Short Romance Stories & Novels

Gia Rowan was diagnosed with a terminal illness in the second year after the death of her husband. She prepared to donate everything she had built to charity, but the will of her late husband shattered her world. Her late husband had left everything he owned to his twenty-eight-year-old illegitimate son, including half of her company. She and her husband remained childless for thirty years. The mother mentioned in his will was not her, but it was Cecelia Warren instead. Betrayal struck her, and in the haze of despair, she lost consciousness. She opened her eyes again to find herself back in the third year of her marriage. With the truth in hand, she had a new chance to choose differently.

The day Henry decided to marry my best friend, I turned into a joke in everyone’s eyes. He lifted my chin and stared into my eyes bewitchingly. “If you admit your fault, I can overlook your mistakes and start over again with you.” I obeyed and uttered the words, “I was wrong.” And yet, with mocking eyes, he sneered, “I can’t believe you’re this cheap, Julia.”

Late at night, my husband came home with a young model. "So, you are the washed-up wife that Mr. Dawson keeps at home?" The girl looked at me with a mocking smile and said. Jay Dawson, my husband, reeking of alcohol, glanced between us with interest. He then hugged the young girl and led her into the bedroom. I sat alone on the living room couch, wrapped in a blanket, and listened to their shameless noises all night. I endured it for two years. Our agreement had finally ended this year, and so had my love for Ethan. I walked away. But Ethan chased after me like a madman.

When my daughter, Ruth Jensen, says for the tenth time that she wants a different mother, I don't get angry. I just calmly ask her who she wants instead. She blurts, "Vivian." She means Vivian Green, her tutor… and also the woman my husband has never been able to forget. At Ruth's birthday party that day, she even openly thanks Vivian, saying Vivian takes care of her like a mother. Looking at Ruth's young, innocent face, I finally understand that she doesn't like me. So, I stop caring for her and my husband the way I used to. Instead, I turn around and join a classified national project. Rather than wasting time on people who aren't worth it, I'd be better off serving my country!

On my wedding day, my fiancé bailed. Sabina—his ex—had sent him a diary listing 77 things she'd done for him. Turns out she only dumped him because his family pushed her to. So, he ran back to her. While I was still reeling, Jacob—my fiancé's best friend—showed up. He got down on one knee, flashed a ring he'd clearly had ready, and said, "Yuna Auclair, I've liked you for a long time. Will you marry me?" I thought he was my person. But after the wedding, Jacob turned distant. Hot one second, ice-cold the next. Then I found a diary in his study. Just like the one Sabina had sent my ex. Page one hit like a truck: [Hurt Yuna Auclair seventy-seven times, and I'll break up with Gabriel and be with you.] Oh—and Gabriel? He was my ex.

When Adrian Cozner went to a get-together with his fiancée and her friends, Lacey Mirren excused herself, saying she had something to take care of. Two hours passed. She still hadn't come back. Just as he was about to get up and look for her, he overheard her close friends mocking him in Portuguese. "This dumbass doesn't even know he's been cheated on." "Right about now, Lacey and Kevin are probably going at it." "Lacey said Adrian isn't as hung as Kevin. They've been childhood sweethearts. This poor idiot—ha, look at him, we're talking crap right in front of him, and he has no idea. So pathetic." Adrian had just started to stand up, but his body froze, his mind going blank. Right then, Lacey pushed through the door, face flushed, completely satisfied, sweat still glistening on her skin. "Haha, how was it? Isn't sneaking around a thrill? You're something else." "Absolutely. Couldn't get enough."

My husband chooses to stay in a honeymoon suite with his secretary during a company teambuilding event. "I'm in poor health, so I need Mr. Lowe by my side to care for me when I'm taking a dip in the hot springs. I'm sure Elaine won't be mad because she's so generous, right?" My husband wraps an arm around her waist, sounding displeased as he says, "Ignore her. I'd have wasted my time on her if she's so petty!" Our colleagues chime in. "Exactly! It's best to get a divorce if your wife gets jealous so easily! Now, Ms. Klein is gentle and considerate. You're a lucky man, Mr. Lowe!" I'm the one who recruited all of these people into the company, yet they all now despise me. Since none of them like me, there's no need for the company to exist anymore. I text my parents. "Don't bother investing in the company anymore. I no longer want it."

A plane crash tore my husband and his twin brother apart. One survived. One did not. When I rushed to the hospital, I saw my brother-in-law, who had just survived the crash, locked in a passionate kiss with his wife. My husband? He lay lifeless in the morgue. Blinded by grief, I stumbled down the stairs…and lost the child I had spent three years longing for. Three years passed. Just as I was finally learning to breathe without him, I overheard a conversation between his closest friend and my brother-in-law: "How long do you plan to keep pretending to be your brother? Alicia is your legal wife." He adjusted his glasses, voice icy and distant. "I swore to my brother I'd protect Emily for the rest of my life. I am him now. As for Alicia… let her be the debt I carry into my next life." That's when I learned the truth. It was the brother-in-law who died in the crash. My husband, the man I had mourned all those years, had taken on his brother's identity to stay by Emily's side, the unattainable woman he had always secretly loved. So then what about me? The woman clinging to old memories, living in torture for three years. What was I to him?

The day before the wedding, my fiancé James's childhood sweetheart had a severe depressive episode. Threatening to take her own life, she demanded the destruction of the wedding gown my grandmother had painstakingly made for me before her passing. To calm her down, James locked me in a room and stayed by her side, helping her cut the gown into shreds. Amid the mess, he spoke indifferently. "Be reasonable. It's just a wedding gown. Do you want to see her die?" Later, James's hot uncle approached me, asking me to carry on the family lineage. I nodded in agreement. But James, with reddened eyes, confronted me. "Are you really going to have his child? Have you completely given up on me?" Covering my slightly rounded belly, I replied, "Be reasonable. It's just a child. He’s your uncle. Do you want to see him with no heir to carry on the family name?”

For five years, I was married to Angelo Harmon, who treated me like a queen, earning the envy of everyone around us. But my dream life ended when I discovered he had a second home with a younger woman. When I confronted him, he brushed it off. "It's just a fling for excitement. You’re still my wife. What's the problem?" His callousness repulsed me, pushing me to terminate my pregnancy and walk away.

Jake Carter called and asked to meet. We settled on the small hometown diner we used to hit up. He couldn't look me in the eye the entire time, and we didn't exchange a word during the meal. It wasn't until we were about to leave that he finally pulled a property deed from his bag. "This is for you," he said. "I accept my defeat. Consider it compensation for your emotional distress. Your name is already on it." I didn't bother with polite refusals. I took the deed, mumbled a quick thanks, and got up to leave. Jake scrambled to his feet, calling out from behind me with the one question he'd been burning to ask all along. "If you loved me back then, why did you let Brenda get to me first?" I turned around, looking him in the eye for the first time all day. "Are you really going to pretend you never knew how I felt? You were just playing dumb the whole time." "I-I'm sorry," he stammered. "Can we still get dinner together tomorrow?" "Forget it. I don't need your apology," I said blandly. "You were a victim in this mess, too. As for dinner, don't bother. I'm resigning from the company tomorrow, and it's best if we don't see each other again." The iron wire ring I once treasured as proof of love had turned out to be a cage. Stepping out of the diner, I threw the rusted ring straight into the trash. From now on, I would live for myself.

"I'll accept the hospital's offer. I leave for Italvia in two weeks." Vanessa Jahn stood by the window, pregnancy report in hand. On the other end of the call, Rob Lambert, the hospital director, sounded thrown. "Wait—what? After all this time? I've been trying to get you on board for years." She let out a humorless laugh. "Guess it finally felt like time for a change. Anyway, I've got a lot to wrap up before I go. We'll catch up later." She hung up. The ache in her heart lingered as she glanced back down at the report.

Claudia Hepburn had seduced his fiancé, Arthur Maxwell, ninety-nine times. However, he was still into her sister, Fione Hepburn. Not only was he nowhere to be seen on the day of the wedding, but he even went ahead and registered his wedding with Fione instead. Claudia was turned into a laughingstock after that. While she was drowning in despair, Arthur’s brother, Brett Maxwell, showed up and took her into his arms. He confessed that he had been secretly in love with her for ages and beckoned her to turn to him. Enchanted by his devotion, she decided to marry him instead. Even after five years of marriage, Brett still doted on her endlessly. That was until a shipwreck took him away. On the day of the funeral, she was so heartbroken that she felt the urge to smash her head against his coffin to end it all right there. It was only when she found she was pregnant that she gave up on the idea of ending it all. She decided she would live on and grieve her late husband for the rest of her life. Just when she was expecting the rest of her life to play out that way, she happened to eavesdrop on a conversation between her ex-fiancé and his friends. “Brett, your brother was the one who died in that shipwreck, but here you are pretending to be him. Did you do it so you could be together with his wife? Aren’t you worried about someone finding out about this?” “I can't be bothered to worry about all that now, I’ve loved Fione from the beginning. I had to endure so much humiliation and marry Claudia just so I could prevent her from ruining Fione’s happiness. Now that God has given me such a perfect chance, I will not sell myself short anymore!”

When I was trapped by large columns of fire alongside Reya, my firefighter husband appeared and chose to only rescue her. I got on my knees inside the sea of fire and begged him to save me, too. He jabbed a merciless kick at me. “You are evil through and through, Amaranth. Are you not going to give Reya a chance to live at least? I will never forgive you for starting this fire to kill her!” At this point, his forgiveness no longer mattered. After he rescued his former lover from the scene, I was burned to a crisp alongside the baby inside me.

On my 30th birthday, my boyfriend of seven years asked to meet at the City Hall. He even told me to bring my ID and wear a wedding dress. But when I showed up just as he asked, he was laughing and looked really excited. “Pay up, pay up! I told you all. No matter how embarrassing it is, Wrenna will always do what I say!” I just looked at him wordlessly. Matthew Young raised his eyebrows at me. “Come on, it was just a joke. You’re not mad, are you?” When I stayed quiet, he got annoyed. “Alright, alright. I said I’d marry you, and I will. Just not right now.” His good-for-nothing friends started laughing and making fun of me. They said I was his simp and would never get angry. And they were right. I was not angry. I did not come here today for him anyway. After everyone left, I walked into the City Hall. “Sorry I’m late. Let’s go get married.”

The last time I argued with my husband, he slammed the door on me and left. I was so upset that I died from a heart attack. Meanwhile, he took his lover and her son traveling to take his mind off things. The entire time, our daughter, who was just a child, was abandoned at home for seven days with my corpse. At last, when Eliott remembered me and my daughter, he returned home to see my corpse. Having fallen sick, my daughter was all skin and bones. When Eliott realized his mistake, he hugged our daughter tightly and broke down crying in front of my grave. My daughter pulled away from him and hid behind my gravestone. She hissed sharply at him, “Who do you think you are? Don't disturb Mommy’s rest!”

Nine years into my "non-cohabiting partnership" with Simon, his father passed away. The first condition in his will was simple: Simon and Ella had to conceive a child. On the day the child turned one month old, Simon would inherit his father's fortune. Simon told me this himself—the night I walked in on them tangled in our bed. Afterward, as he took a slow drag from his cigarette, he murmured, "Lily, just wait a little longer. Once I get the inheritance, I'll marry you." But he went back on his word. From then on, every time Simon planned to meet Ella at our house, he would hang a string of bells on the door. Since his father's passing, those bells had chimed ninety-nine times. After the ninety-ninth, the news arrived—Ella was pregnant, and their engagement party was set. My daughter saw the invitation, hesitated, then softly asked, "Mom, is Daddy's name on this?" I forced a smile and gently smoothed her messy hair into a neat ponytail. "Daddy is marrying the one he loves," I said. "And I'm taking you home." Simon never understood—I never cared about that marriage certificate.

The day after I returned to my home country, my old classmates ambushed me with an invitation to a reunion. In the hotel, I ran into my ex, Shawn Quinn, whom I hadn't seen in five years. The room froze when he pulled out a ring and proposed. Gasps rippled through the crowd. They all expected me to jump at the chance, given how hard I had chased him back in the day. They forgot the gut-punch of our graduation day. Shawn had sided with another woman, letting her paint me as a plagiarist, a cheater, a bully. The school authorities revoked my diploma and kicked me out of the ceremony. Humiliated, I fled abroad, leaving behind a shattered heart. Now, his best friend told me, "Shawn pulled strings to get your diploma back despite your past mistakes. He never forgot about you. He has been waiting for you all these years. You're his only love."

Three months before my wedding, my fiancé, Henry Siebert, decided it was the perfect time to drop a maternity photo shoot on social media—with my foster sister, Betty Foster. The caption? Oh, just this gem: [Legally welcoming our little one into the world.] Betty added a shy emoji. And my mom? She liked the post and wrote: [Once the baby is born, I'll help take care of it so you two can enjoy your time together as a couple.] I couldn't help myself. I replied with a single question mark. And then Henry's DMs came in hot: [She's just borrowing me for a year to get married. Once the baby's born, I'll come back to you.]

At Sullivan Group's annual banquet, a female university student approaches Peter Sullivan and offers herself to him. The usually cold and distant Peter suddenly freezes because this young woman looks exactly like his deceased first love. He can't help but tease, "You're asking to be my mistress in front of my wife. Are you so sure you won't be thrown out?" The young lady lifts her chin, and her stubborn expression is identical to that of his lost love. "You two got married for business reasons and mutual benefits. Does she have any say over what you do? Peter, only you can save my mom. Will you do it or not?" She's right. I'm just a pawn in a marriage of convenience. How could I possibly influence Peter's choices? But then, I catch a glint of tenderness in his eyes that I've never seen before, and a self-deprecating smile forms on my lips. Maybe, instead of clinging on and being thrown out like trash, it's better if I give up my place willingly.