Cerita Pendek Tragic Love & Novel Homewrecker Marriage

I had always been the one who kept my husband, Julian Whitmore, in line. After the car accident, I finally stopped. Julian threw a party with his friends to celebrate. "Elena's finally off my back. Now I can mess around like the rest of you." He even brought Chloe Marsh, his pregnant secretary, back to our home. Chloe was gorgeous and she knew it. But around Julian, she turned sweet and helpless. She'd stroke her flat stomach and talk to me like we were best friends. Julian pulled her close and dropped another bombshell. "Once Chloe gives birth, you'll adopt the baby. He'll be your son." "You can't have children anyway. I'm willing to let her baby call you Mom. That's more than fair to you." He didn't know I had found out I was pregnant after the accident. He also had no idea that while I was unconscious, I'd seen exactly how my life with him would end. In the dream, I lost my baby. I got my parents and my best friend killed. And in the end, I couldn't even find a place to bury my child. When I woke up, I made one choice. Leave Julian and take my child home.

I'd been in a secret relationship with Nathan for six years. He said we couldn't go public because of his career. So we always split the bill, and anniversary gifts never cost more than fifteen dollars. The night before our anniversary, I asked him for the sixth time when he'd come home with me to meet my family. He turned me down again. "Ivy, I just think things are moving a little fast. Marriage is a lifetime commitment, after all." So I went home alone, carrying the expensive cheese and wine he'd bought for my mom. I pushed open the door and found the living room trashed. My stepsister Chloe stood there with a smug grin on her face. "Mrs. Mercer, you owe my family a million dollars. You've been stalling long enough. Time to settle up, don't you think?" Years ago, my father had an affair, and Chloe's mother orchestrated the whole thing. My mom ended up saddled with a mountain of debt, and my father took the easy way out with a divorce. When I said nothing, Chloe scoffed, "What's wrong? Don't want to own up to it? "That's fine. My husband happens to be the best lawyer in the city. He's never lost a case. "This is his first year coming home with me for the holidays. Perfect time to show you what 'pay what you owe' really means." I crouched down to shield my mother, the words of protest dying on my lips. The next second, a familiar figure stepped out from behind Chloe. It was Nathan.

Five years ago, I witnessed my wife, a university professor, having an affair with Henry Bale, her teaching assistant. Mindy Holmes knelt begging me not to expose her, saying that it would destroy his reputation as a student. I agreed on the condition that he would drop out of school, leave this city, and never return. She would have to sign an agreement to leave the marriage without a single cent if she were to be unfaithful to me again. Everyone rebuked me for being vain and for treasuring money more than our relationship. However, Mindy was willing to go against the entire Holmes family just to preserve Henry’s reputation. Five years later, when I went on a business trip in another city, I found a little girl. I sent her to a police station and had her contact her family. When the policeman dialed the number the girl recited to him, I heard a familiar voice through the phone. “Be good. Don’t be afraid, I’ll come pick you up right away.” Less than half an hour later, Mindy rushed into the station when she was supposed to be at her class miles away. I sat on the bench, my gaze meeting hers. She stood stunned. I stood up with a smile. “Mindy, I didn’t know you had a daughter behind my back. Looks like you can bid goodbye to your reputation as a highly-esteemed professor.”

After my dad's first love moved into our house and became my tutor, my mom never raised her voice at her again. She just coughed worse and worse, until one day I found the lab report she'd thrown out. Stage IV lung cancer. That afternoon, Dad came home with his arm around her, and walked right into Mom sitting on the couch. There was a flicker of guilt on his face. "Helena, if you've got something to say, just say it. Don't make a scene in front of the kid." Mom was eerily calm. She pointed at the woman and said, "She gets on her knees and apologizes to me three times. And you sign over half the company. Then we're done." Dad thought she'd lost it. But in the end he signed the share transfer. After that, Mom's pills kept multiplying and her appetite kept shrinking. But she hired the best lawyer in town, and over and over she taught me how to manage those shares once I was old enough. Dad never figured out the one thing that mattered. Mom was already on her way out.

When Zack Fleming gets a tiny scrape on his arm, my wife, Melanie Perry, who loves money more than anything else in the world, rejects a business partnership that's worth hundreds of millions of dollars. She then forces my sister, Cindy Sherwood, to donate a large amount of blood to Zack, despite knowing that Cindy has a heart condition. I immediately call Melanie to demand answers. "We only took a few drops of blood from her," she says nonchalantly. "Why are you making a fuss? Besides, Cindy's tough. She'll be fine. But Zack's different. He's the company's lucky star, so nothing must happen to him. "Business has been improving by the day ever since he joined the company. Everything that I do is for your and the company's sake. Not thanking me is one thing, but how dare you lose your temper at me?" Melanie hangs up after she's done speaking and blocks my number. It seems that my unconditional support for the last five years has given Melanie the wrong idea. She wrongly assumes that the company is improving because of her and Zack's efforts and has forgotten that she's nothing but a pawn that her family used to establish a marriage alliance with me. Ten minutes later, Melanie calls me again even though she's the one who blocked me in the first place. "Have you lost your mind?" she snaps. "Why did you take Zack away and hook him up to so many tubes?" I scoff and answer, "You're the one who said that he was a lucky star. Why are you panicking when I just want to take a few drops of blood from him?"

Two years ago, I was the Donna of the Costa family. When I was on my way to attend the family meeting, I was killed by my husband's childhood sweetheart, Isabella Rossi. She shattered my limbs and smashed my belly before throwing me into an abandoned mine pit. It was such a shame that I was pregnant with the heir Matteo Costa had been waiting for the past five years when I died. Not only did Isabella frame me for working with the enemy forces, but she also broke her own legs and claimed that she got hurt from stopping me. Matteo publicly announced that he decided to sever all ties with me. He also placed a bounty on my head. Just like that, I fell from my position as the Costa family's Donna to a traitor who was wanted by all. Two years later, the mine pit collapsed on itself. That was when the workers dug out my rotten corpse.

At eight months pregnant, my husband, Weston Gibson, tells me the doctors misdiagnosed my pregnancy. I am not carrying a baby. There is supposedly a tumor growing in my womb. He tricks me into undergoing surgery, but on my way back to my room, I overhear him talking to his friend, Daniel Brooks. "You lie to Scarlett and tell her she is infertile. Then you convince her to undergo IVF so you can implant the embryo created from you and Whitley into her. After that, you told her she has a tumor so you can secretly deliver the baby and hand him over to Whitley to raise. That's beyond cruel." Weston scoffs. "Whitley is a model. She can't afford to ruin her figure by having a baby. Now that she has my baby, she can finally hold her head high in front of my parents." My heart shatters when I hear that. Without hesitation, I call the best lawyer in the city. "My husband has cheated on me. I want him to walk away with nothing."

I have just been discharged after leg surgery when Victor Clark, my wife's former colleague who resents her for taking his position, drags me up to the roof and stabs me repeatedly. My wife, Melissa Lane, is the captain of the rescue unit, yet she is busy mobilizing everyone to stop her depressed first love, Ethan Hayes, from setting his rental apartment on fire. I don't call her to save me. In my previous life, I begged her for help. She abandoned Ethan and rushed to rescue me. In the end, I survived while Ethan died in the blaze. Melissa never blamed me. She said that Ethan got what he deserved and even promised me a surprise for my birthday a week later. But on my birthday, she drugged me, tied me to a bed, and drove a knife into me again and again. "You and Victor set me up that day, didn't you? Those stab wounds aren't even serious! You were never going to die! Since you like getting stabbed so much, I'll make it real for you!" When I open my eyes, I am back to the day Victor took me hostage. This time, I let Melissa go save her first love.

I'm six months pregnant when my cousin Hallie Thorne's mate dies. Worried that she has no one to look after her, my mate, Ragnar Clairmont, suggests she move in with us. I don't think twice before agreeing. The moment Hallie walks through the door and sees my pregnant belly, she bursts into tears. Ragnar pulls me aside and says quietly, "Try not to walk around showing off your pregnancy in front of her. Her mate just died before they could even have a pup. Don't rub it in her face." I feel sorry for her, so I agree. That night, Hallie spills dish soap by the kitchen door, causing me to slip and nearly lose my pup. I suspect that she does it on purpose and tell Ragnar. But he just looks at me with frustration. "The three of us grew up together. She would never do something like that. Pregnancy can make you paranoid. Stop assuming the worst of her." But later, while we're camping, she suddenly pushes me into the river before jumping in after me. Ragnar comes running when he hears the splash and immediately dives in to save us. I beg him to save me and our pup, but he swims right past me and gets Hallie to shore first. "She's just a fragile Omega. I need to make sure she's safe first. You're an Alpha. You can handle yourself. I'll go get help," Ragnar says. Under normal circumstances, I could easily swim to shore. But now that I'm pregnant, my body feels heavy and sluggish. I try to shout for Ragnar, but weeds wrap around my legs, and water closes over my mouth and nose. I hear approaching footsteps in the distance, but it's already too late.

Being locked away by my parents as a child left me with severe claustrophobia. Every time it flared up, I not only lost my voice but also lost my ability to use the mind-link with anyone in the pack. In my parents' eyes, a strong werewolf should have gotten over something that happened so long ago. Each time I lost my voice, only Alpha Caius Thorne stayed by my side. He kept notepads and pens throughout the estate and kept our conversation pinned to the top of his messages. He even learned sign language just for me. When another episode struck, I signed to him with trembling hands. "Does this ever make you tired of me?" My mate's scent enveloped me, calming my restless wolf. "Never. If anything, I'm glad we have a language that's just ours." Then Sage Mercer returned. She was a human healer and one of my closest friends. She tricked me into entering an underground stone chamber and locked me inside. The sealed space triggered another episode. I couldn't call for Caius, even though he was standing right outside the door. All I could do was sign frantically. But he acted like he didn't understand and stood there as Sage sealed the heavy stone door. Panic took over. I shifted into my wolf form and threw myself against the door with everything I had. Again and again, I slammed into it until my body was drenched in blood, yet not a single cry for help escaped my throat. Then I heard Sage speaking to Caius on the other side of the door. "Elara has to face her trauma head-on. Protecting her every time this happens won't help her get better. "A Luna represents her pack. With a condition like hers, she'll only hold you back. "Once she can call out for help on her own, we'll let her out." Caius said nothing. I understood his silence for what it was: agreement. So that was how Caius really saw me. A burden. But they had forgotten this underground chamber was designed to hold untamable beasts. Once the heavy door was sealed, almost no fresh air could get inside. No matter

I suffered critical injuries that left me in a persistent vegetative state when I tried to rescue my wife, Regina Livingston, from her abductors. Regina spares no expense, spending millions of dollars to bring in the best medical experts in the country to treat me. She watches over me every single night, never weary of caring for me. Four years into my coma, I overhear a conversation between Richard Sutherland—a man I don't know—and Regina. "You've done all you can, Regina," he says. "You don't owe him anything anymore." Regina remains silent. Then, a young boy, Franklin Sutherland, suddenly asks, "Mommy, why do you always visit this man? Who is he?" I'm instantly shocked. Regina and I don't have a child together. I'm completely bewildered, and just as I try to figure it out, I suddenly wake up from my coma.

On the fourth day after our son died, I decided to end my military marriage. Before that, I spent three days taking care of what remained of him. On the first day, I tricked my wife into signing the cremation papers. On the second day, I went to my son's school and collected the textbooks he never had the chance to use. On the third day, I prepared a table full of his favorite dishes and begged my wife to come home so we could celebrate his birthday one last time. She agreed. Then she turned around, claimed she had a mission, and spent the entire night setting off fireworks with her childhood sweetheart. That night, I sat beside my son's memorial photo and ate alone. The next day, she came home looking guilty and handed me a brand new backpack. She said it was a gift for our son to use at school. She did not know that our child would never live to see his first day of school.

Three years into our marriage, my husband, Derek, confessed that he'd met his true love. He sat across from me, eyes brimming with sincerity. "I was too young back then. You were the only person I ever dated, and I rushed into marriage. "It wasn't until I met Vivian that I understood what real love is. "Just sign the divorce papers already. Set me free." I glanced at the scar on his temple. Without a word, I signed the papers.

Three years as his fiancée, reduced to nothing more than a soulless trinket. No going out. No friends. No opinions. Every breath I took was measured against Leo's mood. For three years I obeyed him unconditionally, trying to warm the heart of this mafia tyrant. Then today, in the fitting room at the atelier, his adoptive sister Alice snatched my couture wedding gown right off the rack. She didn't even have the decency to do it behind my back; she walked straight into Leo's arms while I stood there watching. Leo barely glanced at me. Just patted her head and said, “It's just a dress. Let her have it.” Three years of patience, and that's what it came to. A joke. I looked at the two of them, that smug, triumphant, and I thought: Marciano, did you really think I wouldn't fight back?

When I woke up that morning and happened to glance at the mirror, a scream tore from my throat before I could stop it. Because on the face I had always taken such pride in, there was now a jagged, horrifying scar. As terror gripped me, a cool, detached female voice cut through the air beside me. "What are you shrieking about so early in the morning? Scared by your own ugly face?" I looked up in shock and realized the voice belonged to my girlfriend, Alicia. Only—she wasn't the same girl from yesterday. Gone was the youthful innocence I remembered. In its place, every movement, every glance radiated the allure of a mature woman. The words slipped out before I could hold them back. "Babe… you're gorgeous…" But Alicia's brows knit together, her gaze colder than ice. "Kurt, drop the act!" Act? I was at a loss. Why would she accuse me of pretending? "Don't call me the way you used to five years ago. It's disgusting." Five years ago? But… I'm still twenty-three… am I not?

It was the seventh year we spent living separately after the marriage. I came to see Blake Shaw, and once again, my key broke and was stuck in the keyhole. I quickly called Blake. He said, "You probably got the wrong key again. Stay in a hotel. I'll come back and open the door." I looked at the sticker on the key and froze. The key was right. He changed the locks. Before I could think further, my father called, and he laughed heartily. "Of course he's out! He came over first thing in the morning, and he brought gifts! Then, my best friend's call came in. She was drunk from the sounds of it. "He's drinking with Zack. Your man's growing to be a good drinker." Then, my brother's call came. "He's a busy guy. Finally found the spare time to help me out with my investments." My mind was reeling. They had no idea I just asked the guard if this house's owner was home, and they said he was. I stopped asking questions. Instead, I called a locksmith. A strange curiosity took hold of me. I wanted to find out what secret my friends and family were keeping from me.

Three days before I got married, Evan Jones' claustrophobic ex-girlfriend cornered my car at the cliff of a winding road and rammed into me 12 times. When Evan arrived with the police, I was being rescued by the firefighters from my driver's seat, which had been smashed out of shape. However, Evan went to the limited-edition sports car, which had only lost some paint, and carried the trembling Nikki Shore in his arms. "Evan, Madison is bleeding on her forehead; she needs to get it stitched up at the hospital." However, Evan stopped my stretcher from getting into the car and glanced at my bleeding forehead and bruised arms. "These are just minor injuries, but Nikki has claustrophobia. Her condition will only get worse, and she has to go to the hospital first." As I was about to be left behind, I used the last of my strength to grab Evan by his pant leg. He frowned and pried off my fingers. "Nikki didn't crash into you on purpose. It's just her condition acting up. You're a lawyer, and you should know how some things are beyond our control, so stop making a fuss right now." With that, his assistant handed him a settlement agreement, and Evan grabbed my limp wrist to print my fingerprint on the papers. "Just bear with this. The ambulance will be coming soon."

After another trip to the ER for a bleeding ulcer, I found a flower order in Lily Marshall's phone. The recipient wasn't me. I switched off the screen without a word. No shouting, no scene. Lily glanced at me and gave a soft laugh. "My husband really is the understanding type." She grabbed her coat off the couch and headed for the door. "Josh just got off work. I need to go pick him up." Josh Segel was a college kid barely out of school, the fifth lover Lily had taken since we married. I kept my voice level. "Go ahead. But we're getting a divorce." She barely registered it, too anxious to care. "Josh gets lost on his own. If I don't go, he'll cry." "So because he'll cry, you're walking out on your own husband?" "Don't start, Neil." She sighed, out of patience, and turned to pat my shoulder. "He's young. His feelings are delicate. You're the steady and mature one. Don't put yourself in the same league as him." "And if I stopped being so mature and tried to stop you?" Her eyes went cold. "Go ahead and try. But think it through first. Without this marriage, what are you going to pay for your treatment with?" I managed a bitter smile, took out my phone, and sent a message to her father with her watching. [I agree to the divorce.]

In the last six months, I have been away for work. But when I come home, I find out that my wife, Vanessa Hudson, is now three months pregnant. She insists that she hasn't been cheating on me. But her ex-boyfriend's post online tells a different story. Harold Quinton writes, "Thank you, Vanessa, for fulfilling my dream of becoming a father. You've worked so hard through ovulation, egg retrieval, and implantation, mother of my child." Harold has a very severe case of erectile dysfunction. The moment I find out my wife has gotten pregnant with another man's test tube baby, I feel bitter inside. I dial my boss' number and say to her, "I'm willing to take on the overseas general manager position that you offered me previously." Then, I turn to Vanessa and say, "Let's get a divorce."

My wife, Evelyn Shaw, is a germaphobe. She makes us sleep in separate rooms, and even our laundry has to be done separately. She also throws out any dishes or utensils I use, claiming they're filthy. On our wedding anniversary, I find a man's tie and a half-smoked cigarette in her spotless car. When I confront her, she casually smooths her hair without even looking at me. "It belongs to a coworker I gave a ride to. He accidentally left it behind." I don't say a word. One call to Claire Bennett, her company's biggest rival, tells me everything I need to know. She recently hired a young male assistant, Adrian Holt. Claire laughs. "Your ice queen is in the break room feeding the guy cake right now. Last I heard, she couldn't keep her hands off him." I hang up and throw my anniversary gift into the trash. Evelyn Shaw, we're done.