Short Stories & Novels

My grandfather raised me after my parents died. Before his health failed, his only wish was to see me married and safe. So I begged the man I had loved for six years to marry me. Seventeen times. On the seventeenth, Grant Hale finally agreed. Then, on the day we were supposed to sign our marriage certificate, he walked out of the City Clerk's office with his childhood sweetheart on his arm. "I lost a bet to Nora," he said, laughing as he handed me a fake certificate. "Take this to your grandfather. He will never know the difference." When I begged him to come with me, he shook off my hand. "Stop being dramatic. I got married today. I do not have time for you. If you are that desperate for a husband, go inside and marry some random guy. I will not stop you." So I did.

My father was framed and thrown into prison. To save him, I married the Grand Chancellor, the most powerful man in the palace. On our wedding night, my husband was relentless. He took me again and again. Each time, he came close to losing control. But the very next day, a royal decree arrived. My father had been sentenced to death. I knelt outside my husband's door for days, begging him to save my father. He looked at me coldly and said, "If your father hadn't reported mine back then, my father wouldn't have died such a miserable death. I wouldn't have been sent into the palace either, forced into a life that stripped me of everything I was. "Now things have changed. If you behave and serve my family obediently, I might consider sparing your family." On the day my father was executed, my husband wore a richly colored cloak and personally oversaw the beheading. He even brought the daughter of the man who framed my father into our home and made her his second wife. For three years after that, he never stepped into my room again. I cried and resented him, but he used my family as leverage to keep me in line. It continued until the case was reopened one day and fully investigated. The king himself cleared my father's name. I was granted a special royal pardon that allowed me to make two wishes. My first wish was for my family to live in safety and comfort. My second was to sever all ties with the Grand Chancellor forever.