot of the bed. She upended the brown paper grocery bag.
Clatter. Clink. Crash.
Thousands of dollars worth of diamonds and gold spilled onto the rolling table at the foot of the bed. The emerald ring spun on the plastic surface and fell onto the floor.
"My jewelry!" Genevieve, who was sitting in the corner, gasped. "You brought it in a paper bag? Like takeout?"
"It's what it deserves," Florrie said. She looked at Asia. "Here. You like my leftovers so much? Take them. Wear the ring. It's a bit loose, though. You might need to fatten up."
"Florence!" Arlin stood up, his face red. "Have some respect! Your sister is dying!"
"Is she?" Florrie tilted her head. She looked at the monitor. The heart rate was steady. The oxygen levels were 99%. "She looks remarkably energetic for someone on death's door."
"Get out!" Boston shouted, standing up. "You've done enough damage."
"Not yet," Florrie said.
She reached into her pocket. She pulled out the long, silver sparkler.
The room went silent.
"What is that?" Deirdre asked, her voice trembling.
"A candle," Florrie said. "For the happy couple."
She flicked the lighter. Click.
The flame roared to life. She touched it to the tip of the sparkler.
HISSSSSS.
A fountain of gold and silver sparks erupted from the stick. It was blindingly bright in the dim room. The smell of sulfur and burning magnesium filled the air instantly. The fire alarm on the ceiling began to shriek-a piercing, electronic scream-but no water came. It was a smoke detector, not a heat sensor.
"Are you crazy?" Boston screamed, shielding his eyes. "There are oxygen tanks in here! You'll blow us up!"
"Relax," Florrie said, her voice calm amidst the blaring alarm. She waved the sparkling wand like a conductor's baton. "I'm not an arsonist. I'm just creating a diversion."
She took a step closer to the bed, the sparks dancing dangerously near the silk sheets. Nurses and a security guard were now running down the hall toward the noise.
"Congratulations," Florrie said, her voice cutting through the chaos. "I wish you a long and happy marriage." She paused, her eyes locking onto Asia's. "Oh, wait. You don't have long, do you?"
She reached into her other pocket and pulled out a small, crumpled piece of paper-a pharmacy receipt she'd fished out of the trash at their shared Hamptons house last month.
She held it up. "Funny thing, Asia. Your chemotherapy drugs have a severe interaction warning. 'Avoid all contact with Lilium pollen.' It can cause anaphylaxis. Seizures. Sores."
She gestured with the sparkler toward the enormous bouquet of white lilies on the bedside table-Genevieve's contribution.
"You've been surrounded by your own personal kryptonite for hours," Florrie said sweetly. "And yet... not a single rash. Not one sneeze. You look radiant. How do you do it?"
Asia's face went white. Arlin and Deirdre stared, confused. But Boston... Boston looked from the lilies, to the receipt, to Asia's terrified face. For the first time, a seed of pure, undiluted doubt was planted.
"What is she talking about?" Boston asked, his voice low.
"She's lying! She's crazy!" Asia shrieked, but her protest was drowned out by the arrival of security, who grabbed Florrie by the arms.
Florrie didn't resist. She dropped the dying sparkler onto the linoleum floor, where it fizzled out. She had done what she came to do.
As they pulled her from the room, she looked over her shoulder at Boston. "Ask her doctor," Florrie called out. "Ask to see the allergy panel on her chart."
She was shoved out into the hallway, leaving behind a family frozen in a tableau of suspicion and a room that stank of smoke and lies.
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9.8
I married an S-class Alpha to save my family's bankrupt company.
But my husband, Braydon, treated me worse than a stray dog.
When my heat cycle triggered early, the fever was agonizing. I crawled to our master bedroom, crying and begging him for just one temporary bite to save my life.
Instead, he locked the door from the inside.
"Go back to your room. I told you I didn't want to deal with you this weekend."
Through the crack under the door, I smelled the cheap perfume of his mistress. While I was dying in the hallway, forced to inject a toxic black-market suppressant that made me vomit blood, he was sleeping with her in our bed.
Days later, a drunk Braydon pinned me to the floor, trying to violently force a permanent mark on my neck just to assert his dominance.
When I fought him off, he blamed me for provoking him and casually tossed a credit card at me to buy my silence.
"Go buy whatever you want. Just tell the clinic you slipped in the shower."
Staring at the man who was supposed to protect me, my heart went completely cold. Why did I ever think this monster would change? This wasn't a marriage anymore; it was a cage, and the animal inside it was trying to kill me.
I quietly pressed the record button on my phone, capturing every single word of his twisted bribe.
Then, I pulled out a matte black business card and called the terrifying Enigma CEO who had been waiting for me in the shadows.
9.6
Haylie waited nervously at the Wall Street charity gala for her boyfriend Bryan, but a spiked drink hit her hard, leaving her stumbling into a VIP lounge.
There, Chester Steele, the ruthless CEO of Steele Industrial, found her—drugged and vulnerable. What started as a frantic claiming in the shadows ended with him whispering she was his.
But moments later, a security alert shattered everything: data breach traced to Haylie's terminal. Chester's fury exploded. He saw her brush past a Logan Group rival on footage and dumped her in the rain, firing her as a corporate spy.
Bryan answered her desperate call with ice: "It's over." Reporters swarmed her door, branding her a traitor. Arrested at the office by FBI agents, she watched smug coworker Erin wave goodbye.
Thrown in a cell, chained and grilled with fake evidence—offshore accounts in her name—Haylie learned the worst: charges now included her sick father, Ernest, framed for laundering the leak money. Plead guilty or he dies in prison.
Innocent and raging, she couldn't fathom who planted it all—the gala bump, the logs, the forgeries. Why her? Who hated her enough to destroy her life?
Chester burst in, posting unlimited bail but forcing her signature on a slave contract: live in his penthouse, serve him 24/7. As she collapsed in his arms, trapped in his gilded cage, Haylie vowed silently—she'd uncover the real traitor and make them pay.
9.7
For three years, I was the dutiful wife of billionaire Ervin Valdez.
On our third wedding anniversary, he came home smelling of his mistress's perfume, pinned me down, and brutally mocked me.
His mistress, Sylvia, had even sent me a fake ultrasound report to force me out of the picture.
In Ervin's eyes, I was just a vicious, calculating liar who used a pregnancy to trap him into marriage.
He didn't care that I had actually lost that baby, nor did he know the trauma of my gambling father selling me to a dark club where I was assaulted by a stranger.
When I finally handed him the signed divorce papers, giving up all assets, and left the penthouse with nothing but an old suitcase, he just sneered.
"She is playing a game of hard to get. She won't last three days before she comes crying back."
He froze all my bank accounts, let his mistress humiliate me in public, and waited coldly for me to starve and beg.
He thought my entire existence relied on his wealth, completely confident that I would inevitably surrender to his control.
But he was wrong.
I calmly opened my old laptop, bypassed the complex encryptions, and looked at the dozens of unread emails from top-tier global brands begging for my return.
I resurrected my hidden identity as the legendary jewelry designer "R," and walked straight into the top design firm in Manhattan.
"It is time to find myself again."
9.2
He became crippled because of me,but I ran away from the man I loved...and fell into the arms of his father.
One reckless night with a stranger should have ended there, until I learned the stranger was Lucien Sinclair, the self-made billionaire CEO of the Sinclair Empire.
My ex-boyfriend's father.
Now I'm trapped in a contract marriage with a devil, who forces me to watch my past and present collide under the same roof.
And betrayal? It's my daily dose...especially when my best friend steals my husband right before my eyes.
Then the nightmare turns fatal.
I'm pregnant... with twins.
One child belongs to the father.
The other belongs to the son.
No matter who I choose......someone I love will burn.
8.7
They killed her once. Now, she's back to collect the debt.
Thrown back in time to the single night that shattered her life, Jane King is no longer the powerless charity case of the billionaire Norman family. She's a ghost with a ten-year grudge and a perfect memory of every sin they committed. The timid girl is gone, replaced by a woman with nothing left to lose and a ledger that can only be balanced in ruin.
Her audit begins tonight. With the cold precision of a master strategist, she dismantles the heirs, staging their downfall as tragic accidents. But her bloody work doesn't go unnoticed. From a balcony above, the enigmatic and dangerous Hudson Ellison watches the victim become a predator. He's the only one who sees the monster she's become, and he doesn't want to cage it-he wants to crown it.
He offers a dangerous alliance and the keys to an empire. But in a game of secrets and lies, when you partner with a wolf, you risk becoming the prey.
7.5
When Alessia Romano's ex-husband destroys her family's company to drag her back to him, she refuses to beg. But refusing comes at a cost she never expected.
Billionaire Adrian Virelli pays off every debt and saves Romano Industries from ruin. The price is simple. Three years of her life, living under his roof as his daughter's nanny.
Adrian is cold, controlled, and completely off limits. Alessia tells herself she feels nothing.
But when she discovers a hidden room filled with portraits of a woman wearing her face, the truth hits harder than any betrayal she has ever known
She was never the woman he wanted. She was only a replacement.
She walks away. Then his ex-wife returns, and the danger that follows is nothing like Alessia expected. Someone wants her dead, Adrian nearly dies saving her life, and when he finally opens his eyes again, he remembers nothing.
His ex-wife is standing at his bedside, ready to rewrite every memory he has left.
And Alessia is running out of time to make the man she loves remember that he loved her too.