Too Late to Regret: The Dead Wife Who Owns His Empire Now
Damien Hayes was a workaholic, and as an illegitimate son who had clawed his way to the top, he seemed to care about nothing but Hayes Realty.
For three years of marriage, Lydia Carter had always been waiting for him.
She waited during dates, waited on anniversaries, waited for prenatal checkups, and even waited for the surgical abortion.
What she finally received was a livestream of Damien throwing an extravagant birthday celebration for another woman.
Devastated, she was caught in a chain car accident, convincing Damien that she had died with the wreck.
Yet Lydia survived against all odds and unexpectedly became the sole heir of the world's richest man.
The moment she set foot back on her homeland, she swore she would make Damien taste a pain sharp enough to pierce the heart.
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Chapter 7
The cigarette had burned halfway down, ash hanging on the verge of falling, yet Damien seemed completely unaware as he stared out the window.
He felt restless, and this state had lingered for quite some time.
It had been nearly a year since the car accident.
The furnishings of the estate remained exactly as they had been, without the slightest change.
Even after Ava moved in openly and suggested changes here and there several times, Damien had never agreed.
But she clearly hadn't given up.
That evening, the moment he returned, he noticed something was different about the first-floor living room.
The bookcase beside the sofa was gone, and the rug on the floor had been replaced with a new pattern.
Ronan ran around holding a toy gun, making rattling sounds, and crashed straight into Damien's chest.
Tilting his head up, the muzzle pointed at Damien, he shouted in a muffled voice, "Bad guy, hands up!"
Damien had no mood to play along. His nerves felt tightly wound, his entire state off.
Irritated, he loosened his tie and took a long stride toward the sofa, only for his son to grab onto his pant leg.
Ronan refused to let go, continuing to pester him, "Bad guy, hurry up and put your hands up!"
The last shred of patience finally snapped. Damien reached out, grabbed the back of Ronan's collar, and lifted him halfway off the floor.
His voice rose before he realized it, "Where is everyone? Just letting him run wild like this?"
With his other hand, he snatched the toy gun from his son and slammed it hard onto the floor.
With a sharp crack, the toy gun shattered into pieces.
The newly hired housekeeper and the servants rushed out from all directions, while Ava appeared at the top of the second-floor stairs, a face mask still on.
Unhurried, she said, "What's going on? Why are you yelling at our son the moment you get home?"
Damien cast her a cold glance and casually handed the wailing Ronan to the new housekeeper.
"Didn't I say that without my permission, nothing in this house is to be changed?"
Ava clearly understood at once where his anger was coming from.
A look of grievance surfaced on her face, her voice turning timid, completely unlike the composed mistress she had been moments ago.
"Don't be mad. Ronan accidentally bumped into the corners of that bookcase several times. I was just worried he might get hurt. As for the rug, Ronan liked it. He kept insisting on buying it. I couldn't exactly say no to my son, could I?"
There it was again.
Damien had lost count of how many times Ava had used Ronan as an excuse.
He wanted to say something but swallowed it back. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the house staff standing around, all ears, waiting.
With a frustrated tug, he pulled off his tie and tossed it onto the sofa, then strode toward the study.
"Put everything back. Exactly the way it was."
But as he passed the corner of the second floor, Ava reached out and grabbed his arm, her eyes timid yet resentful.
"Damien, you're scaring me like this. Do you have another woman?"
Damien pulled his arm back with a cold expression. Just as he was about to leave, she wrapped herself tightly around him from behind.
Hearing Ava's voice on the verge of tears as she repeatedly apologized, his heart softened despite himself.
"No."
Back in the study, he sank into his chair, his emotions tangled and heavy.
He hadn't thought about Lydia in a very long time.
In the days right after the accident, he'd felt a faint sense of guilt. But Ava's tenderness quickly pushed it all to the back of his mind.
He had always been a devoted practitioner of self-interest.
Lydia could have remained his wife in peace, as long as she stayed obedient and compliant.
He had never once thought about divorcing her.
But she had bad luck, just like her mother.
That wasn't Damien's fault.
Lately, though, she surfaced in his thoughts from time to time. He even woke from nightmares more than once in the middle of the night.
Drenched in cold sweat, he recalled how she looked in his dreams, her face drained of all color, her eyes hollow.
Lydia kept asking him over and over, "Why didn't you come? You promised me."
On the living room sofa, she used to curl up there waiting for him, casually flipping through books from the nearby shelf.
Sometimes when he came home, he'd see her curled up fast asleep, a book slipping from her body onto the rug.
Her feet were bare, slippers scattered across the floor.
At the slightest sound, she'd wake abruptly, rubbing sleepy eyes and looking at him with unhidden delight.
Damien didn't want to admit it, but that image had once comforted him through many difficult moments.
Someone who trusted him without conditions, who was willing to wait for him like that, he hadn't been incapable of loving her.
The clouds were thick as the aircraft cut through them, revealing Crownford's dazzling, ornate nightscape below.
Julian adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses and glanced toward Lydia beside him.
She was looking outside, her expression grave.
In the half year since Richard's passing, she had kept herself largely secluded.
Henry Bailey had continued treating her and spoke highly of her cooperation as a patient.
The rest of the time, she immersed herself almost greedily in learning corporate management.
Even now, Elena remained a mystery to the world. She had never appeared publicly at any event.
The only footage journalists had of her came from Richard's funeral.
Dressed in black and sheltered beneath an enormous black umbrella, she radiated an unapproachable sense of distance.
In private, the more Julian learned about her past, the more his heart ached for the person she had once been.
He devoted himself almost entirely to caring for her, just as Richard had said, becoming her strongest support in this world without hesitation.
So when she proposed relocating the company's headquarters to Crownford, he began handling the matter immediately.
Even knowing that her true purpose this time was to make Damien's life a living hell.
So what?
Damien owed her that much.
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However, she would soon realize that the Atlas Groups was going to be more than just a survival decision but the key to everything.
8.7
To escape my toxic ex-fiancé and the father who froze my assets, I entered a contract marriage with Barrett, a cold but protective corporate consultant.
I thought he was my safe harbor. I even confided my secret, ruthless strategy to take back control of my company from my ex.
But at the most critical board meeting, a mysterious new chairman dialed in.
The synthesized voice coming through the speakerphone systematically dismantled the board and took over the company, using the exact, word-for-word strategy I had only ever whispered to my husband in the dead of night.
My ex-fiancé turned pale with panic. The board members were stunned into silence.
And I sat there, my blood running completely cold.
The man who had held my hand in the hospital, who had slept in my bed, and who had promised to protect me, had just committed the ultimate corporate espionage.
Every tender touch, every late-night confession—was it all just a calculated move to steal my life's work? How could the only person who made me feel safe use my deepest vulnerabilities to orchestrate my ruin?
I packed up my files, walked straight out of that boardroom, and prepared to disappear from his life forever.
But when I fled to my best friend's apartment to hide, I looked out the window.
The ruthless mastermind who had just stolen my empire was standing completely still in the freezing downpour, waiting for me to come down.
8.6
Four years ago, I melted my skin into the asphalt to pull Julian Moretti from a burning wreckage. I spent years in the shadows, nursing him back to health, hiding my scars while he reclaimed his title as the Underboss of New York.
But on the way to our wedding, everything shattered.
Estelle Russo, the woman who caused the crash that ruined me, complained of a stomach ache in the limousine. Julian didn't hesitate.
He ordered the driver to stop on the shoulder of the highway.
"Get out," he barked at me, his eyes cold.
He forced me out of the car in my wedding gown, leaving me stranded in the dust and exhaust fumes just so Estelle could lie down on the seat.
"Take a cab to the church," he sneered before speeding away.
He didn't just leave me on the road; he abandoned me at the altar to hold the hand of the woman who had once tried to kill him. He called our relationship a "debt" he was tired of paying.
I stood there, the lace of my dress heavy with humiliation, realizing I was never his Queen—I was just his collateral damage.
I didn't call a taxi. Instead, I pulled a burner phone from my bodice and dialed the one number that would end his reign.
"The deal is live," I whispered. "He chose her."
I stripped off the wedding dress, climbed over the guardrail, and stepped into the black sedan waiting to take me to his greatest enemy.
7.6
I am the illegitimate, mute daughter of the wealthy Owen family, kept hidden in the attic like a shameful secret.
To save his failing company, my father decided to sell me off to a repulsive, predatory investor named Grossman.
At the family dinner, Grossman's sweaty hands roamed my bare legs while my half-sister Kaleigh intentionally spilled red wine on my dress, laughing as she watched me suffer.
When I grabbed a steak knife to defend myself, my father slammed his fist on the table.
"Sit down, or I will cut off the maintenance payments for your mother's grave."
My stepmother and sister sneered, treating me like a piece of meat meant to be sacrificed for their luxury. I was starved, locked away, and treated worse than a stray dog, all while my family paraded their high-society status to the world.
I couldn't understand why they hated me so deeply, or who really ordered the hit that killed my mother twenty years ago. The police reports were buried, and I was entirely powerless, trapped in a house of monsters.
But they didn't know that the night before, I had accidentally stumbled into the secret life of Burleigh Livingston—the ruthless, supposedly paralyzed billionaire who was faking his madness.
When Burleigh suddenly crashed our family dinner and threw a limitless Black Card on the table to outbid Grossman and buy me for the night, I didn't hesitate.
I grabbed the handles of his wheelchair, accepted his twisted deal, and prepared to use the devil himself to tear my family apart.
9.7
Elena Whitmore always knew falling for her brother's best friend was a mistake. But one stolen night with Grayson Hale changed everything, and cost her more than she ever imagined.
When he vanished without a word, she buried the past and built a life no one could touch. A life that included a daughter Grayson has never known.
Five years later, he's back. Wealthier. Colder. Determined to uncover why she disappeared, and why she's engaged to a man she doesn't love.
As old sparks ignite and buried truths begin to surface, Elena must decide if protecting her secrets is worth sacrificing the only man she ever loved.
7.2
Ade had sacrificed the life she loved, the things she liked doing to please James. But it was never enough for him. Somehow, the one woman he just couldn't get, was the price, she was the gem.
And so once the opportunity presented itself, Ade became a past chapter of his life. A reject.
Betrayed and scorned, Ade is on a quest to reclaim her life back and face off adversaries.
But now what is she to do with the two men in front of her. One of them her ex James who can't seem to forget her and keeps stepping in her way, and the other, a billionaire who wants her at all costs.