Cerita Pendek & Novel Bias Tragic Love

The day my daughter was fighting for her life, my wife, Shirley Hartley, was busy helping her childhood friend Oliver Burke get married. I called seventeen times. On my eighteenth try, she finally picked up. "Shirley, Nyssa's getting worse. The doctor says she needs life support now. They want twenty grand upfront. Where's the money?" Her voice turned ice-cold. "I used it. Oliver's wedding is coming up, and that stuff costs money. I'm not letting his fiancée's family look down on him. "Nyssa just has asthma, right? She coughs a little and suddenly they want twenty grand? Sounds like a scam." Nyssa lay in the hospital bed, her tiny face ghost-pale. Her eyes slowly opened. "Daddy, I want Mommy." I turned away, biting my lip hard so she wouldn't see me cry. "Mommy'll be here soon." But over the phone, Shirley snapped, "Oliver still hasn't picked out his wedding suit. I don't have time for you freaking out over this." Then she hung up. By the time I scraped together the twenty grand, forty minutes were gone. Half an hour later, the doctor came out of the ER. He pulled off his mask and shook his head. "If we'd started treatment thirty minutes earlier, she might've had a chance." Then my phone buzzed. A transaction alert. Shirley had taken the money that could've saved Nyssa and bought Oliver a $220,000 Maybach. I looked at Nyssa's blue-tinged face and called my lawyer. "Draw up the divorce papers. "And pull the records for every expense Shirley ever covered for Oliver. "I want every cent of our money back."

Sandra's ex-boyfriend had cancer, yet he still found the energy to keep pestering her. So I anonymously sent him a sum of money to make him leave her alone. But when Sandra found what I'd done, she threw the bank card in my face and shouted, "Why would you humiliate a dying man with money? He's already pitiful enough!" I looked at her calmly. "You're my wife. You shouldn't be worrying about another man."

It's Valentine's Day, and I'm at my desk at the county courthouse when my fiancee, Shelby Smith, walks in to get a marriage license with her male best friend, Liam Pearson. She slides her ID across the counter and offers a casual excuse. "Rowen, don't be mad. I lost a game of Truth or Dare. The penalty is being married to Liam for just one day. I'm bringing him back tomorrow for a divorce." Liam, who has a woman's jacket draped on his shoulders, pipes up with a snide grin. "I don't think Rowen is going to process this for us. After all, he's always had a problem with me. I just don't get men—" Before he can finish, I slam the official stamp down on their application form. "Why wouldn't I? I get it. You two are best friends, nothing more. You just lost a dare, that's all. Take this form over there to pay the marriage license fee. Congratulations." Shelby's face instantly falls when she sees how completely unbothered I am. She hooks her arm through Liam's and storms out. The next day, she shows up at the courthouse with Liam again. I take one look at the vivid hickey on her neck, smile, and hand her a waiting-period notice instead. "Sorry, but a new policy has just been communicated to us. Couples rushing into a quickie divorce like you two need to go home and really think things through. If you still want to call it quits, come back in six months."

My best friend, Lena, and I were dragged into an ancient werewolf kingdom. The Moon Goddess gave us one chance to return home, back to our pack and fated mate: Earn the trust of the ruthless Lycan Prince and the savage Rogue King. But the mission became a nightmare. The Lycan Prince shattered my ribs and threw me into a rogue prison. The Rogue King bound Lena’s legs with silver chains and burned away her voice. For two years, we lived like stray. Then, when the Moon Goddess finally announced our failure, the Lycan prince standing before me removed his mask. It was my fated mate all along, Jace. The Rogue King revealed himself as Rowan—Lena’s fated mate as well. “It was only a punishment,” Jace said. “You two hurt Selene and caused her to lose her pup. Now we’re even.” The kingdom was fake. The cruelty was an act. But they didn’t knew, the Moon Goddess had truly appeared in our minds. And when Lena and I were on the brink of death, we made a REAL bargain with her. Our wolf souls…in exchange for our loved one’s happiness. When the sun rises, Lena and I will disappear forever.

When the fire trapped me, my Alpha mate, Graeme Blackwood, was throwing a birthday party for my little sister, Ayana. I was locked in the basement, trembling so violently my bones clattered against each other. When the flames first caught, I called him. Begged him. His voice was ice. "Evelyn, stop the act. It's Ayana's birthday. I'm not letting you out just so you can ruin it. Let her have her night. Once she's happy, I'll let you out." I tried to explain. With the last shred of strength I had, I called him again. He hung up on me. So I just watched. Watched the flames swallow everything.

Five years into our secret marriage, Alex finally agreed to give me a wedding. But the day before the ceremony, I was the one who called it off. The Castellano Family butler asked me, stunned, "Ma'am, the ceremony is tomorrow. Are you sure you don't want to wait for Mr. Castellano to come home?" I picked up my packed suitcase. My voice came out light, almost relieved. "He isn't coming. Right now he's in a church in New York, saying his vows with his adopted sister."

I had been secretly dating Vito, heir to the Carlisi family, for five years, yet we never went public. He said he had too many enemies, so he didn’t want me to become a target for assassination. On our fifth anniversary, I overheard a conversation from the study: "Vito really has a way with women. He even got Bianca, the Rossi family principessa, to keep their relationship secret for five years." "Sia is coming back soon. When she sees you showing up with Bianca, she's probably kicking herself right now." Sia was his childhood sweetheart, the one who had left the country after he chose someone else. The next day, Vito took me to Sia's birthday banquet just as expected, putting on a show of affection for all to see. But when Sia ran out in tears, he shoved me aside and frantically chased after her. I went home covered in wine stains and wounds, and climbed up to the attic he had never let me enter. Photographs of him and Sia covered the entire wall. My heart turned to ash. I called my father. "About the marriage arrangement with the Moretti family, I've made up my mind. I agree."

The first time my Alpha mate chose his childhood sweetheart over me, I forgave him. After all, Dylan saved my life seven times. Seven lives saved. Seven chances given. That was the deal I made with myself. Then Dylan skipped our Mate Anniversary to celebrate her birthday. He gave her the moonstone ring I’d carved for him with my own hands, saying she needed it for protection. And when rogues attacked us both, he stepped right past me as I lay wounded and carried her to safety first. I never fought him over any of it. Each time he chose her, I silently crossed off one of the lives I owed him. The pack thought I loved my Alpha so desperately that I would forgive him no matter how many times he put another Omega before me. But I was only waiting until all seven lives I owed him had been repaid. Then one day, he broke the Mate Vow we’d sworn at the Moon Altar for her yet again. “She has no one else,” he told me. “You’re my Luna. You should understand.” And just like that, the last of what I owed him was gone. “That’s seven. We’re done.” I picked up my suitcase and headed for the Nordic Wolf Alliance in herbal medicine. Dylan and I were over, and I would never see him again.

My husband Marcus Ashford has severe social anxiety. In three years of marriage, he refused to meet a single one of my friends or family. Even our wedding was just the two of us, because he said a crowd would trigger a panic attack. Because it hurt me to see him like that, I put up with my parents' disappointment and my friends' confusion, made every excuse for him, and guarded his fragile little world with both hands. That changed tonight, when I stumbled onto the social media page of his first love, newly returned from overseas. In the photos, Marcus moved through the room with Chloe, working the toasts with total ease, laughing wide and unguarded. I opened the next live photo, and a snatch of conversation came out of it. "Marcus, isn't today your father-in-law's birthday too? You're not going to swing by?" Marcus answered as though it were nothing, "Going would just be pointless socializing. A waste of time. I'd rather stay here with Chloe." I went through those few photos over and over, more times than I could count, until my eyes were dry and stinging, and then I shut off the screen without a word. Then I called a lawyer and had the divorce papers drawn up. So his world was full of voices and noise after all. It simply refused to open for me, and for me alone. Fine. If the party wasn't mine, I wasn't going to keep forcing my way in.

The tenth year since I accidentally landed in modern-day America, and the system finally noticed me—a glitch in its timeline. It told me that in three days, I'd be sent back to where I truly belonged. Back to London. Back to my era. And I—I used to be one of the most powerful men in the entire British Empire. Alexander William Windsor. First in line to the British throne. The system gave me seventy-two hours. A countdown to say goodbye to this century. Day one, my fiancée Evelyn told me our wedding had to be called off. Because Ryan—the boy she'd grown up with—had been diagnosed with a terminal illness. Day two, Evelyn brought Ryan home. To our home. She said he had nowhere else to go. Asked if he could stay. Just for a while. Day three, Evelyn told me she was taking Ryan to Italy. To clear his head. ...That was supposed to be our honeymoon. No one noticed the numbers on my wrist, ticking down. Ten years of being in the wrong place. Time to end it. This time—I'm not staying for anyone.

Today was the day Bryce had decided to mark me. I had waited three years for this, for the day I would finally become his mate. What I never expected was that he would refuse to mark me. Emily's shrill laugh cut across the clearing. "Ivy, Bryce doesn't want to mark you." The moment she said it, everyone who had come for the marking ceremony burst out laughing. "Third time. You may be Bryce's fated mate, but he's turned you down again. Looks like he doesn't want you as his Luna." I opened my eyes and stared at Bryce, who was smiling like none of it mattered. "Why?" "You're too clingy. You need toughening up. Being Luna of the Silvermane pack isn't as easy as you think." I clenched my fists as hard as I could, and my eyes landed on Rowan, the shaman standing at the altar. He came down and looked at Bryce and me kindly. "There will be a second blood moon in two hours. The marking can be done then." Emily laughed even louder. "Even the Moon Goddess knows how desperate you are to be marked. Two blood moons in one night. Let's go wait for it. It's the fourth time. Bryce definitely won't back out again." I gave Bryce one scornful look, then turned away and sent a message to his uncle, Vaughn. "Get to the altar within two hours. Mark me."

It happened on the last shipment run I ever went on. My boyfriend and my best friend left me behind at the transfer station. I waited there for half an hour before they remembered they were one person short. Lawson called me, impatience all over his voice. "Why didn't you get in the truck?" "We're in a hurry for the celebration dinner tonight. We can't turn around." "Stop making a scene. Figure it out yourself." My mouth opened. No sound came out. Beth's voice carried through the line, clear and grating. "We're all adults here. Why does every little thing have to be handled for her?" "She has to grow up sometime." I listened to all of it and hung up without a word. The old me would have apologized on the spot, then done everything I could to catch up with them without causing a single problem. But this time, it all just felt pointless. I canceled every arrangement the family had made for me. I sent my mother a message: [I want to go to Northbay and take over the family business there.] They had always looked down on Northbay for being too small. But I had always wanted to go. I would never have to chase after them again. I would follow only myself.

For all four years of college, my girlfriend Vanessa Moore never once let anyone know we were together. "Dating someone in your own class is asking for trouble. If we break up, it'll be humiliating." To keep our distance, I never dared say a single word to her in front of other people. But Marcus Hale, the guy she grew up with, got to be glued to her side. On the way to the graduation party, a white sedan swerved out of nowhere and slammed into my car. Glass sliced open my face and my arm. When the dizziness cleared, I saw Marcus in the other car, smiling like he had just pulled something off. Blood kept dripping from the cuts. I was pinned, and I couldn't move an inch. Then Vanessa's car came down the road toward us. I called out for help until my voice went raw. She walked straight past me to Marcus. "Are you okay? Where are you hurt?" Leaning on my girlfriend's arm, Marcus limped over to her car and got in. She didn't come for me first. Ten minutes later Vanessa finally walked back, but she stopped three feet away. "It's the graduation party today. Everyone will be there. We have to keep our distance even more carefully. "I heard someone already called an ambulance, so just hang on. I'm taking him to the hospital first." Then she drove off without looking back. She had never intended to save me. My white shirt was soaked through red, and the pain shooting through my body cleared my head completely. A love that never answers back is a love you should put down.

After I gave myself the last dose of painkiller, I stood outside the hotel all afternoon in the vintage couture gown Lucian had chosen for me himself. The black Bentley motorcade that was supposed to come for the bride never arrived. What I heard instead was the chatter of people passing by. "Did you hear? The youngest Don in New York is getting married. He and the bride have been together ten years." That stopped me, because Lucian and I had only been together seven. "They say he bought a blue diamond, the only one of its kind in the world, just to set it in her ring. He's proposing at the church today." The moment I pushed open the church doors, Lucian looked straight at me. "Cassie, I knew you'd come. Ten years ago you lost Elena, the true blood of this Family, and left her to be ground down at the bottom of the world. You had the safety and glory of the Family name while she endured ten years of hell. I let you believe in that engagement for exactly this day. I want you to feel what it's like to be thrown away by everyone." Three people I knew better than anyone sat in the front pew. Marcus spoke first. "You took the life that was supposed to be Elena's. She's back, so it goes back to her. You owe her that." My heart felt like a cold gun barrel was pressed against it. I couldn't get air. Nobody knew that a month ago I had been diagnosed with end-stage neurological failure, and that I had one day left. For my last hours all I had wanted was to hold the hand of the man I loved, with my family around me. I walked out of the church calmly and dropped the keepsake he had given me into a trash can. But now I'd changed my mind. I wasn't going to spend my last day intruding on any of them.

The third time Charles cheated on me, I broke down, grabbed a knife, and pressed it to my chest. "If I die today, the Moon Goddess will punish you. This is what you get for cheating!" That was what frightened him. The blade was silver. If it so much as touched my skin, the wound would never heal. My mother rushed over to wrestle the knife away from me. "Zoe, no matter what happens, don't hurt yourself!" "Leave me alone and let me die. He's out there chasing other women, so I'll die right in front of him!" In the struggle, the knife went straight into my mother's chest. She clutched at it, and blood soaked red through her clothes. She was barely breathing, and still she held on to my shirt. "Zoe, live a good life." After she died, Charles withdrew from everyone. He stayed with me every day, more attentive than he had been when we were dating. Every full moon, he prayed to the Moon Goddess for me. But I screamed like a madwoman every single day. "My mother isn't dead! I can feel that she's still alive!" Charles took me to a therapist, Dr. Merrick, who confirmed I had depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. The most immediate effect was that my wolf disappeared. All my senses dulled. But I never stopped believing she was alive, even though the sharp knife and all that blood kept telling me I had killed her myself. Slowly, I started to believe I really was sick. That changed the day I saw her at a jewelry counter in a department store. But no matter how hard I told myself my mother was dead, it didn't work. I even heard her voice. "Charles, did you get rid of that knife? Don't let Zoe find it, or she'll go after Vivian." "Threw it out ages ago. Zoe will never know it was a retractable prop and not silver at all. You're the one who has to stay hidden, Marlene. You can never show your face in public again." My mother shook her head, smiling. "What you and Vivian have moves me. I'm only doing the right thing." I stood frozen where I was. It was as if a pair of invis

At my coming-of-age ceremony, I was supposed to accept the Chosen Mate Mark from my childhood sweetheart, the pack healer, Rowan. We were supposed to be bonded for life. But then Caleb, our Alpha, stepped in. In front of everyone, he pulled me into his arms—an irresistible force, a suffocating tenderness. He claimed it was a Fated Mate bond, that his wolf had lost control. He forcibly marked me. After crying all night, I had no choice but to accept it. I became the pack’s Luna. Everyone thought Caleb and his wolf were possessive. Insane for me. Then, two years into our bond, I finally got pregnant with his pup. That’s when he cupped my face, his eyes red-rimmed and gentle. He forced me onto a cold medical table. Rowan gave me the injection. A lethal dose of wolfsbane to kill our pup. The reason? I’d once been trapped with Rowan for three months in an abandoned silver mine during a rogue attack. A mine that suppressed our wolf powers. He was killing my pup to silence the pack’s rumors about its bloodline. But more than that, he was severing my last tie to Rowan. All so Rowan would be free to bond with his sister, Chloe. That’s when it hit me. My entire life since that ceremony? A lie. A carefully crafted trap. Fine. This sham of a mate bond? This pack? I don’t want any of it.

My boyfriend, Nolan Reed, was in the running for head coach of the national open-water swimming team, and he was a sports streamer with eight million followers. On a trip to Santa Catalina Island, he said he'd use a livestream to help me conquer my fear of deep water. The second the camera went live, Leah Morgan, the friend I trusted most, shoved me from behind. An icy wave swept over my head. I struggled toward Nolan and reached for him, but he took half a step back, dodging my hand. "Don't pull her out yet. It takes real fear to unlock someone's full potential." Leah thrust the gimbal and ring light so close they nearly touched my eyes as they rolled back. "Ivy, bigger reactions. We just broke our viewer record." On the screen, virtual gifts and betting totals flew by in a frenzy. Someone asked if I was dying. Nolan glanced at the stream analytics and laughed under his breath. "I'm betting she swims back on her own. She's hard to kill. The longer she holds out, the more views we get." Leah counted up the take on her fingers and laughed. "Then I'm betting she doesn't make it back up. Wait until the last minute, then jump in and play the hero." But his last-minute rescue never came. Before I sank for good, a stranger fought through the waves, plunged into the ocean, and dragged me up from beneath the surface. I would later learn it wasn't the first time Nolan had taken bets on me. Every fall, every injury, every time I'd been scared to tears, even every time I'd jolted awake from a nightmare, had become a wager in their group chat. They bet on how long it would take me to break, whether I would ever find out, and, if I did, whether I would dare to leave. The man I'd loved for three years and the friend I trusted most had been treating my pain like a long-running reality show. Since they loved taking bets so much, I would place one of my own. I bet on myself. I would never look back.

When Celia Moore was dying of liver failure, I signed the living-donor consent form and gave her my right liver lobe, nearly sixty percent of my liver, to save her. The independent evaluation doctor asked me again and again whether anyone had coerced me. Through the glass, I could see Adrian Grant standing at the end of the hallway. He didn't come in. He just stood there, head bowed, reading the critical-condition update Celia had just sent him. I said, "No. This is my choice." That surgery nearly killed me. But on the eve of the wedding ceremony we were finally supposed to have, Adrian was still at Celia's bedside. He didn't leave once all night. I left my wedding ring, the divorce petition, and my attorney's engagement letter in the car that was supposed to take him to our wedding. Then I walked away without waiting for him to look back. The day I was discharged, I signed every document alone. There was no one beside me. Three years later, I walked into the Grant Architecture firm's tenth-anniversary gala with a new face, on the arm of the one competitor he feared most. Adrian crossed the entire ballroom and seized my wrist in a crushing grip, his eyes rimmed an alarming red. "Elena, you're alive?" I smiled, pulled my hand free, and straightened his crooked tie. "Mr. Grant, please don't touch me. My fiance has a temper when he gets jealous." Leon Hart slid his arm around my waist and raised an eyebrow at Adrian with a polite, wordless challenge. Adrian's hand froze in midair, as if he'd just been slapped in front of everyone. I turned and walked away without looking back.

At the auction, my fiancé's secretary raised the bidding paddle twice on his behalf. The first time, she outbid Lady Margaret Vesta by a single silver coin, snatching away the emerald brooch meant as a coming-of-age gift for her daughter. She brandished the house seal of my fiancé, Cassian Severus, with a brazen grin. "Her husband can afford to keep a woman on the side, but he won't pay what he owes Cassian. I'm just collecting a little interest for him. What's the problem?" Cassian thought I was still at sea. He just smiled and told her not to be so blunt in front of a crowd next time. The second time, she set the seal into the gold tray, activating an irrevocable, open-ended bid. This time, she was after my mother's heirloom: a silver dolphin necklace. She sat in the seat that should have been mine, wearing the custom crimson gown I had paid for, and looked across half the hall at me. "It belonged to a dead woman. Anyone can wear it. Lady Helena has plenty of jewelry already. Why not let me have it?" Cassian still had his back to me. He didn't know I was already back.

After three years together, my boyfriend, Walker Ashford, proposed. But right after that, he got cold feet. At our wedding photo shoot, Walker buried his face against my best friend Anna Benedict's shoulder. "The way Valentina looks at me freaks me out," he said. At the jewelry shop, he grabbed Anna's hand and refused to let go. None of it made sense. But my future mother-in-law, Judith Ashford, pulled me aside. "Valentina, why not let Anna take your place in the photos? We can put you in later." Walker's sister, Emma Ashford, pushed Anna forward. "She has better taste. Let her pick the ring for you." I swallowed my hurt and watched in silence as they took my wedding photos and picked out my ring for me. Under the lights, the diamonds glittered so brightly they hurt my eyes. I was about to postpone the wedding when I overheard Judith say to my best friend, "Anna, having Walker pretend to get cold feet was a smart move. Otherwise, how could you two have a wedding of your own without Valentina finding out?" Emma curled her lip. "Valentina is an idiot. She believes everything we tell her." Walker sighed and stroked Anna's hair. "Anna is sick. It's her wish to marry me. If Valentina weren't so controlling, I wouldn't have to keep this wedding a secret from her. Anna gets the wedding. Valentina gets the legal marriage. Sounds fair to me." So that was it. Walker had never gotten cold feet. They had made up the whole thing to fool me. I was done with their lies. I decided to return to Florence and take back my life as a mafia princess. "Dad, I'll marry whoever you choose."