The Captain's Runaway Genius In Disguise
I was just a cleaner making fifteen dollars an hour, scrubbing floors to hide from a past that haunted me.
But when I walked into a billionaire's pristine penthouse, the suffocating visions hit me again. I saw a woman brutally murdered in a room that had been bleached spotless.
I called 911, and that brought the one man I had spent three years running from right to my door: NYPD Captain Kelvin O'Brien.
The patrol cops wanted to lock me up because I found the hidden blood too fast. To avoid a psych ward, I had to pretend my horrific supernatural visions were just brilliant deductive logic.
I had to physically endure the phantom sensation of the victim's throat being crushed and poison burning her stomach. All while Kelvin cornered me, demanding to know why I abandoned him and my title as the department's greatest asset, "The Oracle."
I didn't want to look at dead bodies anymore. I didn't want to feel their agonizing deaths. Why couldn't they just let me disappear?
But when the victim's wealthy husband walked into the precinct with a smug smile, ready to get away with murder, I couldn't stand it.
I forced myself to relive the victim's dying moments, guiding Kelvin to cut open her decomposed stomach to find the diamond ring she had swallowed.
"We have your blood inside her stomach."
His perfect alibi was shattered. But when we found an underground syndicate token hidden in his wallet, I knew my quiet life was over.
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Chapter 5
The coffee machine gurgled.
Ariella stood in Kelvin's kitchen, wearing his shirt from the night before, watching dark liquid fill the carafe. The morning sun striped the floor through blinds she didn't remember closing. She must have done it sometime after he'd fallen asleep, after she'd sat on the floor beside the couch for an hour just listening to him breathe.
She poured two mugs. Black for him. Splash of milk for her. The domesticity of it felt dangerous. Like trying on a life she'd forfeited.
"You're wearing my clothes."
She turned. Kelvin stood in the doorway, hair mussed, stubble dark, eyes clearer than they'd been last night. Four hours of sleep had restored something in him. Made him dangerous again.
"Mine were wet," she said. "From the rain. I borrowed."
He walked toward her. Slow. Deliberate. The way he approached suspects, witnesses, problems he intended to solve.
"The Oracle," he said. Testing.
Her hand jerked. Coffee sloshed over the rim, scalding her knuckles. She hissed, dropped the mug, watched it shatter on tile.
Kelvin grabbed her wrist, pulled her to the sink, ran cold water over the burn. His grip was firm. Unyielding. The way he held everything he cared about.
"Sorry," he said. Not sounding sorry. "I shouldn't have-"
"Don't say it again." Her voice was shaking. "Don't ever call me that."
"Ariella-"
"One year ago." The words came out before she could stop them. "There was a case. A family. Three children." She was crying again. Damn him. Damn this kitchen. Damn the way he was looking at her like he could fix this if she just let him try. "I touched the wall. The nursery. I saw-" She couldn't finish. The images were there, waiting, the small bodies, the silence after, the mother's face turned toward the window-
Kelvin's hand moved from her wrist to her shoulder. Pulling her in. She resisted, then didn't, then found herself pressed against his chest, his chin resting on her head, his heartbeat steady against her ear.
"You don't have to," he said.
"I do. I always do. That's the problem." She pushed back, wiped her face, reached for composure like a weapon. "The case. Isai Dean. We need to focus."
She grabbed her laptop from the counter, opened it with shaking hands. Pulled up Instagram, Evelyn Parrish's profile, the curated life of a wealthy young wife.
"Look." She pointed at recent posts. "Three months ago. Warm filters. Valencia, Clarendon. Lots of emojis. Exclamation points. 'Brunch with my love!!!' 'Paris next week!!!'"
She scrolled. The change was abrupt. Two weeks ago. Cold filters. Gingham. Moon. Short captions. Periods only.
"Different person," Kelvin said, leaning in. "Posting for her."
"Exactly." Ariella pulled up a specific image. "This one. 'Eiffel Tower at sunrise.' But look." She zoomed. "The street sign. Rue de la Paix. But the font is wrong. The kerning. This is a set. A fake Paris street in some studio in Queens or Brooklyn."
Kelvin was already on his phone. "Leo? Technical division. I need IP addresses for Evelyn Parrish's Instagram posts. Last two weeks. Priority." He paused. "And check for any studio rentals, photography spaces, anything with a Paris street set."
He hung up. Looked at her. The question in his eyes-how did you know, how do you always know-remained unasked.
"Financials," Ariella said, desperate to fill the silence. "Trust funds. Estate planning. If he was controlling her social media, he was controlling her money. Her freedom. Her-"
The vision hit without warning.
Evelyn. Sitting at a kitchen table. Isai standing behind her, one hand on her shoulder, the other holding a glass. Something clear. Something he was pressing toward her lips. Her resistance. His patience. The way he smiled as he explained that she needed to rest, needed to calm down, needed to drink-
"Ariella!"
She was on the floor. When had she fallen? Kelvin was beside her, hands on her face, forcing her to look at him.
"Hey. Hey. Come back."
"Trust," she gasped. The vision was fading, leaving its usual residue-nausea, disorientation, the certainty of truth without the proof. "He changed the trust. Three days before. Check the-"
Her phone buzzed. Kelvin grabbed it-Diane's name on the screen, text message.
"Read it," Ariella whispered.
Kelvin's eyes moved. Widened. "Evelyn Parrish's family trust. Modified beneficiary clause. Effective three days ago." He looked at her. "Sole beneficiary: Isai Dean Parrish. Upon his wife's death or incapacitation, full control of approximately forty million dollars in assets."
Ariella closed her eyes. Let the confirmation wash over her. Let the pieces click into place-the social media, the trust, the careful cleanup, the professional disposal.
"Forty million," she repeated. "Worth killing for. Worth erasing."
He stepped into her space, his hands gripping her shoulders with a grounding, intense pressure. His eyes were sharp, filled with a fierce gratitude that cut through the morning light.
"You did it, Ariella," he said, his voice low and vibrating with conviction. "You found him. We can get justice for her now."
Ariella let herself smile. Let herself feel, for one moment, the old satisfaction of puzzle pieces fitting, of monsters unmasked, of justice within reach.
The vision waited at the edges of her consciousness. Evelyn's face. The glass. The desperate, desperate hope that someone would find her, would know, would make it matter.
"I need to find her," Ariella said. "The body. She deserves-" She stopped. Swallowed. "She deserves to be found."
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8.6
My boyfriend Grant and I built our tech startup from the ground up. I wrote the code, he handled the money. I trusted him with my life.
Then, the FBI raided our office. I was arrested for embezzling three million dollars. The proof was a wire transfer with my perfect, forged signature.
Grant, the man I loved, stood by and watched me get hauled away. He whispered the real price of my freedom: take the fall, or he’d cancel my grandmother's life-saving heart surgery by noon.
My accounts were frozen. With the hospital's deadline looming, I had no choice. I signed the confession, selling myself into slavery just to keep my grandmother alive.
My first task as his "assistant" was to serve drinks at an exclusive club, forced into a cheap corset and a skirt that was barely there.
That’s when I saw him. The ruthless billionaire from the other night—the man Grant's setup had thrown me to.
When I stumbled and fell at his feet, he caught my wrist. The look in his eyes wasn't pity. It was possession.
9.1
Aurora Sinclair thought she had closed the chapter on Damian Blackwood, the man she once loved, married, and walked away from. But when he unexpectedly comes back into her life, she realizes their story is far from over.
Damian is the heir to Blackwood Enterprises, a corporate empire built on deceit, betrayal, and secrets darker than Aurora ever knew. For years, he obeyed his ruthless father's every demand, even marrying someone else to keep Aurora safe. But now, he's done playing by his father's rules. He's ready to reclaim the company his late mother built, expose the crimes that destroyed his family, and protect the woman he's never stopped loving.
As old wounds reopen and dangerous enemies close in, Damian and Aurora are drawn together once more and bound by passion, loyalty, and a shared determination to end the nightmare once and for all. But with betrayal around every corner, they must face a chilling question: can they survive the past... and have a future together?
8.1
Terminally ill.
Betrayed by her husband.
Abandoned by the only family she had.
Ariel died with nothing... and no one.
But fate gives her a second chance.
Reborn three years before her death, she walks away from the man who ruined her life-and takes back everything they stole.
Her love.
Her identity.
Her power.
Now, the cold billionaire who once ignored her can't take his eyes off her.
The brother who abandoned her starts to regret.
Too late.
Because this time, Ariel isn't the woman who begs.
She's the one who makes them kneel.
9.0
Colette stepped out of the federal prison, finally breathing the air of freedom after two agonizing years.
But instead of a bus home, a black armored SUV blocked her path. Ferris Vance's men kidnapped her right at the gates. He forced her to sign a marriage certificate, threatening to completely destroy her father's legacy if she refused.
The nightmare had only just begun. She soon learned her father had been driven to suicide anyway. Dragged into the Vance estate, Colette was beaten bloody by the family of Ellie, the girl she supposedly wronged. Ferris paraded her in a pure white gown for the cameras, playing the fiercely devoted husband. But the second the lenses turned away, he forced her into a coarse maid's uniform, making her scrub the freezing marble floors on her hands and knees.
"Your life isn't even worth the dirt on my shoes."
Ferris whispered those words as he threw his muddy boots at her bruised face. She was nothing but a piece of bleeding bait, a prop meant to lure his missing lover out of hiding. She was tortured and humiliated for a crime she had absolutely nothing to do with. The sheer injustice of paying the price for another woman's disappearance tore her soul apart.
When he cornered her in the bathroom, the last thread of Colette's sanity snapped. She hurled a bucket of filthy water right into his face, broke out of his grip, and threw herself out a window into a freezing storm. This time, she chose to escape, even if it meant death.
8.0
I sat at a table for two in the center of Le Coucou, clutching a gift box that had cost me two months of savings. It was our three-year anniversary, and I was waiting for Gavin to finally ask the big question.
But when the heavy oak doors opened, Gavin didn't walk toward me with a ring. He walked in with a polished blonde heiress tucked under his arm, her hand resting protectively over a small baby bump.
"This is Tiffany Stone. My fiancée," he said, his voice devoid of any warmth. He didn't apologize for being late or for the three years we'd spent together. Instead, he pulled out a checkbook, scribbled a number, and slid a ten-thousand-dollar check across the white tablecloth.
"Consider it severance for your time," he added, as Tiffany mocked my cheap drugstore dress. "Don't contact me again. Tiffany doesn't need the stress." I was the entertainment for the entire restaurant—the pathetic girl dumped for a better model. By the time I walked out into the rain, I had lost my boyfriend, my home, and the funding for my secret medical research project.
I was an orphan with no safety net, facing an eviction notice and a ruined career. I had given Gavin everything, and he had discarded me like a broken tool. The injustice burned in my chest, a hot, sharp rage that replaced my tears.
Desperate and freezing, I ducked into a coffee shop where I met Colton Bentley, a reclusive billionaire in a wheelchair. After I defended him from a cruel date, he offered me a contract: a marriage of convenience and a seven-figure payment to act as his shield. I signed the papers that night, ready to use his wealth to rebuild my life. But as I watched my new husband navigate his penthouse, I noticed his "paralyzed" legs tense with a strength that shouldn't exist.
8.6
Aubree pushed Ezra down the grand staircase, crippling the only man who silently protected her.
She thought she was finally escaping his control to be with her true love, Foster Newton.
But she had no idea it was a vicious trap meticulously set by Newton and her sweet, innocent cousin, Brandi.
Once Ezra was driven out of New York in despair, Aubree's life became a living hell. Her father completely disowned her. Brandi smoothly took over her home and her millions in inheritance.
"You were just a stepping stone for us, Aubree."
That was the last thing Newton sneered before leaving her to die.
Lying on the freezing floor, her warm blood pooling in her palms, Aubree finally saw the horrifying truth. She had destroyed her own family and ruined the one man who genuinely cared for her, all for a pair of greedy parasites.
Endless regret and suffocating hatred consumed her fading consciousness. Why was she so blind? Why did she let them manipulate her into destroying her own life?
Then, her eyes snapped open.
A violent wave of dizziness hit her. She looked down at her pale, flawless hands. There were no deep cuts. There was no sticky blood.
She was back. She had miraculously returned to the exact night she pushed Ezra, just two hours before his private jet was scheduled to leave forever.
Hearing her father's furious roar outside her bedroom door, Aubree didn't cower.
She wiped the smeared makeup from her face, her eyes turning dead cold. This time, she was going to make Ezra stay, and she was going to send those leeches straight to hell.