The Unwanted Wife's Secret Comeback
Audrey was trapped in a toxic marriage with billionaire Dozier Hodge. To him, she was nothing but a breeding vessel needed to secure his family's trust fund.
The nightmare escalated when Dozier abruptly moved his childhood sweetheart, Blake, into their penthouse.
Blake feigned a fragile illness, expertly manipulating Dozier while openly usurping Audrey's place.
Dozier blindly protected his true love, completely disregarding his wife's life.
He allowed the staff to serve Audrey lobster bisque despite her deadly seafood allergy.
During a sudden storm, he tenderly carried a pretending-to-sleep Blake across a flooded parking garage, coldly ordering Audrey to walk through the freezing, dirty water alone.
He even forced himself on Audrey in the dead of night, ignoring her tears, demanding she fulfill her obligation to produce an heir.
He had no idea that a year ago, it was Blake who had pushed Audrey down the stairs, murdering their unborn child.
Audrey's heart turned to ice. How could he pamper the murderer of their baby, yet brutally drag Audrey to an elite fertility clinic under the threat of ruining her career?
Did he really think she would ever bring another innocent life into this loveless prison?
As the nurse approached with a needle to test her hormones, Audrey stopped playing the submissive wife.
She reached into her bag, pulled out the secret bottle of birth control pills she had been taking every single day, and smashed it onto the doctor's glass desk.
"Cancel the blood test. I have been taking birth control."
She stared into Dozier's horrified eyes, finally ready to tear his empire down.
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Chapter 2
Audrey pushed open the heavy wooden door of the VIP suite at the Manhattan West Side Private Hospital. The overwhelming scent of hundreds of expensive lilies assaulted her nose. The room looked like a high-end florist shop. The visual proof of how much Dozier pampered Blake made Audrey's stomach churn with disgust.
Blake sat propped up against the hospital pillows. She wore a pale pink silk nightgown that draped perfectly over her thin frame. She looked up, widening her eyes to project a fragile, helpless innocence.
A wave of physiological nausea rolled through Audrey's gut.
Eleanor Vance, a prominent Upper East Side socialite, stepped directly in front of the bed. She crossed her arms, creating a physical barricade between Audrey and Blake. Eleanor's eyes scanned Audrey with blatant hostility.
"That fabric has such a... rustic charm to it. It reminds me of my summers in the countryside," Eleanor said, her voice dripping with condescension as she turned to a friend. "Authenticity is so refreshing, isn't it?"
Her mocking voice bounced off the sterile walls. Two nurses adjusting the IV bags paused and glanced over.
Audrey didn't blink. She let her gaze slide over Eleanor's face, completely devoid of emotion, and looked at the wall behind her. The absolute silence and lack of reaction stripped Eleanor of her power, leaving the socialite standing there looking foolish.
Blake reached out a pale, trembling hand and lightly touched Eleanor's arm. "Eleanor, please. Be nice to my sister."
The sickly-sweet tone grated against Audrey's eardrums. It was the perfect execution of Blake's signature manipulation.
Eleanor scoffed. "Why should I? She's just keeping the Hodge wife title warm for you anyway."
The words hit their mark. A sharp pain spiked behind Audrey's ribs. Her fingertips twitched, but she forced her hands to remain still at her sides.
Audrey took two large steps forward. She raised the thick stack of discharge papers and slammed them down onto the metal rolling table. The sharp, loud crack made everyone in the room jump. The air instantly shifted, the power returning to Audrey.
"You have exactly five minutes to get your things together," Audrey said. Her voice was pure ice.
Blake's lower lip trembled, but a dark, ugly shadow flickered in her eyes for a split second before she hid it.
The suffocating silence in the room was shattered by the buzzing of Audrey's phone in her purse. She pulled it out. The screen read 'Genevieve'.
Audrey turned her back to the bed and walked to the large window overlooking the street. She swiped the screen to answer, needing a moment away from the toxic air of the room. She could feel the stares of the two women burning into her spine.
"Why didn't you answer my call last night?" Genevieve's shrill voice blasted through the speaker.
The blatant anger and lack of any greeting felt like a physical slap to Audrey's face.
"I was busy," Audrey said softly.
"I don't care," Genevieve snapped. "Blake is coming home today. You need to move your things out of the master bedroom and let her sleep there. She needs the best mattress for her back."
The sheer absurdity of the demand punched the breath out of Audrey. A cold, bitter laugh bubbled up in her throat.
"No," Audrey said. Her voice dropped an octave, vibrating with cold finality.
"Excuse me? You ungrateful-"
Audrey pulled the phone away from her ear. She tapped the red button, cutting off the toxic stream of words. Her thumb moved quickly, blocking the number entirely. The swift, physical action severed the emotional blackmail. A numb, hollow sense of relief washed over her chest.
She turned around. Blake was leaning back against the pillows, a smug, victorious smile playing on her lips.
The puzzle pieces snapped together in Audrey's mind. Blake had orchestrated that phone call. The heat of pure rage ignited in Audrey's chest, burning away the numbness.
Audrey walked slowly to the edge of the bed. She leaned down, bringing her face inches from Blake's. "Keep your pathetic little games to yourself, Blake. Or I will make you regret it."
The raw menace in Audrey's voice made Blake flinch. She shrank back against the headboard.
The hospital door swung open. A male nurse walked in with a luggage cart. "Ready for your bags, Ms. Atkins."
The heavy tension in the room snapped. Everyone plastered their polite masks back onto their faces.
They took the elevator down to the underground parking garage. Eleanor linked her arm through Blake's, practically carrying her. They walked a few paces ahead, a united front that physically pushed Audrey out of their circle.
Audrey walked straight to the driver's side of her Porsche. She pressed the unlock button on her key fob. She refused to play the role of their chauffeur.
Before she could pull the handle, Blake lunged forward and yanked open the passenger side door.
"I get terrible carsickness," Blake said, her voice dripping with fake sweetness. "I need the front seat."
It was a blatant territorial challenge. The passenger seat of Audrey's car was the wife's seat.
Audrey stared at her over the roof of the car. "Shut the door," she said coldly.
Blake's smile faltered. She hesitated, then slammed the passenger door shut with a frustrated huff.
Audrey reached into the open window and hit the central locking button. The heavy locks clicked down with a loud thud.
Blake pulled on the handle. It didn't budge. She stood frozen, her fake smile slipping.
Audrey pointed a single finger at the rear door. "Get in the back."
The command left absolutely no room for debate.
Blake bit her lip, her eyes shining with genuine, venomous hatred. She stomped to the rear door and yanked the handle. It didn't open either. She rattled it twice, her face turning red.
Audrey pressed the unlock button on her key fob twice—a selective unlock that opened only the rear passenger door. A soft click sounded.
Blake yanked the back door open and slid onto the leather seat.
Eleanor marched up to the driver's window and slapped her palm against the glass. "I'm telling Dozier how you're treating her!"
Audrey ignored her. She put the car in drive and slammed her foot on the gas pedal. The Porsche roared to life, leaving Eleanor coughing in a cloud of exhaust fumes.
The car merged onto the busy Manhattan streets. The force of the acceleration pushed Audrey back into her seat. The physical pressure brought a fleeting sense of freedom. Her tight jaw muscles finally relaxed a fraction.
From the back seat, Blake pulled out her phone. She tapped the screen. Dozier's deep, velvety voice suddenly filled the car.
"I'm sorry I couldn't get away from the meeting to pick you up, Blake. Rest well. I'll see you at home tonight."
Blake had put his voicemail on speaker. The gentle, caring tone Dozier used for Blake was the exact opposite of the cold cruelty he showed Audrey. The sound of his voice was a dull blade sawing against Audrey's heart.
Audrey's hand shot out to the center console. She cranked the volume dial on the car stereo all the way to the right.
A blast of deafening, aggressive heavy metal music exploded through the premium speakers. The screaming guitars and pounding drums completely drowned out Dozier's voice.
Blake shrieked and slapped both hands over her ears. "Turn it off!"
Audrey glanced up at the rearview mirror. She watched Blake cowering in the back seat, her face twisted in discomfort. A slow, ice-cold smile spread across Audrey's lips.
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9.3
On her wedding night at The Plaza Hotel, Clara went looking for her husband.
Instead, she found him in the dimly lit parking garage, passionately pinning down her bridesmaid.
She couldn't even scream or expose them. Just hours before the ceremony, Julian had tricked her into signing away her twenty percent shares of their co-founded company, leaving her completely penniless and unable to pay her grandmother's life-saving medical bills.
Fleeing in absolute despair, a sudden hotel blackout plunged her into a second nightmare. She was dragged into a pitch-black room and brutally violated by a heavily drugged stranger.
When a shattered Clara returned to the office to audit the books and reclaim her power, Julian demoted her to a dusty desk by the trash cans.
He flaunted his mistress in the executive suite and deliberately sent Clara into a horrifying trap. He arranged for vicious clients to drug and assault her, demanding high-definition blackmail photos so he could divorce her with absolutely nothing.
"Since you want to play rough, you can service Mr. Petrocelli tonight," the thug sneered, locking the VIP room door.
Clara was pushed to the brink of hell. Why was the man she devoted three years of her life to trying to destroy her so completely? And why did the freezing cedarwood scent of the stranger who ruined her in the dark perfectly match Conrad Vance, the ruthless CEO and Julian's untouchable uncle?
Rather than let Julian win, Clara smashed a glass bottle, held the jagged edge to her own throat to force the men back, and threw herself off the second-floor balcony into the freezing night.
But the bone-crushing impact never came. A massive figure shot out from the shadows and caught her, and her brutal counterattack finally began.
8.0
Abigayle was the proud heir to the Pena Group, living a perfect life and engaged to Jeffery Sullivan.
But the morning after a charity gala, she woke up drugged in a hotel room, blinded by paparazzi cameras. Her fiancé and her best friend stood at the foot of the bed, throwing a forged pregnancy report at her face to publicly frame her for cheating.
The betrayal was only the beginning of the slaughter. Before she could even clear her name, the Sullivan family ruthlessly bankrupted her family's company overnight. Her father was rushed to the ICU with a heart attack, her brother was run off the road into a coma, and violent repo men raided her penthouse. Just as she was thrown out into the freezing rain, Jeffery's terrifying uncle, Donovan Sullivan—the very mastermind who engineered her family's ruin—stepped in. He offered to cover the life-saving medical bills, but only if she agreed to become his personal plaything.
Abigayle's blood turned to ice. She couldn't understand how the people she trusted most could plot such a vicious, coordinated destruction just to break an engagement. How dared the man who destroyed her entire family stand there playing the savior, trying to buy her body with her own stolen wealth?
Facing a $100,000 hospital deadline and abandoned by everyone she knew, she didn't shed another tear.
"I will never beg him."
Clutching her last diamond bracelet, she hailed a cab straight to the biggest pawnshop in the Diamond District. The Sullivans thought they had buried her, but her counterattack was just beginning.
8.9
For three years, Alana acted as the sole tactical brain for the Dawnbreaker squad, keeping them alive despite being labeled a useless "Dud" Conduit.
But right before the crucial Ascension Trials, squad leader Cash handed her a corporate sponsorship contract. The condition? She had to become the "private companion" to a greasy corporate heir just so the squad could get high-tier gear.
When she refused, the teammates she had bled for unanimously voted to kick her out.
"You're just window dressing, a liability."
They revoked her safehouse access, burned her belongings, and the academy advisor even tried to force her into a state-sanctioned breeding program. They left her to freeze in the slums, betting she would desperately crawl into the rich man's bed.
What they didn't know was that her inability to summon an Eidolon wasn't a lack of talent. Her teammate Dallin had been secretly sabotaging her rituals for years, crippling her potential just to keep her chained as their free tactician.
Stripped of everything and pushed to the absolute brink, Alana's despair morphed into a deadly resolve.
Using a million-credit black market loan and a forbidden blood matrix, she forcibly anchored an Apex-Tier cosmic wolf disguised as a harmless silver pup.
When her ex-squad tried to publicly humiliate her and burn her new "pet" alive in the cafeteria, a flash of silver light severed Dallin's hand instantly.
Looking at her screaming former teammates, Alana finally smiled.
7.9
Eileen Goff was a nobody, scrubbing diner tables to survive while her greedy family bled her dry.
On the eve of her twentieth birthday, the government's mandatory marriage algorithm matched her with a spouse.
It wasn't a plumber or a teacher. It was Harrison Butler, the ruthless, untouchable billionaire king of Butler Industries.
At the registry, Harrison's glamorous intended fiancée threw a half-million-dollar check at her.
"Take the money, get out of here, and never show your face again."
The registry supervisor even offered her a million dollars to sign a cancellation agreement, trying to erase her from the system.
At their first high-society gala, Harrison's stepmother and the fiancée locked Eileen in an empty room, plotting to humiliate her and prove she was just cheap trash.
Eileen was terrified and confused. Men like Harrison Butler didn't just accept federal matches with girls who smelled like fried onions.
But instead of abandoning her, Harrison smashed the door open, publicly banished his own family, and kissed her in front of the entire city's elite.
Why was this billionaire going to such extreme lengths to protect a complete stranger?
Then she overheard his assistant talking about a marriage clause in his grandfather's trust fund.
He didn't love her; he just needed a powerless, state-mandated wife to lock his parasitic family out of his empire.
Realizing she was a highly valuable pawn, Eileen stopped trembling, looked the billionaire in the eye, and spoke.
"I believe we can have more than just a legal relationship. We can have a business arrangement."
9.1
June woke up transmigrated into the body of a ruthless billionaire's toxic, disposable wife.
Before she could even process the massive Beverly Hills mansion, a cold system voice announced she had exactly five minutes of lifespan remaining.
To survive, she was forced to bind with the system and strictly maintain the original owner's "brainless, abusive drama queen" persona to earn hours to live.
She was forced to violently slap hot coffee out of a terrified maid's hands and physically spank her manipulative five-year-old stepson.
When she tried to escape this nightmare by throwing divorce papers at her terrifying husband, Isaac Walton, he simply ripped them to shreds.
Every time she tried to be reasonable or show a hint of kindness, the system tortured her with agonizing cardiac pain, cementing her status as the most hated monster in the family.
The most absurd part happened when she threw a hysterical, system-mandated tantrum over a gossip magazine, and Isaac's icy demeanor suddenly melted.
He gently touched her hair, offering the one thing she desperately needed.
"Stop crying. I'll handle it."
Just as a spark of hope ignited in her chest, the system's critical death warning exploded in her skull: accepting his sympathy would instantly deduct thirty days of her life.
To stay alive, June had no choice but to violently slap away the only hand reaching out to save her, forcing herself to play the greedy villain while her husband's gaze turned dangerously dark.
7.1
Bonnie Galvan woke up to the suffocating scent of lilies, staring at the mirror in the exact same seven-figure wedding dress she had worn seven years ago.
In the doorway stood her so-called best friend Itzel and her secret lover Erwin, desperately urging her to elope.
They warned her that her soon-to-be husband, the billionaire Arlington Townsend, was a crippled monster, and marrying him would ruin her life forever.
In her previous life, she blindly believed their lies and ran away from the altar.
Because of her public betrayal, the ruthless Townsend family completely bankrupted her father's company in retaliation.
Erwin and Itzel swooped in as her saviors, only to steal whatever was left of her family's wealth and power.
When she was finally stripped of her value, Erwin pushed her down an icy mountain slope during a brutal blizzard.
With a shattered ankle, she could only watch as Itzel smirked and Erwin coldly walked away, leaving her to be buried alive under the freezing snow.
As her lungs burned and her heart gave out in the agonizing cold, she was consumed by hatred.
Why did the man who swore to protect her and the friend she trusted with her life plot so meticulously to destroy her?
Opening her eyes again, Bonnie was back in the bridal suite, minutes before the ceremony.
This time, she didn't run.
She walked straight down the aisle, looked the terrifying Arlington Townsend in the eye, and firmly said her vows.
"I do."