Plot Twists Marriage Short Stories & Novels

I took the fall for my husband over an illegal arms deal and spent three years in federal prison. By the time I got out, he already had a child with another woman. On the day of the christening, I calmly handed him divorce papers. Everyone said I had lost my mind—that I was declaring war on the Nelli family. I was perfectly clear-headed. Before I went in, my husband, Silvio Nelli, held my hand and swore he would never betray me as long as he lived. But the night before my release, I dreamed that he wiped out the Thorne family for that woman and took everything I had. I died beside my parents' bodies while he held that woman's child. In the end, he was the only one who came out ahead. Now the child from my dream was real. I wasn't going to wait for the nightmare to come true. I would take back everything my three years in prison had bought him. Then I'd make him pay in blood.

One day, I somehow connected to a video call with my husband from five years ago. “Madison, you said yes to being my girlfriend today! I couldn’t be happier! “We’ll still be this happy five years from now, right? I have promised to spend the rest of my life treating you right.” On screen, Julian Lorde smiled with such confidence. With downcast eyes, I didn’t say a word. I quietly flipped the camera toward the bed. The man tangled in the sheets with another woman was my husband, Julian—just five years later. The sounds of their affair filled the air. Paying no heed to the young man’s stunned expression, I ended the video call and sent a text. “See that? “We won't get our happily ever five years later. The only thing waiting for us is the divorce papers.”

The year Duncan Sadler marries Brianna Collins, everyone says he's lucky. After all, he only gets to marry Brianna because he looks so much like his older brother, Lucas Sadler. Duncan knows better than anyone that he's nothing more than a stand-in for Lucas. But he loves Brianna, so he's willing to spend his entire life in his brother's shadow. That is, until he turns 50 and overhears Brianna talking to a friend. "If only Lucas hadn't died back then…" Overwhelmed with emotion, Duncan clutches his chest and falls down the stairs. When he opens his eyes again, he's back in high school. This time, he chooses to keep his distance from Lucas and Brianna.

The day Arthur Reed and I signed our divorce papers, his stepsister, Chloe Bennett, watched me with red-rimmed eyes. "Lilith, I'm sorry. Once I get better, I'll step aside and give Arthur back to you. You have to believe me." I could recite that apology in my sleep. Whenever Chloe cried, Arthur gave in. To keep his depressed stepsister happy, he would put another set of divorce papers in front of me. We had married four times and divorced four times. Everyone praised Arthur as a caring brother, while I was the one who had to suffer for it. Every time the paperwork was done, Arthur would kiss my cheek and say, "It's just a piece of paper. It's temporary. Once Chloe is stable, we'll remarry. You know you're the only one I've ever loved." I believed him. I kept waiting for him to come back to me. Then last month, I was rushed to the hospital after a car accident. The doctors needed my emergency contact before they could operate. I called Arthur. He sounded annoyed. "Chloe's in a terrible state right now. She needs me. You're so strong. Can't you look after yourself?" So today, when he put the divorce papers in front of me for the fifth time to calm Chloe down, I signed without hesitating. Arthur assumed I would do what I had done the other four times and go home to wait for him to marry me again. He was wrong. This time, I meant it. He would lose both me and his fortune!

The night before I was due to marry my wealthy fiancé at the courthouse, my best friend, who studied criminal psychology, asked me a strange question. "Molly, your future mother-in-law never had children. So whose son is your fiancé?" Perhaps she thought I wouldn’t believe her. She showed me footage from twenty years ago, when my future mother-in-law spoke firmly to the press. "Even if this family line ends, I will never have a child or adopt one." I stared at her. My fiancé was already four years old twenty years ago. If he wasn’t her son, could he be my future father-in-law’s child from an affair? Then my friend slapped a medical report on the table. It showed my future father-in-law was infertile. "I checked. Your fiancé wasn’t adopted, and he isn’t the child of a relative or family friend. Something’s wrong with that family. Think carefully before you marry him." My friend had barely finished speaking when a message from my fiancé appeared. [Honey, I know we’re getting married tomorrow, but I still can’t settle down. Can I pick you up? Will you stay with me tonight?]

I'm watching TV with my family at my parents' house after having our Thanksgiving dinner when I get a call from a delivery rider. "Sir, the brand of men's disposable underwear in size M you ordered is out of stock. Would it be okay if I replaced it with one of the same size from another brand?" I'm stunned. I haven't ordered anything from the store, and all my underwear is right where it should be in my wardrobe. More importantly, the delivery is supposed to go to the apartment my girlfriend, Leah Suthers, and I rent downtown. But I returned to my parents' house two days ago, and Leah flew to Brockdale on a business trip yesterday. There shouldn't be a soul in our apartment right now. I'm just about to tell the rider he's got the wrong address when a message from Leah pops up on my phone. It's a selfie with the caption, "Just finished dinner with a client and got back to the hotel. It's so unbearably hot here in Brockdale. I miss you, honey." In the photo, she's wearing a white blouse and leaning against a white hotel wall. I stare at the picture for a couple of seconds before replying to the rider, "Sure. Just leave it at the door. Thanks." After hanging up, I grab my car keys, tell my mom that something urgent has come up at work, then drive straight back to our apartment downtown in the middle of the night.

When my fiancé slept with my sister, Lily, I wasn’t angry. In fact, I even gave them my blessing. In our previous life, Lily and I got married on the same day. While I married a college graduate, she married the richest man in town. After graduation, my husband worked for the government and steadily rose to the top. Her husband, however, divorced her after becoming the richest man in the country and married someone else. Lily remarried a blue-collar worker, but when layoffs hit, he forced her to sell herself to support the family. She contracted a disease. Then, when I went to visit her, she poisoned me out of jealousy. When I opened my eyes again, we were back on the day of our weddings. Lily thought that by choosing a different man this time, she could change her fate. In the end, she ended up worse off than before.

My fiancé, Luciano Marino, was the Don of the Marino family, and he was an extremely careful man. For the five years we'd known each other, he'd kept me on his estate outside the city. "Eleanor, you're my weak spot. I'll never let any of my enemies lay a finger on you." "The fewer people who know about you, the safer you are." So I'd never once appeared in public with him, let alone met his family. Three days before our wedding, I was outside the study when I overheard him talking to the butler. "Don, are you sure you want to schedule your wedding to Ms. Vanderhall for the same day, three days from now?" "That's right." "Then... what about Ms. Ashford?" He took a deep drag on his cigar. "Eleanor has always been understanding. She won't mind if I'm a little late." My hand froze before I could push the door open, and my mind went blank. Hands shaking, I opened Instagram on my phone and searched for Eileen Vanderhall's account. Her feed was filled with photos of the two of them. She came and went from Luciano's armory as she pleased, attended his family dinners, and even sat in on meetings with his crew. "He says that when you love someone, you share every part of your life with them." So it wasn't that he refused to let the woman he loved into his life. It was just that the woman wasn't me. Back in my room, I dialed a number. "Dad, I lost the bet. I'm ready to come home and marry the man you picked." ...

I died in the year my husband hated me most. Unable to endure his endless silent treatment any longer, I swallowed a bottle of pills and ended my life. At the crematorium, watching the flames roar inside the furnace, he allowed himself a rare smile. “Someone as vile as her doesn’t deserve to be laid to rest whole.” So when the staff handed him the urn, he flipped it over. My ashes scattered across the floor in an instant. All this time, he had believed I was responsible for the death of his first love. That belief was why he had schemed and plotted for years, all for this precise moment of final desecration. When it was over, he stepped over my ashes and walked away without looking back. Though not long after that, he fell to his knees and begged the crematorium to give my ashes back to him.

At the wedding, I recognized at a glance that the masked man standing before me was an impostor for Howard Larson. Despite this, I went through with the ceremony as though nothing were amiss. In my previous life, I exposed the fake groom in front of everyone. Left with no choice, Howard reluctantly returned and completed the wedding with me. That very night, his childhood sweetheart, Joyce Charlton, swallowed sleeping pills and jumped from a building, taking her own life. When Howard heard the news, he showed no hint of sadness. Instead, he cursed her, saying she deserved to die. After the wedding, Howard and I seemed as loving as ever. I even used my family's money to pull his company back from the brink of collapse. However, on our first wedding anniversary, he personally bound me to a helicopter while I was pregnant. There was no warmth left in his eyes. "If you hadn't forced me to come back and marry you that day, Joyce would still be alive. "Why should you get to live so happily? I want you to feel the pain she felt when she died." He shoved me from the sky. I was utterly destroyed. This time, I pretended not to notice the deception and completed the wedding with the fake groom. I wanted to see for myself how, without the Smith family's support, he intended to save the already crumbling Larson Group.

My wife had called me in the middle of the night with a hint of drunkenness in her voice. She admitted to having too much to drink and asked me to come get her. I hurried to the private club she mentioned, only to find myself having to change into a bathrobe as soon as I got there. Surrounded by a group of wealthy women in their fifties, they playfully flirted and teased me relentlessly. Suddenly, a few of them pounced, pushing me to the ground and demanding I crawl like a dog. Despite the humiliation, my main concern was still my wife's wellbeing. Hours passed before she finally showed up, disheveled, supported by her male assistant, looking at me with a cold smirk. It was then that the truth hit me. This whole situation was a scheme she had orchestrated to please him. My anger rising, I called and spoke through gritted teeth, "Three days. I want every single business under the Spencers wiped out."

The day Stella Jameson was released early from prison for good behavior, my husband Samuel Xenos, who was always so calm and collected, lost control. He did everything he could to please Stella in her bed. He said that our marriage was nothing but fake. He never had any real feelings for me. And that lawsuit, for which he risked his life to win for me three years ago, was nothing but a complete setup. [Zara, the man you love most is just my dog. He comes whenever I call. He has always been like this. He’s no different from Victor back then.] That was the message Stella sent me to taunt me. I wiped my tears and prepared a big surprise for them.

It's been five years since I fell ill with depression, and I'm finally myself again. I can talk, laugh freely, and I actually have an appetite. The icing on the cake is that my husband, Ian Beaumont, and I are expecting our second child. At our New Year's Eve family gathering, Ian's godsister, Gemma Waverly, gets tipsy and starts making a scene. "I think it was about five years ago. I was dumped, and I took the car out for a little joyride while the surveillance cameras were under maintenance. "Guess what? The moment I stepped on the gas, a cat abruptly flew out of nowhere and slammed right into my hood. It yowled and bolted off." A faint, disdainful smile plays on her lips. "That damn creature not only scared the hell out of me, but it also ruined my car's wrap. "You'd better be careful in the future. Don't end up like me, accidentally bringing all that bad luck down on yourself. The thought alone makes me sick!" Gemma's tone's lighthearted, as if she's recounting a trivial, unlucky memory. Everyone chuckles and chimes in, telling her she should go to a church and pray so she doesn't end up being haunted by lingering spirits. I, on the other hand, stand amid the rowdy crowd, looking at Gemma's contemptuous face, my mother-in-law, Margaret Holloway's, indulgent gaze, and Ian's resigned, helpless smile. In a heartbeat, all the color drains from my face. It's almost as if the lot of them have forgotten that my daughter, Soleil Beaumont, died in a car accident five years ago.

The day the nationwide serial killer, Landis Grant, was executed, I was the one who escorted him to the death chamber. Right before the lethal injection, he turned his head and looked at me with strange, sudden pity. "You know, I only actually killed seventeen people," he whispered, his raspy voice cutting through the silent room. "I deserve to die, no question. But your hotshot lawyer wife? Her death isn't on my tab." Hearing him mention my wife, Valerie Foster, made a hot surge of rage claw up my throat. Three years ago, she was stabbed dozens of times by Landis while protecting crucial evidence. I drove through the night from out of state, only to find her body completely unrecognizable at the morgue. Grief tore through me so violently that I collapsed, coughing up blood, and spent an entire month confined to a hospital bed. For three years, I chased Landis to the absolute edge of hell, risking everything just to drag him in and avenge her. Following the address Landis had left behind, I made my way to a quiet suburban house. The second I set foot in the yard, I froze completely. Valerie was right there, wrapping her arms around her former mentor, Dylan Reed, kissing him with a tenderness that shattered my heart. A toddler, around two or three years old, was swinging back and forth on a wooden swing right beside them. My head throbbed, white noise roaring in my ears. I took a step forward, but someone grabbed my shoulder from behind. It was my chief, Noah Morgan, the man I respected more than anyone on the force. "Valerie is happy now, son," he said quietly, "Do yourself a favor and just walk away. Let it go." I shoved his hand off my shoulder. Unholstering my service weapon, I aimed into the open air and fired three warning shots. "Valerie Foster, you're under arrest for bigamy," I said, my voice dead and completely cold, "Come to the station with me."

I spent five years beside Kaelan, heir to the Elf King, and bore him a son, yet he never once acknowledged me in public. He said that when he became Elf King, he would give us the highest standing there was. Instead, at the Elven Assembly, he announced that another woman was his fiancée, then personally handed her our son's life-saving elixir to use as a facial treatment. Later I took my child away to the border, and he was finally willing to acknowledge us. But the child who used to run after him calling him Dad no longer needed a father.

When the news of my husband's death reached me, I was seven months pregnant. My vision went black, and I fainted on the spot. When I opened my eyes again, a childish voice shouted in my head, "Mommy, wake up! Scumbag Daddy tricked you! He's not dead! He's with his mistress who's about to steal your identity!" I was stunned. The voice angrily spoke again, "The head of the Shaw family from the capital is your biological brother. Today, Scumbag Daddy is going to let his mistress take your place as his long-lost sister! Then, he and his mistress will conspire to kill you, and my brother and I will be sold off. To protect me, my brother will get his legs broken by human traffickers in the future and starve to death!" The child's heartbreaking cry jolted me awake from my grief like a bucket of ice water. I thought it was a hallucination, but then I heard the voice of an unfamiliar man in the living room. "Mr. Shaw, this is Miss Alice Woods. She's the long-lost sister that you've been looking for for twenty years!"

On New Year's Eve, the smell of a roast in the oven drifted through the house. My grandmother walked over to me, with an old photograph in her hand, the edges worn soft with age. "Is Zack almost home?" My throat tightened. It had been three years. She could never remember that my younger brother was long gone. I was the one who picked up his ashes. At that moment, my phone rang. The moment I saw the name on the screen, the blood in my veins seemed to freeze. I stepped out onto the balcony before answering, keeping my voice low. "What is it?" The voice on the other end of the line trembled. "It's been three years. Are you still angry? I've been waiting for you to come home. Our son has, too. We're downstairs." Downstairs? I walked over and looked down to see a tall figure and a small one standing together. Through my phone, my son's voice came with a catch in his throat, saying, "Daddy…" My thoughts snapped back into place. I said flatly, "We've been divorced for a long time. He said he didn't want to stay with me." Then, I hung up without another word.

The most reckless thing I had ever done was turn my back on the Moretti name and leave St. Clair Harbor with Lucian DeLuca when the Commission pushed his family out and he had nothing left. For three years, we lived in a drafty Brooklyn loft and ducked black Chevrolets on winter nights. Then Lucian fought his way back to the East Coast table. Everyone started calling him Mr. DeLuca again,and I became Mrs. DeLuca, the woman he swore he would always protect. Then Clara Voss appeared. She had once saved his life as a night nurse at an underground clinic, and Lucian never forgot it. He bought her a clinic, protected her family, and let her step, inch by inch, into the middle of our marriage. He said he still loved me, but he also said I was spoiled, jealous, and needed to learn my place. So I did. I signed the divorce papers and left New York behind. Mrs. DeLuca was dead. Evelyn Moretti had come back.

In the eight years since my wife handed our daughter over to her widowed brother-in-law, I went to court eight times. This time, the judge asked me the same question she always did: was I here to sue for custody again? I corrected her. "I'm here to withdraw the suit. I'm giving up custody. I'm agreeing to the divorce." Ten years married to my wife, Vivian Simpson, and eight of those years spent in courtrooms. I'd become the whole city of Northbridge's favorite joke. Now, I'd finally endured enough to let go. From now on, the most spineless man in Northbridge would never have to show his face in front of them again.

My girlfriend, Kiara Sommer, gets one of her legs crippled in order to save me. Her adopted younger brother, Cain Fullton, suffers from heart failure after shielding us from harm. Since then, his heart becomes extremely weak, and he has to rely on the expensive imported medication just to survive. In order to gather enough money for their surgical bills, I take on a body-casting job in the black market. Not only are my limbs encased in scalding hot silicon, but I also have to endure it whenever a few female perverts cop a feel of me. I can't even move an inch when I'm doing my job. After all, I'll have to compensate for the damages if I ruin the mold. I can only grit my teeth and endure the agony, only to get slapped a few times in the face afterward. "You already have the guts to take on a job like this, and yet you're frightened of getting groped?" As I withstand the humiliation and the burning pain, I return to the hospital with the money in hopes of buying more medicine for Cain. When I walk past a VIP lounge, I hear familiar laughter erupting from within. "Kia, this is the 998th test, right? Once Shane passes 999 tests, are you really going to marry him?" Kiara frowns slightly at the question, though she soon replies coolly, "Yeah. The tests stem from my family's rules, and you're ordered to serve as the supervisor. But still, don't go overboard, yeah? Shane is the only one meant to be my husband." So, Kiara lies to me and torments me to this point just so she can marry me? As I stare at my broken and bruised reflection in the mirror, I feel my lips curling into a smile all of a sudden. With trembling hands, I dig out the old phone that I haven't used for the past two years. My eyes slowly redden as well. Then, I draft a text message. "I regret everything now, Winona. Please take me home."