Alex Yoong: The Driver's Line

"Coach, please stop. I came here to learn how to drive, not to have an affair." Inside the instructor's car, because I kept failing to control the clutch, Coach Reeves, who happened to be my husband's friend, made me sit on his lap to teach me. The problem was, I was wearing a short skirt that day, and underneath it, I wasn't even wearing safety shorts. Even worse, he actually pulled his member out and pressed it straight against me.

Every time my driver, Jason, sent me to the office, he brought his girlfriend along. Since we were all headed in the same direction, I never made a fuss. However, one morning, I opened the car door to see a note taped to my usual seat. [No freeloaders allowed in this car!] I tore the note off and turned to Jason. “What's this supposed to mean?!”

He wasn’t supposed to be more than her driver. Just a man in a black car. Quiet. Controlled. Off-limits. But when Seraphina caught Cassian in a moment, high and vulnerable, one he thought no one would ever see, his secret… everything changed. Desire turned dangerous. Obsession turned mutual. And soon, every ride home felt like a slow, deliberate sin. What Seraphina doesn’t know is that Cassian isn’t who he says he is. Beneath the tailored suit and cool detachment hides a billionaire built on vengeance, a man who came to destroy her family for what they did to his. He meant to use her. To ruin her. But somewhere between the lies and the touch of her lips, he forgot which role he was playing, the driver, the lover, or the executioner. Now the secret that binds them could destroy them both. Because the deeper she falls for him, the closer she comes to uncovering the truth he’ll do anything to keep buried. And when love becomes the weapon, no one gets out clean.

I disappeared in the year Sebastian Ferraro loved me most. For thirteen years, he never got an explanation. And for thirteen years, I punished myself by never watching his games, never saying his name, and never thinking about the promise we made in that old hockey rink. Until I returned to this city and saw a faded poster outside the abandoned arena. Sebastian was only seventeen in the photo. He stood at the center of the ice, bright-eyed and fearless, with one sentence printed beneath him: Wait for me past the blue line. That was his promise to me. And I had missed it for thirteen years. Later, I collapsed inside his arena. When I woke up, the boy I had once failed was standing beside my hospital bed. Only he was no longer a boy. He was a professional hockey star. The heir to the Ferraro crime family. And a man whose fiancée was about to marry him. I wanted to tell him why I had left all those years ago. But he looked at me and said coldly, “The past is over. Don’t cause any misunderstandings.” That was when I finally understood. I no longer had the right to disturb his life. So I smiled, swallowed every truth I had kept buried, and booked a flight to New Zealand. I thought leaving was the last thing I could do for him. Until that plane disappeared from radar. The news spread through the whole city. Everyone said Sebastian Ferraro lost control at the airport. He went through the passenger list again and again, screaming my name like a man who had already lost everything.

When the hospital director called me for the tenth time, I was still stuck in traffic on the winding mountain road leading into the city. A pink Polo driving inexcusably slow was wedged in the middle of two lanes and obstructing my path. The "New Driver" sticker on the rear of the car seemed to insult me. I took a deep breath before slamming on the horn. That was when the car jerked to a stop. A man in a floral shirt stepped out of the car, marched to my car, and pounded on my window. "What's with the rush?! Can't you tell by the sticker that I'm a new driver? If you cause an accident, you're going to have to pay up!" I gripped the steering wheel so tightly that veins bulged on the back of my hand. The director's desperate cries were still echoing in my ears, "Dr. Leigh, the boy is dying! The only information we have is that his father's name is Ronald Baker!" Upon noting my silence, the man smiled smugly before smacking the hood of my car. "Go ahead, drive over the barrier to bypass me if you want! Even the police have to slow down for me!" With that, he slammed his brand-new driver's license against my window. "Look closely, I just got my license yesterday! I'm a legal driver!" I quickly glossed over the driver's license. What stood out to me was his name printed on the license. Ronald Baker.

He was just a driver. Until he became everything she was never allowed to want. After a scandalous night out, Ariana Westbrook’s world spins out of control. As the only daughter of a powerful billionaire, she’s used to luxury — not lockdown. Her father responds the only way he knows how: by hiring a full-time driver to monitor her every move. But Liam Blake is not just a driver. He’s charming, mysterious... and hiding a life worth billions. As Ariana fights against the cage her life has become, she starts falling — not just for freedom, but for the man who was never supposed to matter. And when long-buried secrets come to light, she’ll question everything: her family, her identity, and the man who may have betrayed her in more ways than one. She was never meant to know the truth. He was never meant to fall for her. But some collisions are impossible to avoid.