The Runaway Heiress And Her Monster
With twelve dollars in my bank account and a freezing apartment, my friend forced me into a velvet dress to attend an exclusive underground party for free food.
But the night quickly turned into a nightmare when a drunk thug attacked me, nearly strangling me to death in a dark hallway.
Just as my lungs burned for air, a terrifying man stepped out of the shadows and shattered my attacker's bones. He was Axel Carrillo, the billionaire owner of the club. But instead of feeling safe, my blood ran cold. His dark, dead eyes perfectly mirrored the wealthy monster who had abused and locked me in a basement years ago. He trapped me in his VIP room, surrounding me with the elite crowd that openly mocked my poverty.
I didn't understand why this ruthless billionaire was looking at me like a predator watching its prey. I had barely escaped the nightmare of the rich once; I wasn't going to let another powerful man own my life.
Faking a twisted ankle, I stumbled forward, falling directly into his chest.
In less than a second, I expertly slipped the thick money clip and custom leather wallet from his pocket, grabbed my broken stilettos, and ran blindly into the freezing night.
I used his crisp hundred-dollar bills to pay my overdue rent, locking his silver-crested wallet in my desk drawer. What I didn't know was that Axel had let me steal it, smiling in the dark as he whispered to his security.
"Let her keep the bait."
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Chapter 1
The freezing wind pushed through the cracks in the window frame.
Adelynn pulled the pilled grey blanket tighter around her shoulders. Her fingers flew across the chipped keys of her laptop. The plastic keys clacked in the quiet room. She needed to finish this article. She needed the money.
A red notification popped up on the bottom right of her screen. Bank account balance: insufficient. Twelve dollars.
She closed her eyes. Her stomach cramped, a sharp twist of muscles that made her breath hitch.
A loud bang vibrated through the floorboards.
Stan, her landlord, was hitting the ceiling from the apartment below. His muffled shouts about the overdue rent crawled up the walls. Adelynn felt her heart slam against her ribs. She hit the mute button on her keyboard. She stopped breathing. She sat completely still in the freezing room, waiting for the shouting to stop.
Her phone lit up on the desk. Kindra.
Adelynn pressed the ignore button.
Three seconds later, someone pounded on her apartment door. The cheap wood rattled in its frame. Dust fell from the top hinge.
Adelynn grabbed the box cutter from her desk. She pushed her bare feet against the icy floor and moved toward the door. She pressed her eye to the peephole.
Kindra stood in the hallway. She wore a sequined slip dress and stomped her feet against the cold tiles.
Adelynn dropped her shoulders. She put the box cutter on the counter and unlocked the deadbolt.
Kindra pushed through the narrow opening before the door was fully open. The smell of cheap vanilla perfume filled the small space.
Kindra grabbed the grey blanket and ripped it off Adelynn.
"It feels like a morgue in here."
Adelynn snatched the blanket back. She wrapped it around her waist and pointed at the open door.
"Go back to wherever you came from."
Kindra ignored her. She walked straight to the desk and pressed the power button on the monitor. The screen went black.
"If you didn't save that, I will actually kill you." Adelynn rubbed her thumb hard over her knuckles.
Kindra shrugged. "It's New Year's Eve. You are not dying in this moldy apartment tonight."
"New Year's Eve is a scam invented by corporations to make poor people spend money they don't have."
"You look worse than the homeless guy on the corner, Adelynn. Your skin is grey."
Adelynn turned around and reached for the laptop. "I have to work."
Kindra grabbed her wrist. Her grip was tight. Adelynn winced. Her bones felt sharp under her skin from not eating enough.
"My new boyfriend is paying for everything tonight. Free drinks. Free food."
Adelynn stopped moving. The muscles in her stomach twisted again. Free food.
Kindra saw the hesitation. She pulled a tube of lipstick from her purse and shoved it toward Adelynn's face.
Adelynn jerked her head back. The red lipstick smeared across her cheek.
"Stop it." Adelynn pushed Kindra's shoulder.
They shoved each other in the tight space between the bed and the desk. Adelynn's hip hit the corner of the table. A violent spasm ripped through her empty stomach. She bent over and grabbed her waist.
Kindra dropped her hands. Her eyes widened.
Adelynn took a slow breath. She stood up straight and wiped the red smear off her cheek with the back of her hand.
"If the food is bad, I will shove your head in a toilet."
Kindra squealed. She turned and ran to Adelynn's tiny closet. She started throwing clothes onto the floor.
Adelynn looked at the mess. She looked at her black monitor. She let out a long breath.
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9.7
Luna Elena Frost was never chosen, only assigned.
Bound to Alpha Alaric Ashbourne through a cold contractual marriage, she endures three years as a Luna in name only. He never comes home, never defends her, and never looks at her, while his heart belongs to another woman.
At his grandmother's funeral, Alaric publicly dissolves their marriage, humiliating Elena before the entire pack. In that moment, she finally understands the truth. She was never wanted.
But the Moon has not abandoned her.
A forgotten night resurfaces. Her long-silent wolf begins to awaken. And secrets buried within her bloodline start to surface, drawing danger from every direction.
Cast out by the pack that once used her, Elena must flee, survive, and uncover her true power.
Only then does the Alpha realize his mistake.
By the time he turns back in regret, the Luna he rejected may already be gone forever.
9.3
"Adrian, why would you lie to me? Why would you let her push my mum like that?"
Yvonne's voice trembled, holding back tears.
Adrian smirked. "Wake up, Yvonne. You really thought I wanted you when Tricia was right here?"
That was how Adrian-her first crush, the boy she thought cared-chose to humiliate her in front of everyone as she was the cleaner's adopted daughter.
But fate had other plans.
Because the Diamond Belfort brothers-the heirs everyone adored were coming to their school in search of their missing heiress- baby sister. But the queen bee steals the chance that should have been hers. Then again, secrets don't stay buried forever. With her true identity waiting to explode, Yvonne must decide to rise from the ashes, claim her place, and bring down everyone who tried to destroy her.
Because the real heiress doesn't beg.
She takes rather.
Now, Yvonne is done playing small. It's her time to rise, reclaim her crown, and make everyone regret ever doubting her.
7.4
For five years, Jodi was the perfect, compliant secret lover to billionaire CEO Armand Taylor.
Then, she woke up to a cold email and a seven-figure wire transfer. Armand was marrying European royalty. The money was a severance package to quietly warehouse her out of sight.
Refusing to be his dirty secret, Jodi invoked her contract's termination clause to leave for good. But Armand wouldn't let her go easily. He forced her to personally train her vicious new replacement, Selah.
Selah immediately tampered with a crucial financial file, framing Jodi for sabotaging Taylor Corp's multi-billion-dollar tech acquisition.
Without a second thought, Armand took the new girl's side. He cornered Jodi in the boardroom, his eyes dead and cold.
"You have three days to fix this. If you fail, I will personally see to it that you go to prison for corporate fraud."
He froze her bank accounts and stripped away her dignity, ready to destroy her life over a blatant lie.
He thought she was just a weak, discarded toy who would break under his threats.
What Armand didn't know was the terrifying secret Jodi had just discovered hidden at the bottom of her bathroom trash can.
Three positive pregnancy tests.
If the ruthless billionaire found out she was carrying his heir, he would never let her escape.
Wiping her tears, Jodi slipped into a severe black silk gown and crashed an exclusive Hamptons gala to intercept the tech CEO herself.
This time, she wasn't playing the obedient lover. She was going to clear her name and burn Armand's empire to the ground.
7.5
I was tied to a concrete pillar in an abandoned warehouse, the heavy stench of gasoline suffocating me.
Ten steps away, a masked kidnapper slammed a loaded Glock onto a metal barrel and forced my husband, Alvie, to make a sick choice.
"The wife or the mistress. You only get to walk out of here with one."
Alvie didn't even blink.
He walked straight toward the dark corner where his mistress, Gail, was crying. He wrapped his arms tightly around her, shielding her, and guided her toward the exit.
He never looked back. He didn't cast a single glance over his shoulder. To him, I was already a corpse, just trash left on the pavement.
The kidnapper laughed and tossed a lighter onto the soaked concrete floor.
A wall of ghostly blue fire erupted instantly, swallowing me whole. The absolute agony of my skin blistering and melting shattered my sanity.
In my last moments, consumed by the inferno, I couldn't understand how the man I had loved and served so submissively could leave me to burn alive. My heartbreak quickly morphed into a hatred far deeper than the flames.
Then, I violently jerked awake.
I shot up from the bed, gasping for cold air, my hands frantically checking my perfectly smooth, unburned skin.
I looked at the desk clock. I had returned to exactly four years ago, the morning of the annual Gallagher family gathering.
The fragile, naive wife died in that warehouse. This time, I am going to destroy them both.
7.6
Cassie was sold to a terrifying billionaire as a substitute bride.
To protect herself, she glued a grotesque, fake burn scar to her face.
Her adoptive family and her ex-fiancé had stolen her massive trust fund, locked her in an asylum for years, and finally threw her to the wolves. They expected the ruthless Dane Frederick to torture and kill her the moment he saw her ruined face.
At her ex's grand engagement party, her family publicly humiliated her. They mocked her cheap clothes, laughed at her scarred cheek, and even raised their hands to beat her, fully believing she was a helpless freak with no one to rely on.
"Get on your knees and apologize, and I'll write you a check so you don't starve on the streets."
But they didn't expect the billionaire to kick down the doors, wrap his coat around her, and bankrupt their entire bloodline overnight.
Yet, as Cassie stood in the dark and peeled off her fake silicone scar to reveal her flawless face, a deeper terror gripped her.
Tracing her stolen funds, she uncovered a name that made her blood run cold: The Syndicate.
It was the exact nightmare organization that had locked her in the asylum. Why were they controlling her family? And why did the billionaire look at her with such desperate, hidden nostalgia?
Cassie opened her encrypted laptop and dropped into the Dark Web.
She wasn't just a discarded bride. She was the legendary hacker "Nyx," and she was going to burn them all to the ground.
8.2
She was the sacrifice-married off to the city's most ruthless billionaire to save a family that never loved her. But when she discovered his betrayal with her own sister, everything shattered.
Pregnant, penniless, and abandoned, Bella Hart disappeared into the night, vowing never to be powerless again.
Few years later, she returns as the CEO of an international empire, more powerful than anyone imagined possible. Her secret weapon? The little boy with piercing grey eyes who calls her "Mommy, he is the son of the man who destroyed her.
Caleb Black spent years drowning in regret, searching for the wife he threw away. Now she's back, untouchable and unforgiving. He'll do anything to reclaim what he lost his wife, his son, his chance at redemption.
But Bella didn't return to forgive, she returned to conquer.
With enemies circling, old wounds bleeding, and a passion that refuses to die, Bella must decide: Will she let the man who broke her back into her heart? Or will she destroy him the way he once destroyed her? In a world of billion-dollar deals and deadly secrets, love is the most dangerous gamble of all.