My Ex-Boyfriend is my New Step-Brother
Three years ago, Roman Reed was the boy I would have died for. Then he broke my heart and disappeared, leaving me to piece my life back together while I climbed to Hollywood stardom. Now I am the nation's rising star, and my mother has finally found her happy ending with a tech billionaire. But when I walk into our new Malibu estate, the man standing there is not a stranger. It is Roman. My ex-lover. My new stepbrother.
At Northcrest, he is the Blacklisted King. Cold, ruthless, and feared. He hates my fame, he hates my face, and he tells me to stay out of his sight. But under the same roof, the air between us changes.
He watches me from the shadows. He judges my red-carpet gowns with a dark possessiveness that feels like a threat. He warns me, "Do not start something you cannot finish, Scarlett." The paparazzi wait for me to slip. My parents watch our every move. As the hate begins to melt back into the fire that once burned us, the biggest scandal is not my past. It is the man I am living with.
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Chapter: The Trial Opens"Do you think they can smell the mountain air on us, or do we just look like two more people waiting for a car crash?"I leaned my forehead against the cool glass of the SUV’s window. Outside, downtown Manhattan was a sea of moving bodies. It wasn't just the press; it was a circus. People were holding signs—some calling me a hero, some calling me a liar, and others just there to catch a glimpse of the 'Angel' falling from grace. The quiet of the cabin we’d just left felt like a dream I was being forced to wake up from."They don't see us, Scar," Roman said. He was gripping the steering wheel, his knuckles white, his eyes tracking a news drone hovering above the courthouse steps. "They see a headline. They see a story they think they own. But they don't know the weight of the air in that shack, and they sure as hell don't know you.""I feel like I’m walking into a cage," I whispered. "Just a bigger one this time. With more lights.""I’m right behind you," he promised, reaching over to
Last Updated: 2026-05-15
Chapter: The Angel Unmasked"Are the lights too bright? We can adjust them, Scarlett. We want you to be comfortable," the interviewer said, her voice dripping with that rehearsed, soft-shell empathy that usually made my skin crawl.I looked at her—a woman named Sarah who had built a career on 'exclusive' emotional bloodletting. I looked at the three cameras angled toward my face, then down at my own hands. I wasn't wearing the five-carat diamond Marcus had forced on my finger for every gala. I wasn't wearing the silk Dior sheath or the heavy, pore-clogging foundation that made me look like a porcelain doll. I was wearing a faded black sweater of Roman’s and a pair of jeans. My hair was tied back in a messy knot. I looked tired. I looked like I hadn't slept in three years, which was the most honest thing about me."The lights are fine, Sarah," I said, my voice sounding foreign in the quiet studio. "And I don’t think I’m ever going to be 'comfortable' again. Let’s just talk.""People want to know about the 'Angel,
Last Updated: 2026-05-12
Chapter: The Arrest"Miller is here, Marcus. You can hear them, can't you? That’s not the sound of a rescue party," Roman said, his voice flat and cold as the sirens began to scream against the quarry walls.Marcus didn't move at first. He stayed hunched over on that wooden crate, his fingers still digging into his scalp. He looked like a man trying to hold his brain together with his bare hands. The blue and red lights were dancing off the rusted corrugated metal of the shack now, rhythmic and relentless, turning his white silk shirt into a strobe light of failure."They're coming for the monster," I whispered, my hand still locked in Roman's. I could feel his pulse—steady, rhythmic, a sharp contrast to the frantic drum in my own chest. "It’s over, Marcus. Really over."Marcus looked up then. His eyes were wide, darting toward the door as the first gravel-crunch of heavy boots echoed outside. "I can fix this," he muttered, more to himself than us. He stood up, swaying on his feet, his hands smoothing do
Last Updated: 2026-05-11
Chapter: The Final Confrontation"You think you’re so clever, don't you? Hiding in the dirt like a pair of rats while my life's work burns!"The voice didn't come from a distance. It was a jagged, breathless snarl from just outside the shack's door. I jumped, the tablet sliding from my lap and clattering to the floor. I hadn't heard a car—he must have left his vehicle down the ridge and climbed the rest of the way like a man possessed, driven by a rage that wouldn't let him breathe.Marcus stumbled into the light of the doorway, and my stomach turned. He wasn't the polished god of the Reed Tower anymore. He was sweating, his expensive silk shirt torn at the shoulder, and his eyes were bloodshot. He’d tracked the ghost-ping on Lydia’s cloud, following the digital trail of his own betrayal right to our doorstep."How did you find us?" I breathed, backing away until my heels hit the edge of the cot."I built the systems you’re using to destroy me, Scarlett! Did you really think I wouldn't have a backdoor into your mothe
Last Updated: 2026-05-11
Chapter: Lydia’s Testimony"She looks like she’s aged ten years in a single night," Roman muttered, his thumb tracing the play button on the tablet.I sat between his knees, leaning my head back against his chest. The air in the shack was thick and still, the only sound the distant whistle of wind through the quarry. "She’s not wearing her pearls, Roman. She never goes on camera without her pearls.""She’s not going on camera for a magazine spread this time, Scar. She’s going on camera to save herself from a prison cell," he said. He hit play.The video quality was sharp—Chloe’s legal team clearly didn't do things halfway. My mother, Lydia, sat on a velvet sofa that looked like it belonged in a funeral home. Her eyes were puffy, her skin sallow under the harsh studio lights. She looked at someone off-camera, probably a lawyer, and licked her dry lips."My name is Lydia. I am the mother of Scarlett... and for the last three years, I have been a participant in a lie that I can no longer carry," she began, her voi
Last Updated: 2026-05-10
Chapter: The Boardroom Coup"Look at the red, Scar. It’s not just a dip anymore; it’s a hemorrhage," Roman said, his voice a low, vibrating hum against my ear.I leaned into him, the scratchy wool of the blanket still draped over my bare shoulders. We were tangled on the cot, the cold morning air of the shack biting at our skin, but the heat coming off the tablet was enough to burn. On the screen, the Reed Global stock ticker was a jagged, falling knife. It hadn't just opened low; it was plummeting so fast the circuit breakers were tripping every ten minutes."Is that because of the Northcrest files? The ones Miller sent?" I whispered."It’s everything," Roman muttered, his fingers ghosting over the screen. "The Switzerland logs, the 'Angel' audio, and now the Apex manifest. The market doesn't care about morality, but it hates a liability. And right now, Marcus is the biggest liability on the East Coast.""What are they doing? The people in the building?""They’re turning on him," he said, a dark, jagged sliver
Last Updated: 2026-05-09
My Professor’s Obsession
One night, I was a girl seeking vengeance in a velvet mask. He was the stranger who took me against a cold stone wall, his touch a silent, lethal promise.
Now, he is Caspian Blackwood—the most feared architecture professor at Aethelgard. When my "perfect" boyfriend, Dominic Calloway, cheats on me and sabotages my degree, Caspian offers a lifeline with a razor-thin edge: Be his silent, nude model for thirty days.
The rules are absolute. I must wear a silk mask and a weighted collar. I must never speak. I must hold the poses he demands until my muscles scream for mercy. In the lecture hall, he ignores me with arctic indifference. In the studio, his gaze is a physical weight, stripping me faster than his hands ever could. But as the charcoal scratches against the paper, I realize the "deal" isn't just for art. It’s for the soul I accidentally gave him in the dark. Will the deal destroy his career, or consume me first?
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Chapter: The Calloway Connection"Look at the numbers on the second-to-last page, Vane, and tell me if I’m losing my mind or if these dates match the exact months Dad went into the hospital," I said, my voice barely a whisper over the hum of the motel's faulty air conditioner.I had the ledger spread open on the cigarette-burned bedsheet. The paper felt like dried skin under my fingertips. Vane leaned over, squinting at the cramped, legalistic handwriting of Arthur Calloway."August fourteenth... October seventh..." Vane read out, his finger tracing the ink. "Sera, these are the dates of the 're-licensing' fees. But Dad hadn't painted anything new for months by then. He couldn't even hold a brush without his hands shaking.""He didn't need to paint anything new," I said, a cold, hard knot tightening in my stomach. "They weren't licensing new work. They were quietly re-registering his entire back catalog under a Calloway shell company while he was too drugged up on painkillers to notice what he was signing. Look at th
Last Updated: 2026-05-15
Chapter: Dominic Makes His Move"Put the keys down, Dominic, because if you think I’m getting into a car with a man who thinks an envelope of cash is a personality replacement, you’ve clearly forgotten who you're talking to," I said, my voice cutting through the humid morning air of the motel parking lot.He was leaning against a black sedan that looked like it cost more than the entire block, his shades pushed up into his perfectly groomed hair. He looked like an advertisement for a life I had finally stopped wanting."I’m not here to kidnap you, Sera. I’m here to give you an exit ramp," Dominic said, flashing that smile that used to make me feel safe but now just made me feel like I was being appraised for auction. "Look at this place. There’s mold on the stucco and the guy in room four definitely has a meth habit. You're better than this.""I'm exactly where I need to be," I told him, adjusting the strap of my heavy work bag. My shoulder ached from a double shift at the diner, and my fingers felt stiff from scrub
Last Updated: 2026-05-12
Chapter: Alone on Purpose"Two coffees, black, and if you touch that sugar caddy one more time, Vane, I’m going to make you pay the tip with your own allowance," I said, sliding into the vinyl booth of a diner that smelled like old grease and new beginnings.Vane looked at me like I’d grown a second head. He’d never seen me like this. Not this sharp. Not this loud. "I don't have an allowance anymore, Sera. We don't have anything. Why are you acting like we’re on a lunch break from a job you don't have?""Because I’m going to have one by three o'clock," I told him, tapping my knuckles against the laminate table. "And you’re going to stay in that library down the street and finish your GED prep. No more 'accidental brides.' No more hiding in penthouses. We’re going to be boring, normal people who pay rent in cash."The waitress came over, her name tag saying Martha. She looked at my cheap gas-station dress and then at the way I was holding myself—shoulders back, chin up, eyes scanning the room like I was looking
Last Updated: 2026-05-11
Chapter: Alone on Purpose"Two coffees, black, and if you touch that sugar caddy one more time, Vane, I’m going to make you pay the tip with your own allowance," I said, sliding into the vinyl booth of a diner that smelled like old grease and new beginnings.Vane looked at me like I’d grown a second head. He’d never seen me like this. Not this sharp. Not this loud. "I don't have an allowance anymore, Sera. We don't have anything. Why are you acting like we’re on a lunch break from a job you don't have?""Because I’m going to have one by three o'clock," I told him, tapping my knuckles against the laminate table. "And you’re going to stay in that library down the street and finish your GED prep. No more 'accidental brides.' No more hiding in penthouses. We’re going to be boring, normal people who pay rent in cash."The waitress came over, her name tag saying Martha. She looked at my cheap gas-station dress and then at the way I was holding myself—shoulders back, chin up, eyes scanning the room like I was looking
Last Updated: 2026-05-10
Chapter: Sera Walks Out"Are you actually doing this, or are we just playing a very scary game of make-believe in the middle of a swamp?" Vane whispered, his voice cracking as he shoved a handful of socks into his backpack.I didn't look at him. I couldn't. If I looked at the fear in my brother’s eyes, I’d unpack the bag and crawl back into the study to apologize for wanting a soul of my own."We’re doing it, Vane. Grab your inhaler and the extra charger. We leave through the pantry window in five minutes," I said."Caspian will find us before we hit the main road," Vane said, his shadow dancing against the peeling wallpaper as he moved. "He has people, Sera. He has those scary guys Elias knows. He’ll think we’ve been snatched.""He won't," I said, finally zipping my duffel. It felt lighter than it should have. "I'm leaving a note. Not on the desk, not where he can find it right away. I’m leaving it in the book of poems he gave me. He’ll find it when he calms down and looks for the one thing I didn't take."
Last Updated: 2026-05-10
Chapter: Caspian at His Worst"Pack your things and get out of this room, Sera, because I can’t look at you and the ghost of your mother at the same time without wanting to set this entire house on fire," Caspian said.He was standing by the window of the study, the morning sun hitting the silver in his hair and making him look older, harder, and entirely unreachable. The ledger was still open on the desk, the names of our ruined families staring up at us like a list of casualties. He hadn't slept. I could tell by the way his shoulders were hiked up to his ears and the way his hand was white-knuckling the back of a chair."I'm not going anywhere until you stop talking to me like I’m a student who failed a test," I said, my voice echoing in the stale air of the library. "We just found out our parents were friends. We found out Arthur Calloway is a thief. Why are you pushing me away now?""Because you're a liability!" he roared, turning on me so fast I flinched. His eyes were bloodshot and wild. "Do you understand w
Last Updated: 2026-05-09
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