Trapped By The Coldhearted Billionaire's Game
Cassidy Fox woke up in a freezing, luxurious penthouse that wasn't hers.
Before she could clear her spinning head, ruthless billionaire Jaret Taylor threw a phone onto the bed.
The screen showed an explicit photo of her boyfriend, Burt, tangled in sheets with Jaret's fiancée.
Burt had fled the moment things got complicated, leaving Cassidy behind as a scapegoat to face a monster.
Jaret demanded an eye for an eye.
He trapped her in the room, choked her until she nearly blacked out, and threatened to completely destroy her career if she refused to submit to him.
When she still fought back and escaped, Jaret's men captured Burt and lured her to an abandoned warehouse in the middle of a hurricane.
Burt was tied to a rusted pillar, beaten and sobbing in terror.
He didn't care about what degrading acts Jaret would force her to perform to pay off his debt.
"Cassidy, please, just listen to them! We can figure this out, just don't let them hurt me!"
Cassidy felt a suffocating wave of despair and injustice.
She had risked her life driving through a deadly storm to save the man who had once saved her from drowning, only to realize she was sacrificing herself for a selfish coward who had already betrayed her.
Jaret sat at the poker table, looking at her rain-soaked body with a cruel smirk.
"Every hand I win, you do exactly what we ask. If you manage to win a hand, we cut off one of Burt's fingers."
Looking at the pathetic man begging for his life, Cassidy slowly picked up her cards.
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Chapter 7
Cassidy hit the mattress with a bounce, the heavy springs groaning under the impact.
Before she could even scramble onto her hands and knees, Jaret's weight crashed down on her. He pinned her wrists above her head, his large hands easily encompassing both of hers.
She thrashed beneath him, trying to buck him off, trying to bring her knee up, but he was too heavy, too strong. He forced his leg between hers, pinning her hips to the bed.
He stared down at her face—flushed with rage, eyes bright with unshed tears—and the fire in his eyes burned hotter. He didn't give her a warning. He didn't ask for permission.
He crashed his mouth down onto hers.
It wasn't a kiss. It was a punishment. His teeth scraped against her lips, bruising and demanding. He forced his tongue past her clenched teeth, invading her mouth, tasting the copper of her blood and the salt of her tears.
Cassidy kept her jaw locked, refusing to respond, refusing to give him an inch. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth—she didn't know if she had bitten him or bitten her own tongue.
His grip on one of her wrists loosened as his hand slid down, his fingers digging into the curve of her waist. He grabbed the hem of her dress, yanking it upward with a rough, impatient movement.
The cool air on her skin snapped the last thread of Cassidy's sanity. She couldn't let this happen. Not again. Not like this.
As his hand moved to adjust his weight, she felt the cool metal of the bedside lamp base beneath her free fingers.
She didn't think. She just acted.
She wrapped her hand around the heavy brass base and swung it with every ounce of desperate strength she possessed.
Jaret saw the movement at the last second. He jerked his head to the side.
The lamp connected with his shoulder with a sickening thud.
He grunted in pain, his grip on her faltering. He stared down at her, shock and disbelief warring in his eyes. The little mouse had claws.
Cassidy didn't waste the opening. She shoved him off balance and twisted her body around.
Her hand came up, and she put her entire body weight behind the slap.
Crack!
The sound echoed through the silent room like a gunshot.
Jaret's head snapped to the side, the force of the blow whipping his neck around. A bright red handprint bloomed instantly on his cheek. He froze, his body turning to stone.
From the doorway, Kade poked his head in, his eyes wide. He took one look at Jaret's face and immediately backed out, pulling the door shut. Dead woman walking, he thought.
Cassidy lay on the bed, her chest heaving, her hand stinging from the impact. She was shaking violently, but she kept her eyes locked on him, daring him to move.
Slowly, Jaret turned his head back to face her. The shock was gone. The desire was gone.
He didn't strike back. He didn't grab her throat. Instead, he slowly straightened up, his hand moving to his reddened cheek. When he looked at her, the shock in his eyes had curdled into something far more dangerous—a cold, deliberate fury that was worse than any blow.
"You have no idea what you just did," he said, his voice barely above a whisper. He took a step back, putting an unnerving distance between them rather than closing it. "But you will. By the time I'm finished, you'll understand exactly what it costs to strike me."
He stood there for a long moment, his chest rising and falling with controlled breaths, a predator forcing himself back into his cage. Then, without another word, he turned and walked toward the door, his back to her—a dismissal more terrifying than any threat.
The door slammed shut behind him.
Cassidy lay alone on the bed, her body trembling, her hand still stinging, the silence around her heavier than any scream.
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8.6
In my past life, the Cerberus strain leaked, turning the world into a blood-soaked hell of rotting flesh and mutated monsters.
I thought my boyfriend Declan and my best friend Hailee would have my back as we fled the quarantine zone.
Instead, when the surging crowd of the infected cornered us, they didn't hesitate.
They shoved me backward into the horde just to buy themselves three seconds to run.
As I fell into the mud, I saw them fleeing without a single backward glance.
"She's dead weight anyway!" Hailee screamed.
"Just keep running, she'll distract them!" Declan yelled back.
I was torn apart, feeling the agonizing tear of rotting teeth sinking into my neck and the hot spray of my own blood.
Before the apocalypse, my greedy uncle had locked away my ten-million-dollar trust fund, leaving me with nothing but a fake boyfriend who only wanted me for my money.
Until my last breath, I couldn't understand how the people I loved most could trade my life for a head start.
Why did I blindly trust them? Why didn't I see through their perfectly choreographed lies?
Opening my eyes again, the stench of decaying flesh vanished, replaced by the sterile smell of my college dorm room.
Hailee and Declan were standing over my bed, faking tears of concern over my meningitis fever.
I was back exactly seven days before the world ended, and my spatial vault ability had come back with me.
This time, I'm extorting my uncle for every cent, hoarding the city's supplies, and leaving them all to rot.
9.2
Jacqueline Blackburn, a desperate Ivy League tutor, walked into the sleazy Veridian VIP club just to save her job.
But her billionaire client, the ruthless Christian Montgomery, mistook her for a cheap escort, blowing cigar smoke in her face and treating her like trash.
When she furiously turned to leave, a drunk former client attacked her in the hallway, tearing her white dress open and pinning her by the throat.
She fought back, stabbing the man's hand with a pen, only for Christian to emerge from the shadows and brutally crush the attacker's bleeding hand under his heel.
Instead of letting her go, Christian draped his heavy suit jacket over her exposed skin, trapped her in his dark suite, and forced her to sign a suffocating contract.
"You have exactly ninety days, or I will personally ensure you cease to exist in my city."
She thought she could just keep her head down, teach his nephew, and survive.
But she didn't understand why this terrifying underground tyrant was suddenly so fixated on her.
Why did he use his immense power to isolate her, publicly claim her at a billionaire gala, and track her every move?
When she received a chilling midnight text demanding she pack her bags and move into his sprawling estate by 8:00 AM, the terrifying reality set in.
She hadn't escaped the wolf. She had just walked directly into his cage.
8.8
I am the best esports jungler in the league, but I've been hiding a severe wrist injury just to keep my team alive in the semifinals.
Right in the middle of the crucial tie-breaker game, our mid-laner deliberately walked into the enemy team and died without casting a single defensive spell.
He was match-fixing for offshore betting sites, throwing away our entire season for a massive payout.
Because of his betrayal, we had to sub in two terrified rookies, and we were absolutely slaughtered. The stadium crowd booed us out of the arena. The internet exploded with pure vitriol, trending hashtags calling me a washed-up fraud who hid on the bench to save my own stats. The media demanded I retire immediately. My physical therapist gave me a grim ultimatum: my shredded nerves only allow me four hours of playtime a day before my right hand completely locks up.
I destroyed my own body for this team, only to be sold out by a coward and crucified by the very fans I bled for. Why should my legacy end in total disgrace because of someone else's greed?
I refuse to step down. I forced the traitor out, ignored management's safe roster choices, and locked my eyes on the most toxic, universally hated streamer on the platform.
"He's a walking PR nightmare," my coach warned.
I don't care. He is an arrogant, unhinged killer in the game, and I am going to make him mine.
8.4
On the night before her wedding, Navia Harrison discovers her fiancé in bed with her step-sister-and worse, the two of them are already planning how to get rid of her after the marriage.
Humiliated and consumed by hatred, Navia exposes their affair during the wedding ceremony itself, destroying both families' reputations in a single move.
Then, she meets him.
Leonel Crawford - the cold and dangerously powerful head of the Crawford family. Untouchable. Ruthless. A man no woman has ever been able to keep close.
He's also her ex-fiancé's uncle.
One impulsive proposal changes everything.
"If you need a wife... marry me instead."
"Honestly... we'd make a pretty good match."
7.6
Top DEA agent Kaitlynn Bruce woke up to a heavy, chemical lethargy, only to realize she was trapped in the body of a weak, abused war widow.
Before she could even process her new reality, she heard her sister-in-law counting cash, selling her unconscious body to a local thug for a measly two hundred dollars.
The thug dragged her new seven-year-old son, Cason, into the bedroom.
"Mommy!"
When the boy reached out, the man brutally kicked his small body into a wooden doorframe, leaving him gasping and bleeding on the floor.
Memories flooded Kaitlynn's mind. Her predecessor was a pathetic doormat whose husband's military pension had been bled dry by these greedy in-laws, leaving her children to starve and suffer endless abuse.
But as Kaitlynn looked at the bleeding boy's dark, unnervingly alert eyes, a chilling piece of DEA intelligence clicked in her mind.
Cason Richmond.
The name, the town, the abusive aunt—it all matched the classified files of the "Director of the Hive," the most ruthless and feared cartel puppet master in the criminal underworld.
How could this battered, starving child be destined to become the ultimate monster she used to hunt?
The original widow's tragic death was supposed to be the catalyst that pushed this boy into total darkness.
But Kaitlynn Bruce was not a victim.
Adrenaline burning through the drugs, she cracked the thug's neck with a brass lamp and choked the sister-in-law against the wall.
Looking down at the boy who was supposed to become a global nightmare, she made a vow. She was going to rewrite his script, even if she had to burn the whole world down to do it.
9.8
Three women, three brothers, a single, crumpled dollar bill.
Alina's world shatters the moment she's auctioned off-and claimed by the powerful Hawthorne brothers.
Thrown into Adrian Hawthorne's cold, dangerous world, she becomes his to control... his to protect... and, terrifyingly, his to desire. He's ruthless, possessive, and hiding secrets that could destroy them both. But the deeper she falls into his world, the harder it becomes to tell if she's his prisoner-or something far more dangerous.
Because the Hawthorne brothers don't just take.
They keep.
Viviane has spent her life surviving, so when Julian Hawthorne "buys" her freedom, she knows better than to trust it. Men like him don't save people-they collect them. But Julian isn't as simple as he pretends to be, and the deeper she's pulled into his world, the more dangerous it becomes to walk away.
Especially when she realizes she might be the only thing he's ever been willing to fight for.
Lena doesn't belong to anyone-and she intends to keep it that way. Brilliant, guarded, and hiding more than anyone suspects, she enters Lucien Hawthorne's world on her own terms. But Lucien doesn't play fair, and he doesn't let go.
When her past comes crashing back, Lena is forced to face the one thing she's been running from: trusting someone who could destroy her... or save her.
Three women. Three choices.Stay. Fight.
Or burn it all down.
Because being sold was only the beginning.