Rising From The Ashes Of Betrayal
I spent my whole life trying to fit into the "Kensington aesthetic," dyeing my hair blonde and playing dumb just to earn a crumb of my father's approval. But when the manor went up in flames, I realized I was never a daughter to them-I was just an inconvenience.
I lay pinned under a heavy oak beam, the smell of copper and burnt sugar filling my lungs. My father, Arthur, stood in the doorway with my brothers, looking like a phalanx of saviors, but their eyes weren't on me.
They rushed past my outstretched, bloody hand to save my sister, Karly, who was huddled in a corner without a scratch on her. My brother Archer scooped her up like spun glass, stepping over my crushed leg without a second glance. Just before they crossed the threshold, Karly looked back at me and smiled-a small, victorious, terrifying smile. My father didn't offer help; he just shouted that I was an arsonist and slammed the door, sentencing me to burn alive in my own bedroom.
As the crystal chandelier melted and crashed toward me, I didn't feel fear anymore. I felt a guttural, distilled hate for the family that left me to die because of a lie. I had spent my life begging for scraps at a table that was never meant for me, and I died realizing they never loved me at all.
"If I come back," I promised into the void, "I will burn you all down."
I gasped for air and woke up in my bed, the smell of lavender replacing the smoke. It was September 14th, five years before the fire, the exact week I had started ruining myself to please them. I looked in the mirror, scrubbed off the pathetic makeup mask, and realized the old, desperate Kala was dead. If I was going to burn, I'd make sure they were the ones who felt the heat first.
"Queen is back online," I whispered.
Chapters
Share
Chapter 4
Arthur loomed over her, a tower of expensive wool and unchecked authority. He smelled of cigars and old money-a scent that used to make Kala feel safe, but now just made her nauseous.
"In this house," Arthur said, pointing a finger inches from her nose, "nobody defies me."
Kala didn't flinch. She didn't blink. She tilted her head back slightly, exposing her throat, not in submission, but in challenge.
"Respect is a two-way street, Arthur."
The use of his first name hit him like a physical blow. His eyes widened, the pupils contracting into pinpricks of rage.
"Kala!" Doloris gasped, clutching her pearls as if Kala had just pulled a knife. "He is your father! Have you lost your mind?"
Arthur let out a darkly amused huff. "It seems the foster system turned you into a savage. I should have expected this."
He turned away, walking toward the window, then spun back, his face twisted. "You have two choices. Get on your knees right now and beg your sister for forgiveness, or I make a call to St. Mary's."
Kala's heart skipped a beat. St. Mary's.
It wasn't a church. It was a high-end "wellness center" on the coast. In reality, it was a dumping ground where the elite stored their inconvenient relatives. A place of sedatives, padded rooms, and doctors who wrote whatever diagnosis the check-writer requested.
In her past life, the mere mention of St. Mary's would have sent her into a panic attack. She would have crawled on the floor to avoid it.
But fear, when pushed past the point of death, transforms into calculation.
Kala walked past Arthur. She moved to the single wingback chair adjacent to him-his favorite reading chair-and sat down. She crossed her legs, smoothing the silk of her robe. The leather was cool against her skin. She was claiming his throne, right in front of him.
Arthur's face contorted. "Get out of my chair." His voice was low, dangerous.
He took a step forward, his hand reaching out as if to physically haul her from the seat. But he stopped. Kala's gaze met his, and it was utterly devoid of fear. It was a cold, flat, analytical stare that seemed to see right through his bluster to the anxious businessman beneath.
"You want to commit me?" Kala asked, her voice conversational. "On what grounds?"
"Emotional instability!" Arthur roared, thrown off balance by her audacity. "Violent tendencies! Destruction of property! You are clearly unwell!"
"I'm the one sitting calmly," Kala pointed out. "You are the one screaming and turning purple. If a doctor walked in right now, who do you think they would sedate?"
Arthur sputtered, his face flushing a deeper shade of crimson.
"As for violence," Kala continued, examining her fingernails, "do you have footage? A police report? Medical records of Karly's injuries?"
"We are witnesses!" Archer yelled.
Kala shifted her gaze to Archer. It was a laser-focused glare. "Did you see me push the vase, Archer? Or did you hear a crash, run into the hallway, and find Karly crying on the floor?"
Archer opened his mouth. He closed it. He looked at Karly, then back at Kala. "I... I know what you did."
"So, you didn't see it," Kala concluded.
She turned back to Arthur. "If you send me to St. Mary's, I will demand a lawyer. I will petition for an independent psychiatric evaluation. And I will make sure the press knows that the Kensington family is locking up their biological daughter to protect the fragile ego of their adopted one."
She paused, letting the words hang in the air. She remembered the frantic calls from her past life, the hushed, panicked conversations about a deal gone wrong. The Zurich merger. It was in its infancy now, a secret known only to the board. A secret that would, in the future, nearly cripple them.
"Tell me, Arthur," she said, her voice dropping to a whisper. "How will Kensington Corp stock react to a scandal like that? 'CEO Institutionalizes Daughter in Fit of Rage.' The board is already jittery about the merger in Zurich, aren't they?"
Arthur froze.
The room went dead silent.
Kala wasn't supposed to know about the Zurich merger. She wasn't supposed to know about the board's anxiety. She was supposed to be the dumb, emotional girl who cared about lipstick and boys.
Arthur looked at her with a mixture of confusion and genuine alarm. He was a businessman first, a father second. And Kala had just placed a gun on the negotiation table.
"You are threatening me?" Arthur hissed.
"I am stating facts," Kala said, shrugging. "You care about your reputation. I care about my freedom. It seems we have a stalemate."
Karly, watching from the sofa, realized she was losing the room. The spotlight was shifting. Arthur was calculating, not punishing.
She let out a low, pained moan. Her hand fluttered to her chest.
"Daddy..." she wheezed.
You may also like
8.2
In her previous life, Eliana took the fall for her adopted sister Iris and lost everything, even being forced into a marriage where her work was stolen to build another man's empire.
Meanwhile, her sister's "perfect" marriage ended in tragedy-her husband turned out disabled and died young.
Reborn, the sisters swapped their fates, Iris claiming the handsome man for herself while Eliana marrying the allegedly sick billionaire.
Eliana only smiled-she knew the truth behind her marriage in the previous life. This time, she chose a different path, bringing her brilliance into the light while using marriage as a mere tool.
Yet the man she married stood firmly by her side, saying, "With me behind you, no one will dare touch you."
7.6
Sophia's life turns upside down when her husband, Donald, leaves her for his childhood love. Heartbroken and alone, she's forced to confront the harsh reality that her marriage was a sham. But as she digs deeper, she discovers a shocking truth – her entire life has been a lie.
The people she trusted, the memories she cherished, everything was a carefully constructed facade. Her biological father, a billionaire, has been searching for her, and she's forced to confront the dark secrets surrounding her mother's tragic death.
With her emotions raw and her trust shattered, Sophia must navigate this new reality and make a choice: forgive and forget or fight for what's rightfully hers. Will she find love again or will the secrets of her past destroy her future?
7.8
Alexis signed the divorce papers, leaving her with no assets, no alimony, and just the clothes on her back.
To forget her abusive husband Carlos, she got drunk and bought a high-end gigolo for the night with her last 800 dollars.
But the man she slept with wasn't an escort. He was Jarrett Hughes, a ruthless billionaire CEO.
And while she was gone, her ex-husband was busy destroying her entire life.
Carlos framed her with fake photos of her cheating to justify the penniless divorce.
Then came the real nightmare.
Carlos and her own aunt secretly drained her family's corporate accounts, driving her father to jump off a building.
At the hospital, her grieving mother blamed her for the tragedy, violently attacking her in the ER.
To top it off, her cousin Josie—who was secretly sleeping with Carlos—held her father's ashes hostage.
"Crawl on your knees and pick it up, or the ashes go in the river," Josie sneered, throwing cash into the freezing slush.
Stripped of her marriage, her father, and her dignity, Alexis sat bleeding in the snow.
She couldn't understand why the people she loved most had coordinated such a brutal slaughter against her.
But Carlos and Josie made one fatal mistake.
They didn't know the "gigolo" Alexis had accidentally bought was the most powerful man in New York.
Alexis looked at the towering billionaire standing behind her, a vengeful fire burning in her eyes.
"I need you to get my father's ashes back," she said, pulling him into a kiss right in front of her ex-husband. "I don't care what it takes."
9.5
BLURB
"This...this is wrong." I whispered, shivering as Rowan's fingers traced along the lines of my slit.
"Wrong?" Ellis' lips brushed my neck, his teeth grazing my skin. "Honey, forbidden is what makes it irresistible."
Noah's lips grazed my ear, his warm breath fanning my ears as his soft voice slipped in. "And you'll learn... We take what we want."
*****
Isla North had always followed her brother's rules, until she tasted what it was like to break them. Her brother, Asher North, captain of the college hockey team, made one rule when his sister resumed freshman year:
"You can fuck with other girls for all I care, but do not go close to my sister."
They all easily agreed; after all, brotherhood came first. Until three men broke that rule-his best friends. Rowan, the teasing and sinfully hot strategist. Ellis, the calm, gorgeously hot destruction, and Noah, the reckless, untamed, and sexily wild.
Between secret locker room encounters, broken rules, and nights ending in trembling submission, Isla discovers that forbidden desire is intoxicating and dangerous.
The ice isn't the only thing Isla is playing on. Power, lust, and obsession blur the lines, and once she surrenders... there's no going back.
8.9
Three years ago, Corinna had been an orphan, taken in by an influential family to marry their comatose heir.
Then the groom woke up, and the vows curdled; he treated her like worthless, disposable trash.
After her car wreck, she lay bleeding on the asphalt while he cheated with the woman he truly wanted. Something in her snapped, and she asked for a divorce with numb, shattered calm.
After walking away from the marriage, her secrets unraveled-a top-tier heiress, a hacker beyond reach, and a once-in-a-generation healer.
Her ex came crawling back, begging, unraveling, and losing control. But it was all too late.
8.2
I spent a year in a Swiss asylum, swallowing pills to cure a madness that didn’t exist.
It turned out the medication was just sugar.
My insanity was a script written by Jaxon Francis, the Don of New York, just so he could marry a Cartel princess without his ward getting in the way.
When I finally escaped and tried to leave him, his new wife staged her own kidnapping and framed me.
Jaxon didn’t ask for proof. He didn’t look at the evidence.
Instead, he tied a rope around my ankles and dragged me behind a helicopter across the jagged rocks of the Wastelands.
He held his wife close and watched as my skin was flayed and my bones shattered, believing he was executing a traitor.
He left me for dead in the dirt, convinced he had cleansed his empire.
I took the hush money his mother threw at me and vanished, letting Alina Phillips die in that field.
Three years later, I returned to New York as "Echo," the elusive artist the world was obsessing over.
At a charity auction, Jaxon bid one hundred million dollars for a painting of a woman’s scarred back, desperate to buy redemption for the ghost he thought he killed.
He chased me into the rain, begging for a second chance, swearing he had destroyed his wife for me.
I looked at the man who once held my heart and simply smiled.
Then I turned to the man standing beside me.
"Jaxon, meet Darwin," I said, linking my arm through his.
"My husband."