Short Stories & Novels

My husband, the hospital director, stole my kidney to save his beloved first love, who suffered from uremia. While I was under anesthesia for heart surgery, he stormed into the operating room without permission and ordered the removal of one of my kidneys. I begged him to stop, explaining that my heart condition was critical and that I could not survive back-to-back major surgeries. He only sneered at me, his voice dripping with disdain. “I knew you’d be jealous of Cece and make pathetic excuses. That’s exactly why I chose this moment.” Ignoring my desperate pleas, he took my kidney and walked away. In the end, I suffered multiple post-surgery complications and died miserably on the operating table.

The third year after I got diagnosed with intermittent amnesia, I happened to overhear my husband, Lucien Rook, chatting with his friends. “Lucien, Anneliese loses her memories every couple of months, and you keep making us impersonate you to live with her. Aren’t you afraid that one of us might take it all the way one day?” “What’s there to be afraid of?” Lucien laughed uninhibitedly, swishing the alcohol in his glass. “Annie is cold and distant. As long as you guys don’t tempt her, she won’t have any such desires. “But I’m warning you now. You can act all you want, but you can’t ever sleep with her. Once I’ve had my fun, I will be going home to her.” For three years, every time I lost my memories, Lucien was not the one who would hold my hand and embrace me, or even sleep with me in the same bed. In three years, I had lost my memories nine times, and nine men had pretended to be my husband. What they did not know was that my amnesia had been cured two years ago.

My boyfriend Julian is a chess grandmaster, a genius. At sixteen, he became the youngest grandmaster in North American history. I gave him ten years of my life, but a ring was never on the table. But when he reached the pinnacle of his career and won the Grand Slam, he still refused to break the pact he'd made with his family about his career. "According to my plan, I'm not considering marriage or any other form of long-term commitment until all my goals are achieved." I didn't argue with him. I quietly packed his luggage for the World Championship and wished him the best. He had no idea that at the very moment he was lifting the championship trophy with the world watching, I was dragging my failing body to sign my own name on a euthanasia consent form.

Samson Carroll's father, who is the CEO of Carroll Group, is hospitalized, and my sister decides to return to the hospital to work as a nurse. She throws herself into the role—donating blood, helping with emergencies, and keeping watch at his bedside around the clock. Soon, everyone's calling her a hero in scrubs. One night, she blocks the hospital room's security camera. She plans to kill the patient and forge a will so that Samson will marry her. I tell her it's too dangerous. The Carrolls are an influential family with deep pockets and powerful connections, after all. A few kind words and a forged will aren't enough to sway them. But she lashes out at me, calling me an idiot. She says that everyone in Jansbury knows Samson does whatever his father tells him to do. I drag her home, still trying to talk sense into her. "The Carroll family has ties to both the authorities and the underworld. They're untouchable," I explain. "If Samson finds out you lied to him, the consequences are unimaginable." Halfway home, she grows increasingly agitated. "Tonight was my only chance, and you ruined it! You're just jealous I'm about to become a rich man's wife! Go to hell!" Then, in a fit of rage, she shoves me into an open manhole by the side of the road. When I open my eyes again, I'm back on the night I brought her dinner at the hospital.

Five years ago, I was the rising star of the nation’s top chemistry research lab, but on the eve of publishing the results of my study, my husband’s crush, Grace, killed me. She made several people violate me and cut my face up. Then, she injected sulfuric acid into my stomach, crushed my teeth and bones, and discarded my body without anyone’s knowledge. At that time, I was three months pregnant. But she told everyone that I stole the project’s research results and fled to another country. Jim, my husband, personally wrote a report to the government to label me as a globally wanted criminal. Five years later, a livestreamer who did nighttime explorations found my dried-up corpse in the basement of an abandoned warehouse.

The day I married Santino Connor, he went from the infamous heir of a mafia fortune to a broke nobody. When he handed me a plastic ring in a shabby basement and asked if I would start from scratch with him, I looked at the man I had loved since I was a girl and nodded without a second thought. "Santino, as long as it was with you, I would do anything." For him, I worked more than ten hours a day until my stomach bled from the stress. Our son, from the moment he could walk, trailed me from one odd job to the next. I thought my love could eventually build us a life in the sun. Until, at a lavish banquet where I was serving the elite, he showered me with cash from his seat at the head of the table. "What's that thing crawling on the floor? It's blocking my view!" "Take the money and get out of my sight!" When I saw the woman by his side, her face an eerie copy of my own, I finally understood. To him, this was just a game, and I was the only one playing for keeps. If he was going to go to such lengths to deceive me, then it was time for his game to end. What he didn't know was that one month later, he would be tearing the world apart to find me.

I started calling my brother "Mr. Quinn" and my childhood friend "Mr. Webb". They frown and ask why I'm being so formal with them. I smile faintly in response. "Because I think you would rather be associated with Vanessa Quinn." They scold me for being unreasonable. "Vanessa is about to marry a man in a coma for you, and her whole life will be ruined. The only reason we treat her so well is because you owe her." But what they don't know is that the one marrying a man in a coma this time isn't Vanessa. It's me—Willow Quinn.

When Alexander Smith stands in front of me and says he's going to marry someone else, that's when I realize he's been reborn too. I remember our 20 years of love in our past life. A plane crash. And then, rebirth. "This is to save Sophia," he says. "In our past life, she was sold to a Vostmark oligarch after her father's political scandal. Not long after, she took her own life due to abuse. I can't let that tragedy happen again, so I need to get engaged to her." As he speaks, he hands me an orange prescription bottle. "If you take this, you'll forget me for a little while. You won't feel the pain. It's just seven days. Once her father's scandal blows over, you'll stop the medication and your memory will return. Then I'll end the engagement and officially propose to you." I stare at the bottle, knowing it's a lie. Not the part about Sophia's suicide. The lie is about the drug. He thinks it only causes temporary memory loss. But I know better. The suppressant causes permanent damage to emotional memory. The seven-day countdown isn't the time it takes for my memories to return. It's the time it takes for my love for him to die.

"Mom, Dad, I’ve decided to come home for the blind dates you mentioned. I’ll be back by the end of the month." In the early spring, with the lingering chill of winter in the air, Valerie Stonecutter pushed open the door while speaking softly into the phone. Her gentle voice drifted through the rain like a thread weaving through the mist. Pulling her collar tighter against the cold, she heard her parents breathe a sigh of relief on the other end. "Val," her father began, his voice heavy with age. “Your mom and I haven’t been in good health these past few years. So now that you’ve made up your mind, that’s good. When you’re back, I’ll have your Aunt Laura arrange a few suitable candidates for you to meet." Hearing that her parents were already making arrangements for her future, Valerie’s gaze flickered, her emotions momentarily unsettled. After a few more words of small talk, she ended the call. She glanced around her home with a heavy heart, her thoughts tangled in a quiet storm. Then she retreated to her bedroom and began to pack.

Out of the blue, my younger sister posted the result of her pregnancy test. The caption? "Thank you my dear brother-in-law for helping me when I needed help the most and fulfilling my dreams of becoming a mother!" Shocked and furious, I couldn't resist leaving a snide comment. "Congratulations. Maybe you can keep my husband too?" My husband's reaction? He blew up and dismissed me. "I just donated my seed to Cara! Don't make a scene, Barb!" Oh, I'll make a scene.

When I was two months pregnant, the Alpha, Lucas, asked me to give blood to his childhood friend. She pretended to have been injected with wolfsbane by a rogue werewolf and required the Luna's blood to recover. “Jessica, your physical constitution is good; hurry and give Lilith a blood transfusion!” “A real Luna wouldn’t just stand by and watch her die!” Lucas and his friends pushed me into the operating room. “It’s just a blood transfusion; it won’t harm the fetus. Even if we lose it, we can have another, but Lilith must survive.” I gave up struggling, watching my blood being drawn and transferred into Lilith's body. After waking up, I dragged myself home, only to be pushed to the ground by Lucas. I ended up with a miscarriage. That was the moment I decided to give up on this relationship.

Emma Blanton twists her ankle, and my fiance, Matthew Harrison, insists on becoming her personal chauffeur. When I voice my disapproval, he makes an even more outrageous decision. He moves Emma into my apartment at Bellemont District—the apartment I bought with my own money. He argues like he's the victim, "You're being selfish. She's injured, and living alone is too dangerous for her right now. I'm just being a decent human being. "And that place is sitting empty anyway. Having someone there helps with security." On the morning we were supposed to get our marriage certificate, he doesn't show up. I call, expecting apologies. Instead, I hear, "Emma had a fever this morning—101 Fahrenheit. I had to take her to urgent care. We can postpone getting the marriage certificate. Her health can't wait." To hell with postponing! I grab my phone and call David Rockefeller. "Do you want to marry me? Then get to City Hall. I'm serious—right now."

The first thing the fake heiress did when she saw me was imitate me. I loved fishtail dresses. Hence, she immediately bought all the fishtail dresses in the city. I loved roses. Thus, she made the entire rose garden hers. I thought she was only jealous that my family had brought me home. Unexpectedly, my elder brother mistook her for me when he saw her from the back when she was wearing a fishtail dress. He gave me forty-nine lashes as punishment that night. She was carrying roses in her arms when my father saw her cheek and mistook her for me. Then, my father immediately drove me out of the house. Before I could investigate the matter, I died of acute renal failure. After my death, I saw her marry my fiance with my family’s blessing. She made a remark on the night of her wedding. “System, I’ve got to thank you for letting me change people’s memories. As long as others mistake me for her, I can casually change their memories.” Enlightenment gripped me, but it was too late. It did not occur to me that I would return to the moment when she had just purchased the fishtail dresses.

I had been married to Adrian Foster for six years when I finally conceived his child. However, the doctor’s reaction upon hearing Adrian’s name left me frozen. "I clearly recall that Mrs. Foster already gave birth to a son here two years ago. She’s a famous actress, and she and Mr. Foster made the perfect couple." I stared at her in disbelief. "What are you talking about? We’re legally married. We have a certificate!" "There’s no mistake. Mr. Foster is someone notable, and he doted on his wife. He was always by her side." I stormed out of the hospital in anger, but my hope was shattered when the lawyer confirmed that my marriage certificate was a forgery. The world tilted into darkness. My ears rang, my surroundings blurred, and I could no longer hear a thing. At last, I understood. He had never been my husband. He had never once looked forward to the child growing within me. With shaking hands, I dialed my family’s number, and in my heart, I swore that this merciless liar would burn in hell.

After seven years of being mates with Alpha David Jones, he secretly cheats on one she-wolf after another from the Nighthowl pack. When I'm pregnant and almost due for labor, his secret lover offends the Alpha of Wildrift pack. To prevent a battle between the packs, David wants me to get to my knees before Wildrift pack's Alpha and beg for forgiveness. I refuse, afraid that it'll hurt the child. He snaps, "How can getting on your knees affect the child? We can just have another one if you have a miscarriage!" He drags me to the Alpha of Wildrift pack and forces me onto my knees. Then, he tells me to beg for forgiveness. My water breaks just then. David's lover, Sarah Lloyd, merely laughs mockingly. "Look at her, so scared that she's wet herself!" That night, I suffer from a difficult labor, almost losing my life. Meanwhile, the news of David heroically storming the Wildrift pack's territory to save Sarah spreads throughout the pack. I'm calm when David's mother, Celine Anderson, hurries to my bedside. "You promised I could leave after giving birth to an heir. Can I go now?"

Gianna Rossi struggled in the slums for over a decade before she accidentally discovered she was the biological daughter of the don of the Ricci famiglia, also known as the Gray Wolf famiglia, Domenico Ricci. She tried to reunite with her family, only to be ruthlessly driven away by the Soldati outside the estate. They left her battered and bruised. Her lover, Matteo Santoro, wiped the blood from her wounds and swore he would infiltrate the famiglia himself to seek revenge against the Ricci family's fake Principessa on her behalf. Once he successfully seized power and took control of the Riccis' arms operation, he would restore Gianna to her rightful place as the cherished daughter of the Ricci family. She believed in his sacrifice and endurance. She hid in the shadows as his secret lover, convinced that his public displays with the fake Principessa were nothing but an act. Yet one night, Matteo got engaged to the fake Principessa. Gianna stood in the corner wearing a server's uniform, watching their happiness unfold. She was a fool who had been played for.

While I was being brutally tortured, my mate was with his first love, a she-wolf named Lily who'd been poisoned with wolfsbane. The wolves who had a personal vendetta against Louis blinded me and stuffed my mouth with stones, violating me one by one, then tried to call him using my phone. The alpha only gave me a heartless command before hanging up, not listening to a word. "Unless you donate your bone marrow fluid to Lily, I'll continue ignoring you!" The enemy wolves stared at the blood trickling down my legs, and mocked, "Oh, were you pregnant? Well, seems like we got the wrong person, anyway! How could you and your baby not compare to a poisoned she-wolf?" When my corpse was discovered, Louis immediately reminded Lily to be careful. When another wolf reminded him that he should check in on me since I was pregnant, he scoffed. "Pregnant? Her? Is that the lie she's going with to justify not saving Lily? "I never want to see such someone so venomous again!" Little did he know that he already saw me. The corpse, decaying and rotting in front of him, was me, his Luna.

I was diagnosed with Neurogenic Wolf Spirit Atrophy. In half a month, I would be dead. The day I received the diagnosis, I decided to give up treatment and donate my body to the Central Research Institute after my death. Through the mind link, I reached out to my brother, whom I hadn’t seen in six years, hoping he would help me sign the papers. He sneered and cut off the link without any hesitation. With the Spirit Severance Donation Contract, a formal waiver of my right to have my wolf spirit returned to my pack's sacred grounds after death, I crossed countless territories alone to the high-ranking city where he resided. He had been promoted to commander of the Silverfang Patrol, basking in glory. He casually signed the document without even looking at me, then said with chilling indifference, “Don’t ever come to me again. Given how ungrateful you are, I can't be bothered to give you a proper burial." I nodded lightly. “I understand.” He did not know that the money for his treatments in the past years had come from me. Now, there were only seven days left until my death.

"A hundred million. Take it, leave my son Eric, and never come back." Luna Anya stood at the entrance of Dark Moon Manor, looking down at me, her eyes cold and full of disgust. Before, I would've burst into tears, shaking, begging, "I'm not with him for the money!" But now, I just lowered my head and said quietly, "Okay." She froze for a second, then sneered, "You pathetic Omega. At least you know your place." Back in Eric's private villa, I asked Eric, "If I left, would you search for my scent? Would you look for me?" But he just laughed, pushed me away, and said, "Who do you think you are? Go if you want. I wouldn't waste my breath on you." So, I really did leave. But a rumor started spreading through the werewolf world. Eric, the future Alpha of the Dark Moon Pack, had gone mad. He was searching the world, desperate to find the scent of a lowly Omega. "I was wrong, Sera! Please, come back!"

After being in love with Dylan for seven years, I planned to propose to him at his birthday party. But then I overheard him speaking to his friend in Italian: "You like Lydia? I'll give her to you. I'm tired of her anyway. Sarah is better—she's a dancer, young and sexy." He thought I couldn’t understand, but he didn’t know that I had learned Italian for him. I threw away the ring I had designed for him, tore apart the wedding suit I had sewn and left. Our friends were all speculating how long it would take before I came back. Dylan sneered with disdain, "She’s just an orphan with no family. Where could she go without me? Three days at most." But to his surprise, I never returned and found a new home.