The Billionaire's Lethal Substitute Wife
Five years ago, my fiancé and my adopted sister framed me, took my family trust, and cut my car's brake lines, leaving me with a shattered body in the freezing rain.
Now, struggling as a stunt double to fund my revenge, I risked my life to save a billionaire's trapped son from a locked room.
But instead of gratitude, I became the billionaire's prey.
Jaidyn Miles, the apex predator of Wall Street, investigated my crippling debts and threw a five-million-dollar contract in my face.
"You possess the single most valuable asset in this transaction. Your face."
He demanded I dye my hair jet black, wear specific white dresses, and use a bespoke perfume. He wanted me to be the living, breathing doll of his dead wife.
I refused to be a billionaire's prop and walked away.
But Jaidyn immediately bought the entire movie studio where I had just bled for a life-changing role, threatening to destroy hundreds of jobs and my only chance at a career if I didn't submit.
Why was I always just a tool to these wealthy, arrogant men? First a placeholder for a family trust, now a ghost for a dead woman?
I grabbed his contract and a pen, my eyes cold. I wouldn't be broken again.
"Three months, and you don't interfere with my shooting schedule."
I signed my name. I would take his five million, and I would use it to bury the people who ruined my life five years ago.
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Chapter 8
Harley's hand froze on the brass door handle. Her knuckles turned white from how hard she was gripping it.
Jaidyn's words were a precision strike to her only weak point.
She slowly turned her head. Over her shoulder, she saw Leo. Kian had picked the boy up. Leo was reaching his small, trembling arms toward her, his face buried in Kian's shoulder, crying silently. The absolute heartbreak in the child's eyes made Harley's chest physically ache.
She cursed herself silently. You are too soft.
She let go of the door handle. She walked with heavy, angry steps back to the small desk near the bed. She grabbed a blank prescription pad and a heavy Montblanc fountain pen lying next to it. She pulled the cap off with a sharp snap.
Jaidyn stood by the door, watching her. He saw the fire in her eyes, the aggressive way she moved. A faint, almost invisible smirk touched his lips.
Harley leaned over the desk. The pen flew across the paper. With quick, fluid strokes, she drew a small cartoon knight wearing a helmet and holding a sword. Next to it, she wrote in sharp, elegant handwriting:
Brave little knight, I will come back to see you. - Harley.
She ripped the paper from the pad. She didn't hand it to Jaidyn. She walked straight to Kian and tucked the note into Leo's small, clenched fist.
She reached up and wiped a tear from Leo's cheek with her thumb. "Be tough," she whispered.
She turned around and walked out the door. She didn't look at Jaidyn once.
The heavy door clicked shut behind her.
Jaidyn stared at the closed door. The amusement in his eyes vanished, replaced by a dark, consuming obsession.
Kian shivered. "Jaidyn, let her go. That woman is a feral cat. She's going to bite you."
Jaidyn slowly adjusted his cufflink. "A wild cat is only valuable once it's broken and tamed," he murmured.
He pulled his phone from his pocket and dialed his Chief of Staff.
"Two things," Jaidyn ordered, his voice cold and mechanical. "First, buy the building next to Harley Vance's apartment in Brooklyn. Set up a full surveillance perimeter. Second, find out who she was supposed to meet at the club last night. Cut off every single resource that agency has."
He hung up.
Meanwhile, Harley pushed through the revolving doors of the hospital. The crisp, freezing morning air of New York hit her face, waking her up.
She checked the time on her phone. 7:30 AM.
She ran to the curb and threw her hand up. A yellow cab screeched to a halt. She pulled the door open and slid into the back seat.
"Queens. The old factory lots," Harley told the driver.
It was the secret casting location for the epic blockbuster Rise of the Warlord.
As the cab bounced over the potholes of the Manhattan Bridge, Harley pulled up her hoodie. She grabbed the roll of medical tape she had stolen from the hospital room. She wrapped the thick tape tightly around her waist, binding the stitches so they wouldn't tear open when she moved.
The driver looked in the rearview mirror, his eyes widening as he watched her aggressively tape her own bleeding ribs. He swallowed hard and pressed the gas pedal down further.
Harley leaned her head back against the cold window. She closed her eyes, running through the complex sword choreography she had memorized last night.
Back in the hospital room, Leo had finally stopped crying. He lay in the bed, holding the small piece of paper against his chest. He fell asleep.
Jaidyn walked over to the bed. He gently pulled the note from Leo's fingers.
He looked at the drawing of the little knight. His eyes narrowed.
The drawing wasn't just a doodle. The lines were incredibly confident, the shading perfect. It had a distinct, artistic soul to it. It was the stroke of a master designer, not a desperate stunt double.
Jaidyn's intuition flared. Harley Vance was hiding something massive.
He pulled out his phone, snapped a high-resolution photo of the drawing, and sent it to his most trusted, art-savvy personal aide. Keep this strictly between us. Cross-reference this style against emerging underground artists and designers. I want to know who she is, he typed.
The yellow cab pulled up to the rusted gates of the Queens factory lot. Harley shoved a twenty-dollar bill at the driver and stepped out.
The lot was packed with luxury trailers and black SUVs. Beautiful, perfectly styled Hollywood actresses stood in small groups, sipping green juice and waiting for their turn.
Harley walked through them. Her cheap hoodie was stained with dirt and a faint patch of blood. Her canvas bag looked like garbage. The actresses sneered, whispering and stepping away from her as she passed.
Harley didn't care. She walked straight to the casting tent. Her eyes were locked on the prize.
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8.5
Tyla thought Miami was her fresh start. She didn't expect to become the obsession of the city's most dangerous "Golden Boy," Daniel Thorne. He's untouchable, wealthy beyond measure, and used to getting what he wants. And right now? He wants Tyla-body, soul, and everything in between.
But the heat in Miami isn't just from the sun. While Daniel's magnetic pull draws Tyla into a world of high-stakes parties and whispered promises, a blade is being sharpened in the shadows. Summer, the "best friend" who has lived in Tyla's shadow for years, has finally reached her breaking point.
Summer doesn't just want Daniel; she wants Tyla's life. And she's willing to burn both of them to the ground to get it.
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.
8.7
Brought back from a humble life in Montana, Nora found out she was the true biological heiress of the ultra-wealthy Beaumont family.
But her biological parents didn't love her; they loved the fake daughter, Olivia, much more.
The moment she arrived, her father pushed an engagement termination agreement across his massive desk, forcing her to give up her wealthy fiancé so Olivia could have him.
Her mother looked at her with pure disdain.
"You should know your place. Don't reach for things that were never meant for you."
To break her spirit, they moved her into a cramped, dusty servant's room. They even ordered the butler to feed her cold kitchen scraps and gristle.
They wanted to humiliate her, to make her feel like a piece of trash rather than a daughter.
They expected her to cry, to beg, and to be absolutely crushed by the realization that her own flesh and blood saw her only as a liability to their reputation.
They thought the country girl would easily fold under their united front of cruelty.
But Nora felt no sting of betrayal, only the calculating clarity of a chess player.
She calmly signed the paper, pulled out the Beaumont family trust rules, and looked them dead in the eye.
"Since I am the legal heir, I demand what belongs to me. I'm taking the master bedroom."
7.7
For three years, I was the unpaid maid, cook, and accountant for my boyfriend Kieran's family. His mother, Jeanie, never let me forget my place. "You're not legally family," she'd say, whenever I asked for basic respect.
Then I found the messages on his phone. He and Jeanie were arranging his engagement to Carolina Farley, a wealthy heiress. They called me a placeholder—someone who was just "around" until a better option came along.
Jeanie sat me down and told me it was time to leave, confident I had nowhere else to go.
She was wrong.
While they slept, I earned my CPA license. While they spent, I saved every dollar. While they dismissed me as "just the girlfriend," I bought my own condo.
When Kieran finally came crawling back, begging for another chance, I had one thing to say:
"I'm already married. To a man who didn't need three years to know my worth."
He thought I'd wait forever.
He thought wrong.
8.7
I stood as a ghost, watching the rhythmic thud of dirt hitting my own casket. My father, Senator Ellwood, dabbed his eyes for the cameras while my stepmother, Carroll, played the grieving mother perfectly, even though they were the ones who had paved the way for my murder.
The vision shifted to a high-rise office where Isadore Walker, the terrifying "Shadow Regent," was methodically bankrupting every elite family that had betrayed me. He pressed a silver koi fish necklace to his lips and triggered a massive explosion, choosing to burn the entire world down just to join me in death.
"Little Fish," he whispered.
In my first life, I was a naive pawn who believed my best friend, Catarina, when she claimed I simply slipped into the pool at my Debutante Ball. I let the opportunistic Cody Stevens play the hero who "saved" me, leading to a hollow engagement that ended in my ruin. I never knew that my stepmother had conspired with our housekeeper to hide my true identity and keep me from my biological family.
I died without ever understanding why Isadore, a man who treated me with cold indifference, would sacrifice everything for my sake. I didn't know that my entire life was a web of kidnappings and bribes designed to keep me as a political pawn.
Suddenly, the heat of the explosion warped into the agonizing burn of icy water. I broke the surface, gasping for air, back at the very party where my downfall began three years ago.
As I climbed out, I didn't look for Cody’s help. I wrapped myself in Isadore’s sandalwood-scented jacket and felt the cold steel of the tactical knife he had left in the pocket. This time, I wasn't the victim; I was the one who would light the fuse.
8.5
Aileen transmigrated into a dark, unfinished novel as the villainous, abusive wife of a powerful billionaire.
The moment she opened her eyes, her husband's calloused hand was crushing her throat, and her six-year-old stepson was pointing a box cutter at her face, screaming for her to die.
A cold system voice suddenly exploded in her brain, forcing a mandatory mission: save the villainous father and son, or face immediate death.
To survive the system's strict Out-Of-Character warnings, Aileen had to keep playing the role of the deranged, hateful wife.
She was despised by everyone. Her husband threatened to drag her to an asylum, and her terrified stepson scrubbed the floor with his own pajamas just to avoid her wrath.
Things escalated when the novel's original female lead publicly framed Aileen in Central Park, throwing herself onto the grass and clutching her pregnant belly.
"She pushed me. She tried to hurt the baby!"
Archer rushed over, shoved Aileen aside with absolute disgust, and looked at her with the eyes of a murderer.
Aileen felt a bitter wave of exhaustion. She had discovered the original owner's hidden antipsychotic pills; the woman wasn't just evil, she was severely mentally ill and completely broken by this loveless marriage.
Yet, no one cared, and her husband would always choose to believe his childhood sweetheart's fake tears.
Since everyone in this world was convinced she was an unpredictable lunatic, she decided to give them exactly what they expected.
Aileen turned her back on the ridiculous scene, a cold smile forming on her lips.
She was going to stage a massive, undeniable psychological breakdown, using her "insanity" as the perfect shield to play the system and rewrite her fate.