Plot Twists Romance Short Stories & Cheating Novels

The day we take our graduation pictures, I come across a photographer's post. In the caption, he writes, "I've been a photographer for ten years, and this is the first time I've ever done a wedding shoot on the same day as the bride's and groom's graduation! "They're both gorgeous, and they're incredibly patient. The groom doesn't even touch his phone. He just keeps gazing at the bride with so much love. "I spend all day shooting, and my camera's memory card is completely full. But getting to photograph a couple this perfect makes it all worth it!" I think about how my boyfriend, Zack Warner, is absent from our graduation photo session that morning, leaving us without a single picture together in our caps and gowns. Still disappointed about that, I open the photos, feeling envious. The moment I see the bride's and groom's faces, my breathing quickens. The groom is Zack, my boyfriend of four years. He always says we'll get married once he finds a stable job. The bride is my best friend, Wendy Carter, the campus belle. Just two hours ago, Wendy comforts me over WhatsApp, saying there are plenty of men in the world. If I'm upset with Zack, I can always find someone else. But now, she's holding Zack's hand, their fingers intertwined. She's the bride-to-be about to begin her happy new life.

My husband, Jake Langford, gets poisoned with the toxic aphrodisiac in order to save me. Apparently, he needs to sleep with 99 virgins in order to get cured. Every time he's done with a session, Jake looks at me with red-rimmed eyes. "You mustn't think badly of me, Lily!" Whenever he says that, the jealousy and resentment I feel get drowned out by guilt immediately. I count the days, thinking that things between Jake and me will go back to how they were like before once we've gone through 99 days of hell. That is, until I discover the second phone hiding inside our closet. Only then do I realize that there's no such thing as 99 virgins. It turns out that Jake has been sleeping with the same woman every night this whole time.

Amanda Gordon, my girlfriend, could never get quantities right. She always purchased one extra of everything. On our dates, she always ordered for three. “Oops, I ordered too much. Why don’t we invite Kevin too?” On my birthday, she bought two gifts. “Oops, I bought one too many. Why don’t we give it to Kevin?” After a while, I grew used to it and simply accepted that as my new normal. On the day of our wedding attire fitting, Amanda suddenly reached out and stopped me. “Leigh, the suit I designed for you is over there. This one is for the best man. I had it made for Kevin.” I looked up at the best man’s suit in front of me. It was sharply tailored, with clean, structured lines and tiny silver crystals set into the collar. The groom’s suit she had left for me, meanwhile, was plain, wrinkled, and stained. I finally decided to leave her at that moment. She had given the only bespoke suit she could commission to Kevin Burg. There was nothing left in this relationship worth holding on to. I quietly looked at my phone and sent a message to my former professor, Lawrence Hindle, who lived far away in Westmere. [Dr. Hindle, does your institute still have an opening for me?]

Tammy, who my husband Steven used to mentor, was in the car crash with me. My liver had ruptured. I was drenched in blood. Steven didn't even flinch. He yanked Tammy out first, and she only had a scratch on her forehead. While I was unconscious, barely hanging on, he was freaking out about her getting a scar. When I came to, completely done, I chucked the divorce papers at his face. He went feral—ripped them up and said I'd only leave him over his dead body. I used to hate when he pulled that line. But now? If that's what it takes, so be it.

It started with a sudden downpour. I turned around to buy an umbrella. By the time I got back, Winston Sterling had already draped his overcoat across Sera Thorne’s shoulders. He pulled me under the umbrella, his tone gentle, as if soothing a spoiled child. "Sera can't handle the cold. Just let her have it this once, Nat. Be a good girl. Don't make a fuss." I looked down at my own shoulder, which was already completely soaked through. I didn't say a word. We had been building our startup for five years. Everyone always said Winston and Sera were the dual heart and soul of Sterling Tech. One wrote the code, while the other pitched the product. Meanwhile, I was the one managing the budgets, chasing down clients, advancing money for our office rent, and pulling all-nighters to grind out business proposals. Yet, all I ever got from him was a single, offhand sentence. "Nat, you're always the reasonable one." But I finally understood. It was always the reasonable one who got pushed out into the rain, time and time again. When the car door opened, Winston practiced an all-too-familiar routine, adjusting the passenger seat cushion for Sera. That was a lumbar support cushion I had bought for myself after injuring my waist. I threw the newly purchased umbrella straight into the trash can. Then, I pulled up my phone and clicked send on the equity exit agreement I had prepared long ago. Three minutes later, his reply came back as a brief, three-word text. "Don't be silly." What he didn't know was that at that exact same moment, I had also opened another email.

I had been in a relationship with Celine Jodie for seven years, but she married her first love, Dylan Graham, a month before our wedding. One afternoon, I was checking the guest list when a screenshot popped up in the wedding planning group. The screenshot was of another group chat called 'Our Promise at 18'. There was a photo of Celine and Dylan standing at the entrance of the local county clerk's office, holding their marriage certificate, and below were people who responded with texts. Her brother, Jordan Jodie, said: [Did you manage to keep it a secret from Gabriel? Don't let him delay the wedding over this matter.] My best friend, Isaac Tatum, replied: [Don't worry, he's still waiting for Celine to come back to try on her wedding dress.] Celine's best friend, Hailey Krate, wrote: [They just want to give their youth a proper ending. It's only a temporary marriage certificate. It's not like we're actually changing the groom.] Celine said: [Let's keep this from Gabriel for now. I'll explain to him after the wedding.] I held my phone, my fingertips cold. Two seconds later, the screenshot was unsent. The wedding planning group was silent for a moment. Then, Jordan casually asked how many boxes of candy I wanted to order, and Isaac urged me to try on my suit tomorrow. I stared at the screen and answered: [No need to order candy for doorgifts anymore. The groom won't be attending.]

When I find out my husband is cheating on me, I don't cry. My pride won't let me waste a single tear on a man who isn't worth it. Instead, I crash a stranger's funeral so I can cry my eyes out over someone else's memorial photo. I'm sobbing so hard I'm shaking when the widow suddenly shoves a million-dollar check into my hand. "Take the money and get lost. Don't think you can worm your way into my family just because he's dead." I stare down at the check. Suddenly, being the other woman doesn't seem so bad. At least she gets paid. Meanwhile, I'm the wife who gets cheated on and humiliated, and somehow I'm still the one expected to step aside for the other woman. I'm about to leave when an arm suddenly blocks my way. The dead man's son is a tall, handsome college student. He leans down, looks me straight in the eye, and sneers, "You fraud. You're crying your eyes out over my dad, but you can't even get his name right." Caught, I take a step back. He plucks the check from my hand and leans close to my ear. "You want the million dollars? Fine. Then play along with me and help me piss off my mom. She's the one who actually cheated on my dad."

On the first day of New Year's, my good buddy, Vincent Wales, sent me a video. “Leon, take a look. Does this woman look like your wife? It’s all over.” In the video, a man and a woman were making out passionately. As the car rocked violently, the woman’s face came into view. It was unmistakably my wife. My blood rushed straight to my head. My hands shook as I dialed her number. “Hello, honey… What’s the matter?” Her breathing was uneven, like she had just been doing something intense. I was about to speak when she suddenly let out a few loud cries. “A-Ah… It’s nothing. I’ll hang up now. I’m just playing cards with friends." With that, all I heard was the dial tone. Playing cards? She had clearly told me she was working overtime!

While strolling around the mall, I bend down to tie my shoelaces. When I lift my head again, my boyfriend, Lucas Carter, and my best friend, Kimberly Wendell, are already over 30 feet away. Just as I am about to catch up with them, I notice that the spot that should've been mine is slowly vanishing as the two walk closer and closer. Eventually, they are shoulder to shoulder as they talk about topics that I can't join in on. It's as though a third person was never there. During our university years, Lucas and Kimberly were known as the the school’s most promising “twin stars”. This continued even after we graduated, with them becoming the youngest chief physicians at the hospital. Meanwhile, no matter how hard I work, I can only trail behind them as an ordinary nurse. Lucas is always patting my head, saying, "You're cute, even when you're a little slow sometimes." Then he turns around and works seamlessly with Kimberly to perform one complex surgery after another. As I stare at their backs, I suddenly feel utterly exhausted. I no longer want to continue down this road, forever chasing after Lucas.

Julian Ashford, the golden boy of the city's elite, had his left leg broken by his father with a golf club -- all because of me, a scholarship student. He was stripped of his billion-dollar inheritance and cast out of the family. For three years, he dragged that ruined leg around an auto repair shop, doing backbreaking labor just to scrape together enough for my college tuition. Everyone said I was the luckiest girl alive -- that I'd brought the untouchable heir of a financial empire to his knees, made him willing to live on scraps in the worst part of town. Today was our three-year anniversary. I was carrying the freshly signed Holloway Group inheritance confirmation documents, ready to finally tell him my real identity and pull him out of this misery. I walked down the corridor of The Grand Pavilion, holding a box of vanilla shortbread -- his favorite. Through the half-open door of a private suite, Julian Ashford stood tall on two perfectly healthy legs, dressed in an immaculate tailored suit, sliding a rare pink diamond ring onto the finger of Victoria Sterling -- the city's most celebrated socialite. "Victoria, I used that scholarship girl as a shield to survive three years of my old man's relentless arranged marriage schemes. My body's completely untouched. You've always been the one I was going to marry." I looked down at my own hands, cracked and raw from the cold, and tore the inheritance documents to shreds.

Edward and I held our engagement party in Las Vegas. Everything seemed perfect—until someone suggested a game of Truth or Dare. One of Edward's female coworkers looked me straight in the eye. "I am pregnant. It is your fiancé's baby." Laughter burst out around us. Everyone thought it was a joke—except Edward. After the trip, we returned home. He looked uneasy. "I'm the father of Juliet's baby," he admitted. "Don't overthink it. We were on a business trip and got too drunk with a client. We accidentally spent the night together. "She is from a British aristocratic family. Reputation matters a lot to her. She will never marry me. She only wants to have the baby and raise it alone." "So what are you saying?" I asked. "I am the father. I have to take responsibility. I will stay in the apartment I rented for her and take care of her pregnancy on weekdays, and come home on weekends. "Our wedding will be delayed. We will get married after the baby is borned." I gave a small smile. So he had it all planned out. He was just here to inform me. He let out a sigh of relief, picked up his Rimowa suitcase, and walked out without looking back. I wiped the tears off my face and began packing away all the memories of our relationship. Suddenly, my phone buzzed. The voice on the other end sounded messy and emotional. "Margot, I freaking love you. Don't marry him. Marry me instead." I froze for a second, then replied, "Okay."

At the company's annual event, an oddly shaped necklace tumbled out of my wife's purse. It was engraved with her friend's initials, L.L. To protect his privacy, Camille Sinclair announced our secret seven-year marriage right there in front of everyone. She pulled me up on stage and gave the cameras a shy little smile. "Those letters are my husband's initials, Liam Locke. It's got nothing to do with anyone else." After the show ended, I let go of her hand and quietly begged, "I did what you wanted. Now can I get my mom's medication for this month?" That was when her best friend, Logan Lane, showed up carrying a box stuffed full of erectile dysfunction pills. He made sure the whole room heard him as he said, "Hey, bro, before you worry about your mother's illness, maybe worry about getting it up first. Camille's always complaining to me that you can't get the job done. She can't keep using toys to get by, can she?" The spotlight swung onto me, and thousands of people burst out laughing. By the next afternoon, I was the laughingstock of the entire industry. I was known as the husband who couldn't perform. Camille savored the sight of me falling apart. "Honey, you should learn some gratitude. Why don't you thank Logan?" I walked out under everyone's mocking stares. When I got back to the hospital, I found my dying mother hanging from the ceiling fan. Clutched in her hand was a suicide note, stained with blood. [Don't waste money treating me anymore. Don't beg her for anything ever again. Don't let her make you suffer another day.]

After spending a passionate night with Emma Kemp, she lights a cigarette lazily in bed. "You really should brush up your intimate skills. You can barely hold a candle to Scott in this aspect." I feel as though my blood has turned to ice in my veins. Scott Barlow is the son of my mom's side piece. Emma continues, "When you called me to check on what I was doing, Scott was right next to me. The moment he heard your voice, he got so worked up that he kept clinging to me very tightly." Then, she turns to look at me, her lips already curling into a mean smirk. "Honestly speaking, I finally understand why your mom had cheated on your dad back then." Emma is waiting for me to kick up yet another ruckus hysterically, just as I did the first few times I found out about her affair. But I opt not to say anything. Instead, I just pick up my clothes that are strewn across the floor and put them on. Emma is stunned at first, but she soon scoffs and dials a number before putting it on loudspeaker mode. "You're wrong. I told you that Vince has learned his lesson this time." Scott's disdainful voice soon drifts out of the loudspeaker. "Fine, you win. You get to decide which position we're using in bed next time." But what Emma doesn't know is that I've never learned my lesson. On the contrary, I don't want her anymore.

On my wedding day, the first love of my boyfriend appeared and declared she wanted my place at the altar. Sobbing theatrically, she pleaded, "Claire, I’m seriously ill. You have your whole life to be with Evan. Just let me have this wedding." And my boyfriend backed her up without hesitation. "Claire, you’re already pregnant with my child, and we’ve signed the marriage papers. You’ve got everything you need. This wedding? It doesn’t matter." The guests gawked, while I stood there as the punchline of their jokes. But instead of causing a scene, I kept my composure. That same day, I booked an abortion and looked his first love straight in the eye with a smile. "Sure, take the wedding, and take him too. He’s all yours."

On our tenth wedding anniversary, I made a special trip to the salon to have my hair done. While settling the bill, I noticed an extra charge on my account. It was a coloring and perm package. Judging by the price, it was a package meant for waist-length hair. Mine had been cropped short for seven or eight years. I called my husband, Jason Moore. "Have you used my salon membership card recently?" There was a brief pause on the other end of the line before he laughed lightly, "Oh, I lent it to Quincy a few days ago." Quincy Hahn was his business partner, a fine arts student with long hair. She treasured her natural curls more than anything. She would never be willing to dye or perm it. More importantly, her elder sister was a major shareholder of this salon. Why would she ever need to use my card? I said nothing more and ended the call. Then, I headed straight to a location displayed on my phone. In the cafe, a long-haired lady was nestled in Jason's arms. Her freshly permed curls were soft and bouncy, framing her blushed face with certain demureness. Jason had always complained that my short hair made me look rough and manly. I lacked gentleness and charm. It seemed this long-haired lady suited his tastes perfectly.

I booked a consultation with a renowned traditional medicine practitioner six months in advance to treat my surgeon wife's arousal disorder over the holidays. However, on the appointment date, Wendy did not show up. Just as I was about to call to question her, I noticed a photo her male friend had posted on social media. In the photo, my usually aloof wife was hugging the guy with a radiant smile. The caption read: [Only I can cure your problem.] But what caught my attention was my wife's flushed face in the photo, clearly displaying signs of arousal. With a cold smirk, I immediately liked and commented: [You must have magic fingers that work wonders!] The comment section exploded, with everyone speculating whether I would tear my wife's lover apart. What awaited my wife was our official divorce after the cooling-off period ended.

My CEO husband told me he had a last-minute job to handle. He said that because of it, he couldn't accompany me to retrieve the body. Then I went online and saw a photo my husband's secretary had posted as a birthday status update. [Thanks for the red velvet cake, Mr. Mitchell! Happy birthday to me!] I smiled and left a comment. [Happy birthday.] That single comment sparked a frenzy among my colleagues. They immediately began placing bets on how big of a scene I would make. Then he called. "Lucy is just celebrating her birthday, Brianna! Why do you have to ruin it by showing up in the comments?! Don't you know how sensitive she is? How is she supposed to feel comfortable at work now?! "She's only been here for two years. She doesn't even have any friends! What's wrong with me looking out for an employee and keeping her company on her birthday? A lucky girl who grew up in a wealthy family like you wouldn't understand! "If you want to talk about this, fine. Wait until I get back. But delete that comment right now! We can always wait another few days before retrieving his body. Where is your father going to go anyway? He's already dead!" I clenched my fist and replied, "That won't be necessary." By the time he returned, we would already be legally divorced.

After Princess Winona Green abandons me at the border's military camp for five years, she finally remembers my existence and decides to bring me home. When a dozen or so carriages that are laden with wedding gifts arrive at the military camp, Winona's expression is filled with unbridled smugness. "I did tell you that once I gave birth to Shane's child, I'd marry you, Gideon. See? I didn't lie to you at all. Today, I've personally come to the border just to pick you up." Then, Winona approaches me haughtily. "Shane might be a musician, but I've already sired the oldest child with him. It's only reasonable for him to be made an equal consort, just like you, the son of an official." I merely frown without saying anything. All I do is look at Winona. She lets out a sigh before walking toward me again. "I know that you've been hopelessly waiting for me for the past five years, Gideon. That's why I traveled all the way to this barren wasteland just to prove my sincerity to you. In half a month, we shall get married." The sight of Winona immersed in her own fantasy of fake devotion makes me chuckle coldly. "Seize them!" How dare Winona make me, the general of the border, fight with a mere musician over her affections! Does she really think that my blade is just a decoration?

The day before our wedding, Luke Murray got wasted. On the ride home, he looked right at me and slurred, "Cassie, don't bring the kid to the ceremony. Arya can't know I'm the dad." I hit the brakes. Hard. He smacked into the seatback, halfway sobering up. When he finally realized it was me, he just... froze. Then he said real slow, "Guess you heard. Wedding's off—for now. Cassie doesn't want marriage, but the kid's mine, so I gotta step up. She's your bestie, right? You probably feel bad she's doing this alone. So once he's in school, I'll come back and marry you." I let out a sharp, bitter laugh. "...That's fine. I don't mind." He didn't say a word when we got home—just grabbed his suitcase and left. I wiped the last tear off my face, sat on the bed, and just stared at nothing. Then my phone lit up. My childhood friend's voice cracked on the other end. "Arya, don't marry him. Please." I didn't say anything for a sec. "Okay."

On our wedding night, my husband hurt me, and I bled quite a lot. After that, he was left traumatized, and he gave me the cold shoulder for six whole months. I was understanding. I brought in the best therapist I could find, hoping we could find our way back to each other. Then one day, while I was making rounds as a doctor, I heard him with my own ears, speaking to a physician inside an exam room: "Doctor, my first love is coming back tonight. "I heard your hospital does cosmetic procedures for men... down there. Please use your very best technique. I want her to experience the perfect first time!" Outside the door, in my white coat, I clenched my fist until my knuckles turned white.