The Betrayed Heiress's Vengeful Flash Marriage
Ashley was tied to a rusted iron pillar in an abandoned warehouse, the noxious fumes of gasoline soaking her clothes.
Her fiancé Devon and her stepsister Brittany stood before her, revealing a horrifying truth. Devon never saved her from that fatal car crash three years ago; he merely stole the credit.
Worse, Brittany smirked and confessed that Ashley's own father had orchestrated her mother's murder. Before Ashley could process the betrayal, Devon callously tossed a lighter. A wall of blistering heat instantly consumed her. Even when Bennett Hawkins, the cold and untouchable billionaire, rushed into the inferno to shield her with his body, they were both swallowed by the explosion.
As the fire melted her skin, Ashley died with agonizing hatred. Why did her own flesh and blood want her dead? What dark secret were they hiding about her mother's tragic death?
Opening her eyes again, freezing saltwater violently flooded her lungs.
She was back at her twentieth birthday yacht party, right after Brittany had secretly pushed her into the freezing Hudson River.
Staring at the hypocritical faces of her family pretending it was an accident, Ashley didn't cry or beg. She calmly snatched a phone and dialed 911.
"Yes. I need to report an attempted murder."
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Chapter 4
The freezing night wind blasted into the warm living room. The crystal chandelier swayed violently, the glass pieces clinking together like frantic wind chimes.
Every bodyguard froze. Edson spun around.
Bennett Hawkins stepped through the ruined doorway. He wore a long, black cashmere overcoat. The cold air seemed to radiate from his very bones. His dark eyes swept the room, carrying the destructive force of a hurricane.
Two dozen elite tactical security contractors flooded in behind him. They moved in perfect, lethal synchronization. Their heavy boots hit the marble floor. Within three seconds, they had physically pinned Edson's bodyguards against the walls, twisting their arms behind their backs.
Edson's mouth fell open. He recognized the man who held the economic throat of Wall Street. Edson's purple face instantly morphed into a sickening, desperate smile. He rushed forward, his hand extended. "Mr. Hawkins! What an unexpected honor-"
Bennett didn't even look at him. He walked right past Edson, his shoulder brushing the older man aside. Edson's hand hung in the empty air.
Bennett stopped exactly one foot away from Ashley. His chest heaved once. His eyes locked onto the thin line of blood dripping down her neck.
The muscle in Bennett's jaw ticked so hard it looked like the bone would snap.
He reached up and grabbed the lapels of his cashmere coat. He stripped it off and stepped into Ashley's space. He wrapped the heavy, warm fabric tightly around her shivering shoulders, pulling the lapels together across her chest.
The scent of cedarwood, cold air, and faint tobacco engulfed Ashley's senses. The phantom smell of the warehouse fire vanished instantly.
Her breath caught. Her hands moved on their own. Her freezing fingers gripped the lapels of his coat, holding on to the fabric like a lifeline.
Bennett felt her hands shake. His eyes softened for a fraction of a second. He reached up and wrapped his massive, warm hand over her freezing knuckles.
"Sorry I'm late," he said. His voice was a low, gravelly rumble that vibrated in his chest.
Brittany stood by the stairs. Her eyes tracked Bennett's hand over Ashley's. Her chest tightened with pure, toxic jealousy. She stepped forward, pushing her chest out, trying to catch his eye.
Edson rubbed his hands together. "Mr. Hawkins, please, if this is about the port development project, we can discuss it in my study."
Bennett turned slowly. He kept Ashley tucked securely behind his broad back. He looked at Edson like he was looking at a cockroach.
"I am here to collect my fiancée," Bennett said. His voice was absolute zero. "We are fulfilling the marriage contract our grandfathers signed."
The room went completely dead. The only sound was the wind howling through the broken doors.
Fleda gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. Brittany's eyes widened to the size of saucers.
Edson's brain scrambled to calculate the money. A greedy light sparked in his eyes. He took a step forward. "Mr. Hawkins, Ashley is... unstable. Her reputation is ruined. If you want to honor the contract, Brittany is much more obedient and suited for your status."
Brittany immediately smiled. She tilted her head, giving Bennett a look of pure, innocent submission.
Bennett let out a short, harsh laugh. The sound held no humor. He looked Brittany up and down.
"Does the Sawyer family make a habit of offering up garbage when someone asks for a diamond?" Bennett asked.
Brittany's smile shattered. The blood rushed to her face, turning her skin a blotchy, humiliated red. She took a step back as if he had physically struck her.
Devon stood in the corner. He heard the word 'garbage'. His fists clenched at his sides, but he kept his mouth shut. The oppressive weight of Bennett's power kept him pinned to the floor.
Bennett's chief assistant stepped out from behind the tactical team. He pushed his gold-rimmed glasses up his nose. He pulled a thick folder from his briefcase and threw it directly at Edson's chest.
The heavy paper smacked against Edson's sternum.
"If anyone in this house touches a single hair on Ms. Sawyer's head," the assistant said, his voice clinical, "Hawkins Group will short Sawyer stock at the opening bell. Your company will be scrap paper by noon."
Edson clutched the folder. Cold sweat soaked through his dress shirt. He nodded frantically. "Understood. Completely understood."
Ashley stepped out from behind Bennett's back. She looked at Devon.
"The engagement is over," she said.
Devon stepped forward, his pride finally overriding his fear. "You can't just decide that, Ashley. It's a family merger."
Ashley reached for her left hand. She grabbed the three-carat diamond engagement ring and yanked it off her finger. She threw it as hard as she could directly at his chest. The heavy platinum band smacked hard against his sternum. Devon flinched, instinctively taking a step back in shock. The ring bounced off his expensive suit jacket and hit the marble floor, rolling away with a sharp, metallic ping.
Ashley turned to Bennett. She looked straight into his dark eyes. "Get me out of this house. Now."
A dark, dangerous spark of pleasure flared in Bennett's eyes. He nodded. He wrapped his arm tightly around her waist, pulling her flush against his side.
Justyn broke free from his shock. He lunged forward. "You can't just leave! You haven't explained anything!"
Two tactical guards slammed Justyn face-first into the drywall. The plaster cracked.
Ashley stopped. She looked over her shoulder at her brother.
"The migraines and the blurred vision you've been having for the last month," Ashley said, her voice carrying across the room. "It's heavy metal poisoning. Check your blood."
Justyn froze against the wall. His pupils dilated. He slowly turned his head to look at Fleda. Fleda's face drained of all color. She looked away instantly.
Ashley turned back around. She walked in perfect sync with Bennett toward the ruined doors.
She paused on the threshold. The cold wind whipped her hair. "Get your lawyers ready. I am not dropping the charges for the yacht."
She stepped over the splintered remains of the ruined oak doors and walked out into the dark.
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7.6
Isolde Mitchell knew her wealthy husband was cheating on her, but the true nightmare began when her mother-in-law summoned her.
The older woman coldly announced that the mistress was pregnant with a boy and would be moving into their estate.
Because Isolde's family had gone bankrupt and she had only given birth to a frail daughter, she was deemed completely worthless.
When Isolde packed her bags and demanded a divorce, her husband Clark just laughed.
He threatened to use their ironclad prenup to leave her penniless and take full custody of her daughter just to torture her.
To make matters worse, he forced Isolde to secure a failing business deal with the ruthless billionaire Jacques Valdez, essentially ordering her to sell her body to get the signature.
"If you fail, you will never see Bria again."
He even sent his goons to snatch the little girl from her preschool to prove his point.
Isolde was completely cornered, trembling with a mix of rage and absolute despair.
How could the man she married be such a monster? She would rather die than let them destroy her daughter, but how could a bankrupt mother fight a powerful dynasty with absolutely nothing?
Out of options, she looked at the private business card the terrifying billionaire Jacques had unexpectedly given her daughter.
Swallowing her pride, she decided to make a deal with the devil himself, ready to use his power to tear her husband's family apart.
7.8
Andrea was trapped in a suffocating marriage with billionaire Gregory Morse, forced to live as the pathetic substitute for his dead fiancée.
When armed intruders broke into their estate in the dead of night, she called her husband in pure terror.
"Stop playing these cheap, attention-seeking games," Gregory sneered with disgust, and hung up the phone.
She barely escaped with her life, but the cruelty only escalated. At the family mansion, his dead fiancée's sister deliberately scalded Andrea's hand with boiling tea. Instead of defending his wife, Gregory publicly humiliated her, ordering her to clean up the mess while calling her a stray dog.
That night, hiding in the dark wine cellar, Andrea overheard a chilling confession.
Gregory admitted to his brother that he knew Andrea was completely innocent of the car crash that killed his fiancée. He knew she had been framed.
Why did he marry her? Just to use her as a psychological punching bag to vent his twisted grief. He watched her suffer every single day, treating her like disposable trash, while violently threatening anyone who showed her an ounce of kindness.
He thought she was just a useless, helpless shadow who would quietly endure his torment forever.
He had no idea that behind her submissive facade, she was secretly Madame Lan, the apex predator of the global fashion world. And now, she was ready to burn his empire to the ground.
7.0
Eleanore thought her fiancé, Johan, was her only salvation after her family went bankrupt.
But at a high-society gala, he handed her a drugged glass of water. As the unnatural heat burned through her veins, the horrific truth hit her. Johan had isolated her and controlled her finances, all while secretly getting engaged to a wealthy heiress. He drugged Eleanore to ruin her completely, planning to lock her away as his helpless, secret mistress.
Desperate and losing her mind to the drug, Eleanore fled down the hallway. With Johan and his bodyguards hunting her, she stumbled into the dark presidential suite.
But she wasn't alone. Sitting on the leather sofa was Alexander Briggs—the most feared corporate raider on Wall Street, and Johan's exiled brother.
Outside the door, Johan was screaming, ready to drag her back to hell.
"I can be your antidote. But it's going to cost you."
The ruthless billionaire looked at her trembling body with cold calculation. He offered her a staggering deal: a three-month fake marriage to destroy Johan's empire, and in return, absolute protection and her father's massive debts paid in full.
She couldn't understand why the most powerful predator in New York would use a ruined girl as his weapon, but she knew she would rather die than let Johan touch her again.
When Johan finally broke down the door to claim his prey, Alexander calmly pulled Eleanore into his arms.
"Watch your mouth. You are speaking to my future wife."
7.7
Jaclyn woke up in the sterile hospital room after falling down the stairs. The nurse delivered the devastating news: she had bled heavily and lost her baby.
But before she could even cry, her trusted cousins, Katelyn and Cherri, locked the door and revealed the horrifying truth.
"It wasn't an accident," Katelyn smirked, pinning Jaclyn's arm down. "The lubricant on the top step was a very deliberate choice."
They needed her broken and unstable. They had forged her signature, draining her massive trust fund to save their uncle's bankrupt business.
What shattered Jaclyn's world was the fresh hickey on Cherri's neck. Her lover, Bradford, had helped plan the entire murder.
When Jaclyn tried to scream, they smothered her with a pillow, framing her as a lunatic having a mental breakdown.
Two weeks later, when she confronted them, Bradford violently shoved her through a second-story glass window to silence her forever.
As she fell to her death, the husband she had spent her life hating—the ruthless billionaire Gaines—burst through the doors.
He threw himself forward, his face filled with pure terror, desperately trying to catch her.
When her body hit the stone patio, Gaines fell to his knees in her blood, weeping and begging her not to close her eyes.
Until her last breath, Jaclyn was consumed by suffocating regret. Why did she trust the monsters who killed her, and hate the only man who truly loved her?
Opening her eyes again, she was back in the penthouse, exactly one month into her marriage with Gaines.
8.7
I was pregnant with the future heir of the Blackwood Pack, but my fated mate, Alpha Gavin, was nowhere to be found when sharp, tearing agony ripped through my swollen belly.
Instead of rushing to my side, he was in a luxury penthouse with his mistress, Piper.
When I desperately called his human number for help, it was Piper who answered the phone.
"I'm Piper. His future Luna."
Minutes later, I received a leaked audio file of Gavin promising to formally reject me the moment our pup was born.
Before the heartbreak could even set in, my armored SUV was violently rammed off the road by a massive truck.
It wasn't an accident. It was a targeted hit paid for by Piper's pack.
I woke up in the clinic with an empty womb. My pup was dead.
Gavin didn't even show up. He just mind-linked the butler to say he was "too busy" to deal with my loss.
He let his mistress murder our child and treated me like disposable trash, assuming my grief would make me a weak, compliant victim.
He thought he could just bury my trauma and move on with his perfect new life.
He was wrong.
I faked my own death in a fiery crash, leaving him with nothing but my signed rejection papers and the bloody receipt proving his mistress hired the killers.
Now, armed with a new identity and untraceable wealth, I am stepping out of the shadows.
I am going to bankrupt their packs from the inside out and make my former Alpha watch his empire burn.
9.5
After her step sister ran away from her marriage to the billion dollar heir, they took Emerald Jane Campbell as a stand-in to fill in the position of her step sister. Forced by her evil mother, Emerald can't do anything but to follow. She was tied to the disabled billion dollar heir for three years and all she got was cold treatment from him. Years later, a kidnapper appears in their lives. The kidnapper threatens the life of Emerald until Jude Rafael Sanders- the billion-dollar decides to do what it takes to protect his wife, Emerald.
Secrets began to unravel one by one. But what if Jude finds out his beloved wife has something up beneath her sleeves? Find out how tension intensifies in their roller coaster marriage.