Jasmine Writes

I woke up naked in a stranger's luxurious penthouse with a splitting headache and zero memory of the night before. The man sleeping beside me was Jason Montgomery, the billionaire captain of the New York Ghosts. And on both of our left ring fingers were matching, irremovable gold wedding bands. He looked at my terrified face with pure disgust, accusing me of being a calculating groupie who set him up. He threw some oversized clothes at me and kicked me out onto the streets without even a pair of socks. When I finally made it back to my tiny Brooklyn apartment, my own mother took one look at my expensive, unfamiliar clothes and delivered the final blow. "Did you sleep with some man for money? Nothing about you looks like you belong in this family anymore!" I was completely shattered. I didn't know how I ended up in his bed, why we were suddenly married, or why my memory was a terrifying void. Why did this paranoid sports star also have no memory of our supposed wedding? What exactly happened at that bar last night? Trapped between a mother who despised me and a ruthless celebrity husband who warned me to stay quiet, I stared at the gold ring digging into my flesh. I couldn't just hide and cry. I had to find out the truth, even if it meant confronting the Ice God himself.

For six years, Elena Craig dedicated her life and her brilliant mind to her fiancé, Jory Black. She built his tech empire from the ground up, believing they were heading toward a perfect marriage. But her reward wasn't a wedding ring. It was a staged car crash and the suffocating, damp earth of a fresh grave. As her bones splintered under the crushing weight of the dirt, she heard the people she loved most standing over her casket. "Don't worry, sis. I'll take good care of Jory for you. And all your money." Her stepsister Carissa laughed like poison, while Jory coldly dismissed Elena as just a boring stepping stone. They had been sleeping together in her bed, plotting to bankrupt her mother's company, before burying her alive to silence her forever. The agonizing pain of suffocation was nothing compared to the raw, gaping wound of their betrayal. How could she have been so blind to the monsters living right beside her? Why did her unwavering loyalty only earn her a brutal, agonizing death? Then, her eyes flew open. She wasn't dead. She was sitting on Jory's plush sofa, reborn exactly two days before her family's ruin. Hearing her stepsister's suppressed moans coming from the master bedroom, Elena didn't shed a single tear. She calmly walked in, dropped her three-carat diamond ring into Jory's whiskey, and slapped him viciously across the face. "Our engagement is over." Leaving the cheating scum behind, she walked straight out into the midnight air to propose to the most ruthless billionaire in New York.

Chloe had just given birth to twins, lying exhausted in a cramped, bustling hospital ward. When she called her husband, Julian, he was busy partying with his actress mistress. He coldly hung up on her, having already drafted a brutal divorce agreement that would leave her with a pittance. Strangers in the next bed loudly mocked her pitiful state, gossiping about how Julian was dumping her. For years, Chloe had erased her own identity to fit into his elite world, only to be thrown away like garbage. She was completely alone, clutching her helpless babies, bracing herself to sign the cruel papers just to survive. She couldn't understand why her absolute devotion was met with such chilling indifference. Why did she have to suffer this ultimate humiliation while he celebrated with the woman who ruined her life? But then, a senior doctor noticed a unique mole on her wrist and ran a secret DNA test. The results were staggering: Chloe was the long-lost daughter of the billionaire Beaumont family. With her fiercely protective parents and three powerful brothers suddenly forming an impenetrable fortress around her, Chloe picked up her phone and texted her arrogant husband. "City Hall tomorrow at 10 AM. If you don't show up, my lawyer will handle everything. And trust me, you won't like their terms."

Five years ago, I stood in the freezing rain at my mother's funeral, waiting for my husband. Blake Knight, the billionaire NHL superstar, was two hours late. When he finally showed up, he brought his rumored girlfriend, the woman he had just rented a hotel rooftop for to celebrate her birthday. Watching him defend her fake tears, my heart completely died. I took off my diamond wedding ring, placed it on my mother's headstone, and walked away from my marriage forever. I fled to London, changed my name to Ava, and secretly raised the triplets he never knew existed. I thought I was finally safe from him. But today, my kids vandalized a silver Aston Martin in our apartment's parking garage, and the owner caught my youngest daughter. My phone rang. The voice on the other end was Blake's. He had moved into my building, and he was holding my little girl in his penthouse, demanding her mother come get her immediately. Panic suffocated me. If I walked through that door, my five years of hiding would be instantly destroyed. He would recognize me, realize I didn't get rid of our child like everyone thought, and he would use all his power to take my babies away. I couldn't let him ruin my life again. "I'm just her nanny," I lied through my teeth. I frantically begged my best friend to go upstairs and rescue my daughter in my place. He bought the disguise, but now, the King of the Ice is dangerously obsessed with investigating my new identity.

She married him out of desperation, becoming the perfect docile wife while he treated her like dirt beneath his shoes. But everything shattered the night she overheard him mocking her with his friends-and discovered the necklace she'd cherished, her only link to the boy who once saved her life, didn't even belong to him. It was all a lie. No longer the doormat he married, she discards her fake identity and reclaims her birthright as the hidden heiress of Salvadore City. Now she's on a mission: find the necklace's true owner among his circle of friends, no matter how many hearts she has to break along the way. But her husband isn't ready to let go. Convinced she's playing games to make him jealous, he's blindsided when divorce papers land in his hands. By the time he realizes the woman he dismissed was never who he thought she was, she's already moved on-living her truth, chasing her destiny, and leaving him choking on regret. Some cages, once opened, can never be closed again.

My stepmother’s bodyguards were seconds away from dragging me back to a life that was essentially a prison cell wrapped in silk. I couldn't even scream for help because the words always died in my throat—a clinical condition called selective mutism that felt like drowning on dry land. I had just discovered the sickening truth: my father was planning to sell me to a sleazy investor named Sterling to cover his company’s bankruptcy. They were going to drug me, ship me off to a private island, and strip away the only thing I had left—my late mother’s multimillion-dollar art trust. When I arrived at the manor, my stepmother Lydia handed me a glass of wine laced with bitter sedatives, her smile sharp as a razor. "Drink up, darling. It’ll make the transition to Mr. Sterling much easier." My stepsister Harper stood in the corner, wearing a dress bought with my mother’s stolen money, mocking my inability to speak. My father didn't even look me in the eye as he calculated my price tag, treating his own daughter like a piece of damaged, mute inventory. They thought because I didn't speak, I didn't hear them laughing about the "accident" that killed my mother or how they planned to burn her final restoration work. They assumed my silence was a sign of surrender, a white flag waved by a broken girl who would never fight back. How could the people who were supposed to be my family treat me like a commodity to be traded? Did they really think my silence meant I was weak, or that I didn't know every dirty secret they were hiding in their ledgers? I didn't drink the wine. Instead, I burst into the VIP suite of Carlisle Pierce, the most cold-blooded billionaire in New York, and slammed a crumpled napkin on his table with a desperate, last-second gambit. "MARRY ME. NOW. $1 MILLION."

On our third anniversary, my husband canceled our dinner, claiming a sudden work emergency. I tracked his phone to an exclusive French restaurant, only to find him tenderly fastening a blessed bracelet—one I had flown across the world to get for him—onto his college ex-girlfriend's wrist. The sheer shock triggered a violent placental abruption. Bleeding out in my car just across the street, I frantically called his number. Through the window, I watched him glance at his screen, frown in annoyance, and press decline to focus on his lover. While I was wheeled into a freezing operating room for an emergency C-section utterly alone, he took his mistress back to our marital bed. He didn't even bother to check if I was alive, completely oblivious that our premature daughter was fighting for her life in the NICU. I soon discovered our entire marriage was a sham. He had used my family's wealth to save his company, and now he was trading me to secure a massive business deal with his ex's father. The man I loved didn't exist; he only saw me as a disposable asset. "I'm going to make him wish he had never been born." After secretly securing my baby in a private retreat, I ordered a medical-grade silicone pregnancy belly to hide my flat stomach. I stepped back into our penthouse, ready to burn his precious empire to the ground.

My sister-in-law didn't want me to marry for love. She wanted me to marry rich-so she could turn my husband into her personal ATM. So I did the one thing guaranteed to ruin all her plans. I got myself a broke hockey player. At least, that's what everyone was supposed to believe. Beckett Hayes needed a girlfriend badly. The Chicago hockey star had a reputation problem, angry sponsors, and too many headlines painting him as arrogant, reckless, and impossible to settle down. I needed a man convincing enough to stop my family from arranging my future for me. Our solution was simple: fake date. His rules were even simpler. Live in his shabby apartment. Help sell the struggling-player act. Smile for the cameras. No real feelings. Easy. Until my family showed up to mock the "loser" I'd chosen-and Beckett stepped between us like they had insulted something that belonged to him. Until he put a no-limit black card in my hand and told me to stop sacrificing my dream of becoming an artist just because I was afraid to spend money. Until our fake dinners started feeling domestic, his hand started finding mine under the table, and I began forgetting that every protective look and possessive touch was supposed to be part of the contract. Then Beckett's grandfather arrived at our tiny apartment wearing cashmere, flanked by bodyguards, carrying a priceless Hayes family heirloom for me. Apparently, pretending to be broke was the easy part. Pretending I wasn't falling for my fake boyfriend was becoming impossible. Especially when his grandfather took our only bedroom and left Beckett and me with one pullout sofa, one night, and absolutely nowhere left to hide.

As I lay on the floor of our manor, bleeding out from a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, I used my last ounce of strength to call my husband, Cole. I begged him for help, my vision blurring. But the only thing I heard was the clinking of champagne glasses and his mistress's giggle in the background. "Stop the drama, June," Cole snapped, his voice cold. "We're about to go on stage. Don't call again." He hung up, leaving me to die alone on the Persian rug while he accepted an award with another woman on his arm. I woke up in the hospital days later. My baby was gone. They had removed my fallopian tube. Cole finally arrived, smelling of expensive scotch and his mistress's perfume. He didn't hug me. He didn't cry. Instead, he leaned over my hospital bed, pressing his knee into the mattress until my fresh stitches tore open and bled. "You embarrassed me by calling an ambulance," he hissed. "My mistress, Alycia, says you're faking it. Clean yourself up." He left me bleeding again to go announce a $10 million donation to Alycia's "groundbreaking" medical research. I stared at the TV screen, numb. The research Alycia was taking credit for? It was mine. I wrote that patent years ago under a pseudonym. They thought I was just a poor, orphan housewife who needed Cole's money to survive. They had no idea I was actually a billionaire scientist hiding my identity. I pulled the IV needle out of my arm. A drop of blood fell onto the divorce papers I had been hiding. I didn't wipe it off. I signed my name right over it. Then I walked into the bank, reactivated my dormant account with $128 million, and bought the penthouse directly overlooking Cole's house. The mourning widow is dead. The avenger is born.

I was an intern nurse working exhausting shifts, yet my mother constantly forced me into blind dates with wealthy, arrogant men to secure our family's social standing. During a terrifying hospital lockdown, an assassin disguised as a doctor held a scalpel to my throat. I was almost killed, but a high-ranking military colonel threw his own body down a flight of concrete stairs to shield me. I survived with cuts and bruises, but when I went home, my mother didn't care about my near-death experience. She was only furious that I had rushed out on my blind date with Preston, a rich financial analyst. She forced me to meet him to apologize. When Preston grabbed my arm, bruised me, and mocked my attack as a pathetic lie, my mother still took his side. "Men get angry," she told me coldly. "It's your job not to provoke them. You will beg for his forgiveness, or you are no longer welcome in this house." I had narrowly escaped an assassin, yet my own family was willing to feed me to a monster just for a fat paycheck and neighborhood gossip. My heart went completely dead. So, when the intimidating Colonel appeared, offering me maximum military protection through a sudden marriage, I didn't hesitate. I walked back into my parents' house and calmly slapped a crisp marriage certificate onto the coffee table. "I won't be apologizing to Preston. I got married today."

I was carefully folding a new silk nightgown, ready to fly to New York and surprise my fiancé of several years, Donald. Then my phone pinged with a photo from my stepsister, Cindy. It was a high-resolution image of her and Donald, tangled together naked on messy bedsheets. On his arm was the one-of-a-kind silver bracelet I had custom-designed for his birthday last month. Cindy was staring right at the camera with a triumphant, provocative smile. A second message popped up: "Omg, sis, so sorry! Sent that by accident!" It was a blatant, mocking slap in the face. Later, I even intercepted a call where Donald laughed with his mother about how my declining family was just a worthless stepping stone for them. He called me a "boring, good girl" who was easy to manage, bragging that he would just go back to having his fun with Cindy right after our wedding. They really thought I was just a naive fool who would either come crying to him or quietly swallow this humiliating betrayal. They thought my silence meant I was weak and defeated. But I didn't shed a single tear, nor did I scream. A cold, sharp anger shot up my spine, extinguishing every last ember of heartbreak. I threw the silk nightgown into the trash, opened my laptop, and used my MIT computer science background to hack straight into their luxury hotel suite's smart system. I wasn't going to New York to cry. I was going to broadcast their filthy affair to the entire city at the most prestigious charity gala of the year.

I gave up my college dreams and spent every penny I had to support my boyfriend Boyce's NHL ambitions. But as I lay dying in a damp hospital room, I called him begging for treatment money, only to hear his new girlfriend laughing on the line. Boyce coldly called me a useless "Puck Bunny" and a convenient ATM before hanging up. Moments later, his new girl Beryl called back to deliver a truth that shattered my reality. "Do you know how you got sick? It wasn't an accident." Boyce had deliberately arranged for me to be infected with HIV. He thought I was too clingy, and this was the easiest way to get rid of me so he could chase his hockey dreams without baggage. Just before I took my last breath, a man arrived to save me, sent by Case Hoover-a wealthy fiancé from an old family arrangement I had completely forgotten. The irony was crushing. I had destroyed my life serving a monster who murdered me, while my actual fiancé tried to protect me. I died in excruciating agony, my soul held together by nothing but pure, bottomless hatred. Why was I so blind? Why did I give everything to a man with a heart blacker than a starless night? Opening my eyes, I gasped for air, finding myself staring at my healthy, eighteen-year-old reflection in the mirror. I was reborn in my senior year of high school. This time, I wouldn't be his stepping stone; I was going to make him pay the ultimate price.