Surrendered Desires
She has the perfect life. The perfect marriage. The perfect lie.
On the night of her wedding anniversary, Ariana Cole receives no flowers, no kiss, no warmth. Just a cold dinner and a silence that finally breaks her.
Then came Luca, the man who once made her feel like fire and vanished without a goodbye. When fate throws him back into her life, so does everything she thought she buried: her desire, betrayal, and the aching truth that her perfect marriage is a beautiful lie.
Torn between a husband who’s suddenly desperate to win her back, and an ex who never truly left her, Ariana slips into a dangerous double life. Then come the anonymous messages, the buried secrets, the undeniable chemistry and the truth that her past was stolen… not forgotten.
As passion reignites and manipulation turns deadly, Ariana must confront a devastating revelation: someone close to her stole her chance at happiness. And they’re not done yet.
With her reputation shattered, a scandal threatening to destroy her career, and the man she truly loves falsely accused, Ariana has one choice: surrender to control or fight her way to freedom, truth, and love.
This time, she’s not breaking. This time, she chooses herself …and love follows.
Baca
Chapter: Things We BurnI stood in the elevator of Daniel’s penthouse tower, the flash drive still warm in my pocket like a gun that has been loaded. The numbers above the door ticked higher: forty-one, forty-two, forty-three. Every second pulled me deeper into a war I didn’t start… but I would be damned if I didn’t end it. My reflection in the elevator mirror looked too calm, too elegant in my silk blouse and leather coat. A woman shaped by Manhattan and masked by control.But underneath, I was shaking, not with fear but fury. I had watched the footage a dozen times last night. Daniel’s voice, calm and deliberate, plotting my collapse like it was just another legal case. Vanessa, sipping wine like she already tasted my ruin.They thought I wouldn’t find out, and that I would stay loyal to a lie, but I was done being the polite wife in a luxury cage. Tonight, I was the storm they never saw coming. Ding. The elevator doors opened. His private hallway glowed with soft lights and silence, the silence you buy wh
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Chapter: Pier of SecretsI couldn’t breathe.The voicemail kept replaying in my mind like a curse on loop. It was low voice, calm threat, that final demand:// “Come alone. Pier 14. Ten o’clock.” I checked the time.9:07 p.m. The city outside my window sparkled like it always did, romantic from a distance, merciless up close. I shouldn’t go. But I couldn’t not go, not yet, because whoever left that message didn’t sound like they were bluffing. And I couldn’t afford another secret unraveling. Not after what Daniel did. Not with Luca gone. Not with my entire life dangling between grief, lust, and shame. I slipped on a black trench coat and tied my hair back into a loose bun. No makeup. No heels. Just soft boots and clean pockets.I needed no weapons, and no lies. Of course, except the lie I was telling myself — that I had this under control.*********The cab ride was short. Too short. The driver dropped me off three blocks from the pier, and the cold wind whipped against my skin as I walked the rest of the way
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Chapter: The Secrets We KeepYou know that feeling when the air feels heavy? Like the universe is holding its breath, waiting to see what you’ll do next? That was me the morning after I found the letter, the one I wrote to myself, like a ghost of the woman I used to be trying to claw her way back.I hadn’t slept. I couldn’t, because every time I closed my eyes, I saw Luca’s face. The look he gave me right before I walked out. That quiet devastation he didn’t say out loud.And Daniel… still lying in that hospital bed, bruised but breathing, was just a few miles away. Our marriage had fractured long before the crash, but now? Now, guilt pressed into every corner of my chest. I told myself I needed coffee but what I really needed was to feel something that didn’t twist.I head downstairs to the café in my hotel, still in yesterday’s clothes, still smelling like someone else’s story. The city outside looks like nothing had changed. But everything inside me had changed. I took my coffee black, bitter, and fast. Shortl
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Chapter: The Weight of GoodbyeThe room blurred around me. I clutched the phone tighter, like gripping it could somehow make the words mean something else. Daniel. Accident. Critical.Those three words splintered through me, slicing through the air Luca and I had just begun to breathe together.“Where?” I managed to ask, voice cracking.“St. Vincent’s Hospital,” the officer said calmly, like he wasn’t detonating the entire ground beneath my feet. “We need someone to identify him. He’s stable, but unconscious.”Unconscious. The word echoed in my skull. “I’m on my way.” I hung up. My fingers trembled, still holding the phone, still caught between the warmth of the past and the horror of the present. Luca looked at me, jaw tightening as he pulls back. “What happened?”“It’s Daniel. He’s… there was an accident.”For a second, neither of us said anything. And then his face softened, but the distance between us widened anyway.“Do you want me to come with you?”“No.” I swallowed hard. “I have to do this alone.” I could
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Chapter: The Taste of AlmostThe air between us crackled with silence.Luca didn’t say another word as he stepped into the hotel room, and I didn’t stop him. I should have. I know I should’ve. But knowing what’s right and doing it? Two very different things. He placed the coffee and the painting gently on the side table, then turned to me with a gaze so gentle it disarmed every defense I had left.“I didn’t mean to come here like this,” he said. “But I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about you. About us.”I stood near the window, wrapped in the hotel’s white robe, arms folded across my chest like a barrier he’d already broken through. “And what exactly are we, Luca? Because last time I checked, I’m still married.”His expression didn’t change. “Are you, though?”I flinched at the honesty in his voice. Not cruel. Just… true. “Daniel threw me out.”He nodded. “And what do you want now?”“I don’t know.” I bit my lip. “I shouldn’t want you. Not like this.”“But you do.” His words weren’t a question. I looked at him.
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Chapter: Pages We Never BurnedI stayed up all night reading the journal I thought I’d buried with my past. It was supposed to be just paper, Ink, closed chapter. But the words I wrote about Luca all those years ago—they’re still alive. I flip to a page I haven’t dared touch in years. The one with the tearstain at the edge, the day I found out he left New York without a word.// “If love is fire, then he was the flame I walked into, knowing it would burn. And I’d do it again, every time, just to feel it.”That was before Daniel. Before marriage. Before mortgages and quiet dinners and scheduling sex like appointments. I press the page to my chest, exhaling slowly. My body still remembers the shape of Luca’s kiss. The urgency in his voice. The way he held my face like I was something precious, not just desired.It’s 3 a.m., and I’m curled up on our bed alone, staring at the space Daniel once filled. He hasn’t called. He hasn’t come home. And I don’t know what’s worse—his silence or my longing for the wrong man. No.
Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-06-25
Masuk
