A Thousand Heartbeats Novels & Stories

Blurb She needed ten thousand dollars. She got sold for two million. Desperate to save her family, Elena Marcelo walked into a Manhattan club. She walked out as merchandise, witness to a murder, trapped in an auction, bought by Adrian Kael, the coldest underboss in New York. He promised her brother's safety and her mother's hospital bills. She promised him nothing. When a rival calls her his toy at a syndicate gala, Adrian doesn't raise his voice. He breaks the man's nose. Then takes her hand and walks out. Because Adrian Kael didn't buy a prisoner. He bought the only witness to a war he didn't know he was fighting. And the man who never needed anyone? He's already drowning in her.

Samantha Benson, an 18-year-old starting her freshman year of college. She is not bright, far from being a prodigy, but she is dedicated and responsible, or at least she was until she moves in with her stepfather and his son, Nick. When she arrives at that house everything changes. Someone changes her and everything she thought was the most important thing, ceases to matter. Nick would turn her world upside down. What if someone destroyed all her dreams? What if someone took away her lifelong habits, everything she had worked for and turned it into mere passion and desire? It would devastate her, tear down her world and create infinite possibilities. Samantha is going to discover what it is to fall into the depths of her mind and also what it is to rethink a thousand times what she knows, and all for love.

To help my husband, Henry Carter, pay off a million-dollar debt, I clean windows and scrub toilets in an office building on Valentine's Day just for the triple pay. After I'm done with the windows, I am about to transfer the last 50 thousand dollars of the debt when a post suddenly pops up on my phone. The title of the post is, "What is something you see in real life that makes you feel sorry for someone, even if they are your enemy?" One of the top comments says, "The person I hate the most is my boyfriend's wife. My boyfriend pretends to be poor to spend money on me and cheats his wife out of over a million. That woman works day and night at a cleaning company just to make money for me! "This has gone on for eight years. That woman has been scrubbing toilets for eight years! Even if she is my enemy, I feel sorry for her." I freeze, and my fingers tremble uncontrollably. No way. It has to be a coincidence. I stare at those words, stunned and unable to recover from the shock. Then, a new comment appears, "Now, my boyfriend plans to fake an illness by telling his wife that he has cancer. He's going to trick her into giving him money to buy me a car." At that exact moment, Henry sends me a message. The instant I open it, I feel my heart skip a beat. It reads, "I'm sorry, honey. I'm sick—I have cancer. The doctor says we need to prepare 80 thousand dollars for treatment. I hate myself for this. Why am I even alive? I'm just dragging you down with me." The words "late-stage liver cancer" in the attached diagnosis report are painful to look at. I think in dismay, "Henry, you do not need to pretend to be sick. You are indeed in the late stage of cancer."

Years after graduation, someone suddenly tags me in the class group chat. "Mr. Warren is gravely ill, Mira. Aren't you going to do anything? You really are heartless!" I only realize what's going on when I click on the fundraising link in the chat. Our high school homeroom teacher, Joseph Warren, has late-stage cancer. Thus, Lyra Fairfield, the class belle, is leading a fundraiser and patient-donor matching process. "I'll donate ten thousand dollars. My husband is the director of Waverly General Hospital, and I've already asked him to arrange a VIP ward for Mr. Warren." Right after I send that message, the group pounces on me. "Mira, you contracted an STD back then and tried to pin it on Lyra. She didn't even hold it against you, and now you're trying to steal her thunder? You're unbelievable!" "I can't believe you're still lying through your teeth during such a serious situation. You never change, do you?" Lyra immediately defuses the tension. "Mira, I don't blame you for what happened in the past, but you really shouldn't impersonate the director's wife. I've already arranged the ward and surgery, and I'm donating another 100 thousand dollars to Mr. Warren!" I'm this close to laughing out of sheer anger. She's the one who scratched her name off the diagnosis report and framed me for having an STD all those years ago. I never even confronted her about it, and now she's playing the victim? Lyra soon posts a photo in the group chat, showing off her husband's car. Yet, when I see the man in the passenger seat, I guffaw. Isn't that my husband's driver? When did he start running a hospital?

After half a month of nonstop overtime, I secured a contract worth over ten million, pulling the company back from the brink of collapse. My boss, Richard Gray, was overjoyed. At the celebration party, he called me the pillar of the company and announced that he would reward me with a bonus. However, when the end of the month came, and I opened my payslip, I froze. Negative 250 dollars. A negative commission? I actually owed the company 250 dollars? I immediately called the finance department, asking if there was a mistake on my payslip. They replied, "No mistake. This is the cost calculation formula that Mr. Gray personally instructed us to use. He said you'd understand once you saw it." I went straight to Richard for an explanation. He laughed. "The contract that you signed, after factoring in the concessions, upfront resources, and hidden expenses, left the company with a net loss of 150 thousand. Since the loss was due to your personal decisions, you're responsible for five percent. That totals to 7500. "Considering how hard you worked, we deducted it from your base salary first. But your salary wasn't enough, so you still owe the company 250. Don't worry. The company treats its employees well. We'll write that off." Soon after, he awarded 100 thousand dollars to the newly arrived intern. I watched the newcomer, probably connected to Richard, cheerfully treat the entire company to dinner with her bonus, and something inside me just snapped. From that day onward, I did the bare minimum. I clocked in. I clocked out. Nothing more. Later, when a critical project went catastrophically wrong and the company faced a colossal compensation demand, Richard came begging me to fix it. I just smiled and said, "Sorry, Mr. Gray. I've already resigned. If there are any problems, you can ask the intern who got the 100 thousand dollar bonus to handle it."

One month on an island cruise had earned Marie Anderson five hundred thousand dollars, and a secret that would refuse to stay buried. Marie thought she'd left billionaire CEO Andrea Forrester in her past. Two years later, she's rebuilt her life with a new boyfriend, Mark Forger. But the ghosts of her reckless decision have come out during the day. When Andrea walks into a gala she's attending with Mark, chaos erupts. Not just in public, but in her heart. And she realizes she had always carried a flame of that month they'd spent together burning inside her. Now caught between two men who will stop at nothing to keep her, Marie must decide who truly desires her as much as she desires him.

Beta Drax was killed alongside his childhood best friends over a thousand years ago. He was awakened as one of the Supreme Beings to help rule alongside King Aidan and Gamma Ty. He was forced to reject his first mate because it was a forbidden love and then he was assassinated in a coup not knowing his second chance mate was pregnant with his twin boys. He returned to find his second chance mate was mated and married to the mate he rejected years ago. They raised his boys while having kids of their own. He never expected to be still bonded with both mates. What happens in this triad when obstacles try to push them apart? What happens when old enemies lurk on the outside trying to destroy their bond from within? Will their love for each other hold true?

Supreme Delta Toffe Cloudwater has had a rough start after being released from prison, he tried to kill his brother's murderer which is what landed him in prison, he was imprisoned for over a thousand years since his brother's demised along with King Aidan and Drax in a coup by their best friend and blood-brother. These events made him more determined to prove his loyalty to his family as he felt like he had let them down when they died. The Supremes are known to be mated to two mates to appease their wolf and vampire but Toffe is still without his second destined mate years later. After a brief fling and one night in the heat of passion with a warrior he cared about, he ended up with a son but certain circumstances made her runaway unknown to him.

The moms at the company post about me online, claiming the free daycare I provide for their kids is a "prison" and a vile tactic to force them to work overtime. What they don't know is that the daycare was set up with imported equipment and staffed by internationally trained professionals. It costs nearly eight thousand dollars a month per child to operate. The internet curses me out, calling me a show-off and disgusting capitalist. So I grit my teeth and send out a company-wide announcement. "To support everyone's desire to handle their own childcare, the company has decided to close the free daycare program. Effective immediately, it will be replaced with a childcare benefit. Eligible mothers will receive 200 dollars a month." As soon as the notice goes out, the moms panic. They crowd outside my office, begging me not to shut it down.

Leqaria Vanxie awakens in the future after getting killed and was forced to sleep to regenerate for one thousand years. As a vampire, living forever makes her want to do something interesting. She made a decision to pursue her previous aspiration—lead a prosperous life and have a partner with many children—since she had previously failed to do so. But nothing appears to be as simple as it was in the past. Her life becomes more complicated with the arrival of Vaans Arkriqel, a descendant of her Loyalist whom she didn't know existed for her. And his blood attracted her as much as a bee would for honey. She couldn't let him go, so Vaans could only retaliate with everything he had and become the first general who would run away from something he couldn't handle.