Cerita Pendek Ruthless Romance & Novel Face Slapping

The company had just taken off when a project my wife, Lenora Peterson, was in charge of ran into trouble. To ease her mind during her pregnancy, I went overseas in her stead, spending ten perilous years abroad before finally returning home, barely alive. Instead of the joyful reunion I had imagined, she greeted me with cold detachment and thinly veiled disgust. "Why are you back?" Lenora asked. "Today is Nathan’s housewarming party," she added. "Let’s head there first—we’ll talk later." We rode in silence the entire way. When we arrived, a ten-year-old girl came dashing over and clung to Lenora affectionately. “Mommy, why did you take so long? Daddy’s been waiting for you forever!” Daddy? My eyes burned with rage—until I saw my old friend Nathan Grant stepping out to greet us with a smile. "Lily, come to Daddy. Mommy’s tired—don’t bother her now." When I met Lenora’s eyes, the guilt I saw there told me everything I needed to know. I turned away and texted my assistant, Morgan Williamson, to begin acquiring the company that, by right, had always belonged to me. He soon reported back. "Mr. Brooke, the acquisition process will be completed in three days."

In the third year of her marriage to Anthony Lancaster, Simone Nolan is still the envy of every woman in Avenport. "Mr. Lancaster treats Mrs. Lancaster so well! Last time, she just coughed once, and he immediately gave her a full physical." "She married the nation's most authoritative doctor, after all. May I be this blissful in my next life!" Simone smiles, long used to the nurses' chatter. She's about to push the door open when she hears an argument inside. She falters. "Mr. Lancaster, are we still going to terminate Mrs. Lancaster's pregnancy later? This is already the third time!" "I've already told you that whenever Simone gets pregnant, an abortion has to be performed, no matter how many times." Anthony's cool voice pierces Simone's ears. Her face instantly becomes ashen. "But why? She has always wanted to have your children." Anthony's tone is icily sharp. "It's because of that surgery three years ago. I removed one of Simone's kidneys and gave it to Winona."

My husband's first love gets engaged. To make her regret it, he abandons me, his newlywed wife, and joins a research project down at the southern tip of the earth. I've made 999 attempts across several years to visit him, with each one ending in failure. After five years, I stopped going. During a lively birthday party, he suddenly shows up. When he sees my slightly bulging belly, he howls in anger. "I spent five years at the research base, and not once did you care about how I was doing! Who's the father of the bastard child you're pregnant with?" "It's none of your business," I calmly reply.

For five years, I was married to Joshua Grayson. He was known as the gentleman of the tech industry and was never arrogant. In fact, he was always cool and collected. A shame we never had any children of our own. I asked every single doctor I could get my hands on, but nothing helped. For that, I kept beating myself up. Joshua told me that it was fine if we had no children, and that what mattered was that our souls were perfect for each other. We did not need any children to secure our bonds. I believed him. And then I found an unsealed box of Plan B in a secret space in his study. It looked exactly the same as the vitamin tablets he fed me all the time. A phone sat under the box. The screen was a photo of him with his top secretary, Yvonne Wellington. It was a family of three. Then, a message popped up on the screen. 'Our girl's born, Joshua! Haven't thought of her full name yet, so we'll call her Cece for now.' 'Oh, right, you fed your wife contraceptives for five years. Now that we have a perfect family, you should kick her out and make me your wife instead. When's that going to happen?' The message hit me like a lightning bolt that came out of nowhere. To think I wasted five years beating myself up for never getting a baby. To think I looked forward to one. And now, everything was crumbling around me.

During the year-end review, Shirley Johnson, Chris Kennedy’s childhood friend, said she wanted to take over as the project lead so she could get promoted to deputy general manager. For the sake of the company, I turned her down. Shirley, furious, quit on the spot and went to get married. Under my lead, the project brought in billions, and the company went public in one leap. Later, I married Chris. During our honeymoon, I was kidnapped and dragged into an underground compound in Morandia. I was about to call for help when I heard Chris say, "Do whatever you want with this vile woman." I desperately demanded to know why. Chris kicked me in the stomach. "If you hadn’t forced your way into the project lead position back then, Shirley wouldn’t have been pushed into that marriage! She wouldn’t have been abused to death. You owe her." When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day Shirley demanded to be the project lead.

"Mrs. Sterling, are you sure you're ready to end this marriage of twenty years and give up the custody?" "Yes. File it. I’m done." I said calmly through the phone as I scrubbed at a stubborn grease stain on the granite island. For twenty years, I poured my entire being into this family. I managed the households, handled the children's education , and stood by my husband's side, supporting his rise in the syndicate without complaint. But my husband Alexander brought his young adopted sister Chloe to the interview, saying, "My success today is all thanks to my adopted sister." Even my own children looked down on me, calling me common and crude housewife. They had formed an alliance with his ever-present "auntie," the woman who seemed to think she was the true lady of the house. I signed the divorce papers and walked away, leaving them to become the "perfect family" they clearly wanted. But that when the family panicked…

The birthday gift that I've given to my wife, Jasmine Gunner, is discovered inside a kennel by the streets. Because of this incident, I get made fun of by the entire elite circle in Harborough. It's Jasmine's birthday once again. Everyone teases me, saying that the gift I've prepared for her must be the most expensive one again. "As expected of the fashion sense of someone who's struck it rich all of a sudden. He thinks that the more expensive something is, the better it must be." "I wonder which kennel it will appear in this time." The scions continue laughing among themselves. But soon, they realize that I've never given Jasmine a single thing for her birthday. In fact, I never bother showing up even though Jasmine's birthday party is coming to an end soon. "Henry, where's my birthday gift? Also, you're being very unscrupulous! To think that you've missed out on my birthday the whole day! Do you have any idea how stormy my family looked earlier?" Jasmine glares at me, her expression dark. I rake my fingers through my messy hair, finally remembering that today seems to be Jasmine's birthday. "Sorry, I've completely forgotten about it. I'll have my assistant pick out a gift for you tomorrow to make amends to you." The swirling emotions in Jasmine's eyes dissolve instantly. She looks at me as though she can't believe what she just heard. "What did you just say?"

After my son was abducted, my husband took me to an adoption center to bring home a baby boy born the same year as the child we'd lost. I poured every ounce of love I had into raising him. He had a sensitive stomach, so I pushed through my chronic back pain to cook him special meals every single day. When he spiked a fever in the middle of the night, I carried him twenty miles through the rain to the nearest hospital. When he couldn't focus in school, I was constantly at his classroom door, flattering his teachers and bringing them gifts, just to get them to pay a little extra attention to him. Fifteen years of grinding sacrifice, and it all came down to one moment at his college acceptance party. "I couldn't have gotten into Harvard without my mother's love and hard work," he said into the microphone. He raised his glass, eyes drifting toward where I was sitting. The cameras flashed as I started to rise from my seat, matching his silent lip movements. And then I heard a name I didn't expect. "She is Rachel Lynch." I froze. That was my best friend's name.

After visiting Grandpa at the care home, I got a text from my boyfriend, Lucas Mercer. “Sofia, come to the office tomorrow at ten. I’ve got a surprise for you.” I thought of the proposal plan I’d spotted on his laptop. I smiled to myself and booked the first available flight. But when I walked into that office, I froze. Lucas was down on one knee, holding out a diamond ring to my cousin, Ashley. Ten years ago, she’d hired someone to drive a car into my parents and kill them. Then she’d trapped me in the fire that followed. “Ashley, I’ve been practicing for five years. Will you marry me?” His eyes were full of nothing but her. I dug my nails into my palm. This year also happened to be the fifth year Lucas and I had been together. “Yes.” Ashley smiled and produced a document. “Since you’ve been loyal to me for five years, my father decided to throw in an extra five million as a bonus!” The room erupted. I stood there watching the celebration. The Harlow Group investment agreement I’d been holding was now a crumpled ball of paper in my fist. I turned and dropped it in the trash, then called my assistant. “Lucas Mercer. Cut him. Pull up the updated list of fiancé candidates.” Ashley had no idea I’d already returned to the Harlow family as the heir apparent. Lucas had no idea that by chasing five million, he’d just walked away from fifty.

The night before the World Cup, Reid Callister made a post on social media. In the photo, he wore a Portugal jersey and was smiling at the woman beside him. He had written something sweet: [Officially done with Argentina. It's all Ronaldo from here.] Our mutual friends all went quiet. Everyone knew that the night Argentina won the championship four years ago, he had cried in my arms until dawn. That was also the night he slipped a ring onto my finger. He said, "Messi got his fairy tale. Let's go get ours." Someone in the comments section asked what happened to his Messi obsession. He replied, "I was young and stupid back then. Now, I know who's worth rooting for." I stared at the post for a long time. I did not comment. I just set down the divorce papers on the coffee table. Before I left for my flight, I tucked the ring into the pocket of his blue-and-white jersey. This time, I would not be watching the game with him.

My online boyfriend dropped a bomb on me the day before freshman orientation day. He had been playing dice with a group of friends and lost a bet. Apparently, I was the prize. Before I could even figure out whether he was joking, he added me to a gaming group chat packed with more than a hundred people. The announcement at the top had already been changed. "Congratulations, Oliver! You just won yourself a 200-pound girlfriend!" A few seconds later, someone posted an old high school photo of me. It was a picture of me in my loose school uniform. As I was at nearly 200 pounds, my neck had practically disappeared into my shoulders. The chat instantly erupted. "Holy shit! That's not a girlfriend. That's a pig in human form." "A bet's a bet. Oliver, you have to do the couple challenge with her tomorrow." The jokes only got worse from there. Before long, someone even started a betting pool over whether I would have the nerve to show up the next night. My own boyfriend threw 10,000 at me and then backed out. "Don't blame me, man. You rolled a six. You won her fair and square." Oliver, the guy who had supposedly won me, stayed completely silent. Then, the girl everyone in the freshman group had already crowned the hottest girl on campus suddenly tagged me. "Lauren, you're coming tomorrow night, right?" I watched message after message fill the screen. Then, I smiled. They had no idea that I had spent the past several months preparing for the day I finally met my boyfriend in person. I was no longer the girl in that photo. I had gone from 200 pounds to 110. I'd been stopped by plenty of guys over the past two months. I'd gotten so many men asking for my number in the past couple of months than I had during the first 18 years of my life combined. None of the people laughing in that chat knew any of that. And I… Well, I didn't see the need to explain myself. Instead, I quietly put 3,000 on myself. My bet was simple. I would show up exactly on time. The entire group chat went crazy the moment they saw it. Mocking comments, jokes, and laughing emojis flooded the screen. I didn't say anything, letting their jeers fill the screen. Then, I sent one final message. "A bet's a bet."

I'm playing hide-and-seek with my little niece. I close my eyes, count to 20, and head up to the attic, only to find the door padlocked shut. I turn to leave, but then I hear rustling on the other side. I tiptoe closer and press my ear against the wooden door. I'm about to shout, "Found you!" when I catch the sound of my buddy Alec Redmond's breathless breathing. "Cassidy, you think anyone's going to come up here?" My girlfriend, Cassidy Brennan, laughs softly. "Don't worry. I promised Cora I'd buy her that Barbie she's been wanting. She locked the door, so no one's going to find us." I freeze outside the door. My blood runs cold. This morning, Cassidy and Alec tell me they have a surprise planned for me. Then the two of them drive off together. I clench my fists until my knuckles go white. So, this is the real surprise.

My boyfriend's tablet, left behind at my place, suddenly lit up with a group chat notification. "Ron, that gold digger's totally hooked, right? When are you taking her to the luxury boutique so we can humiliate her in public?" "Everything's ready. We're just waiting to film her fawning over the designer goods like the greedy little gold digger she is. The guys are gonna love it!" The group chat was called "Exposing Gold Diggers." And my boyfriend Ron was the one who'd created it. I opened the tablet and scrolled through the message history. Screen after screen of vile, disgusting garbage. My blood boiled with every word. So that so-called love at first sight at the designer boutique had been a setup from the very start. He'd spent the better part of a year carefully worming his way into my life, showering me with attention, all while treating me like prey, waiting for the perfect moment to humiliate me for an audience. What a joke. I was the real deal, a genuine heiress from one of the wealthiest families in the country. The gifts he'd gone to such lengths to give me? I couldn't have cared less about any of them. If he was so obsessed with playing people, then I'd give him a taste of his own medicine! Let him see what it felt like to be the one getting played!

The year Jonathan Nash becomes paralyzed in a car accident and falls from the top of the boxing world, I sell my family home and spend eight years working as a hotel housekeeper to scrape together the money for his surgery. I stay by his side until he fights his way back to the top and becomes world champion again. At the celebration party, he holds up his trophy and says through tears, "To the love of my life, who never left my side. May we spend the rest of our lives together." My eyes well up with tears. I think all those years of sacrifice are finally paying off. Unexpectedly, the spotlight sweeps past me as I stand up and instead lands on Amber Lloyd, the boxing team's doctor. I freeze in place, hearing nothing but the pounding of my heart. On the big screen, a slideshow titled "The World Champion's Recovery: A Wife's Journal" begins to play. Each slide is filled with my own records, including Jonathan's muscle response logs from all those nights I spent massaging his legs, gait training plans, and breakdowns of his boxing technique. What hurts even more is the final slide—his marriage certificate with Amber, dated five years ago. Jonathan grips my trembling shoulders, his expression a mix of desperation and warning. "Yvette, the public wants a respectable love story about a boxing champion's miraculous recovery. They don't need to know that the woman who helped me through it all was a housekeeper. "If you come forward now, no one will believe you. There's no point making a scene over this. I'll buy your family home back for you." I stare at the man standing in front of me in disbelief. Eight years of selfless devotion have become the very thing he uses against me. I walk out of the ballroom, my hands shaking as I pull up the overseas job offer on my phone. Without a second thought, I tap "Accept". "Ms. Sloan, your flight and visa will be ready in three days. Please stay in touch. We look forward to having you on board!"