After All This Time Always

Ever since she could remember, Maya Connors has always been the smart, shy girl that sat at the back of the classroom. She tackled every task with a boundless zest, except when it came to boys and relationships. Being eighteen and never once had a boyfriend, she was adamant that it would stay the same until she graduated. But sometimes, you have to expect the unexpected - such as falling for Ethan Morrison, a boy who was way too handsome and way too out of her league. Despite coming from very different social circles, a school trip to Europe was all it took as to her dismay, she found him incredibly charming. But when Maya ventures out of her shell and falls too deep, she realizes that it's too late to go back. With her heart laying on the line, she's about to face a whirlwind of emotions, drama, and secrets.

"Five years and that's all you have to say to me?" he asked. Standing so close she could taste his breath. She wanted to move away from him. But she didn't want him to know just how much he affected her. So she stood right there. She wasn't going to let him intimidate her. "Well... Is there anything else you want me to say?" she asked The side of his mouth moved upwards. He was smiling? Why the hell was he smiling like that? She thought. She didn't remember saying anything funny. "You left... Kitty" he said. "I asked you to stay... Begged you to stay... And you left anyways.. With him. And now you come back... Acting like everything is okay between us...?" There was something about him... She thought. Something about the way he called her 'Kitty' that made her heart flip. "You shouldn't have gone with him". He said. "Oh really? Why not? Because you didn't want me to?" she asked. She was starting to get angry. "Yeah that's right" he replied. "And because of what you felt for me -what we felt for each other. When I came near you, you felt an excitement so intense that you ceased to breathe --like you are feeling right now. You wanted me just as much as I wanted you. And that should have been enough to make you stay" -------------------- Katherine Kavell has been in love with Jensen Packard ever since she was a teenager... And all she had ever wanted was for him to see her as more than his best friend's sister.Only he never did. So she decided to leave. But when she returns five years later with her son, Jensen Packard knows that he can't let her go for the second time.

My parents made Dana and me settle it with rock-paper-scissors. Loser had to marry the Baillieu heir—the so-called "freak." I won. Then flipped the script. "Cool. I'll take Blake. Dana can have the empire." Last time? I was dumb in love with Michael—Dad's adopted golden boy. Chose the company, stayed behind, and handed Dana off to Blake Baillieu. Big mistake. Six months in, Dana was gone—wrecked by that marriage. Right before she croaked, she texted Michael blaming me. Said I lost the game and ditched the deal, dumping Blake on her. Michael? Snapped. Dude went full psycho. Turns out, he and Dana had been sneaking around for years. He dragged me behind the Baillieu estate and forced a dozen intellectually disabled men to assault me. "If it weren't for your cruelty, Dana would still be alive! You'll pay for everything she suffered!" I was over eight months pregnant—almost due. Begged him to stop. Begged for my baby's life. He didn't care. Kept ordering them to take turns. Even when my water broke, he just watched. Both my baby and I died that night. Now? I'm back. And this time, I rewrote the story. Step one: marry Blake.

Lena Clermont fell hard for her dad's friend, Andrew Rohan—twelve years older. The first time she saw him, he was all sharp suits and broad shoulders, effortlessly standing out. He smiled, patted her head, and handed her a princess dress. Fast forward to twenty. He got drugged at a banquet. She wore that same dress, offering herself as the cure.

At twenty-eight, I held the dubious honor of being the last unmarried socialite on New York's Upper East Side. Everyone around me was growing increasingly anxious about my single status. In my previous life, my mother arranged a matchmaking cocktail party, where I was told to choose a husband from ten handpicked elite bachelors. I bribed the event planner to place Mark West's profile at the very top—and as I had hoped, I chose him. After we married, Mark treated me with what seemed like tender affection. He even bought me an oceanfront villa in the Hamptons, making me believe I had finally found true love. But that illusion shattered the day I was nine months pregnant, just hours away from giving birth. Mark drove a scalpel straight into my abdomen—then, right in front of me, hurled our newborn onto the floor. "If you hadn't forced me into this marriage with your family's power, Sofia wouldn't have been heartbroken enough to go drinking and get drugged and assaulted. This… this is what you owe her!" He tossed the scalpel aside, then calmly let his private doctor pin down my blood-soaked body. I fought through excruciating pain for six agonizing hours, until I finally bled to death. Afterward, Mark dumped my corpse into the Hudson River. But for Sofia, he hosted a grand funeral—funded with my money, under my name—and paraded himself to the world as a grieving, devoted widower. Given a second chance at life, I refused to step foot in that cursed matchmaking event. Instead, I went straight to my mother with a demand: marry me to Robert Black—the most ruthless, cold-blooded titan of Wall Street, whose scarred face was feared by all. In the end, stripped of my financial backing, Mark's hedge fund collapsed. He became a disgraced fraudster, spat on by everyone on Wall Street.

When Yelton Group tanked, their CEO and his wife showed up at our door, begging for a marriage alliance. My dad, thinking I was still head-over-heels for Rosie after ten freaking years, threw a million into their sinking ship and signed me up to marry Rosie. Wedding night? She blindfolded me and kept whispering how bad she wanted it. A month later, I tested positive for an STD. Then I caught her bragging to her friends. "Quinn got wrecked by, like, a dozen girls," she laughed. "Wanna guess who gave him the infection?" Her friends were cracking up. "I scouted all the grossest red-light spots," one said. "Each one's got a different flavor." "Just wait," another giggled. "When the symptoms hit hard, we'll know who wins." Rosie added, "Prize money's ready. Soon as we figure it out, she gets paid." That's when it hit me. It wasn't Rosie in bed that night—it was a lineup of strangers she set up. I lost it. Went straight to her, demanded answers. She didn't even flinch. "Mad? Please. If you hadn't dangled that million to force me into this marriage—or scared Caleb off—do you think I'd waste my time on you? "Once Caleb forgives me, you're done." I asked for a divorce. She locked me in the basement. "Chill," she said. "We're still placing bets on who gave you the STD." Six months later, I died down there. Just rotted away. Then I woke up—right back on the day her parents came begging for that deal. Only this time, on the wedding day? She was the one crying.

Ava found her mate in Alpha Declan years ago, but Declan has a younger brother with an insane big brother complex. He hates Declan and goes to crazy extremes to try and ruin his life. The brother, Sabin, is also an alpha. He took over a neighboring pack. Unfortunately, he also made it, so Ava had to leave Declan, and Declan thinks she has taken his brother as a mate. Now two years after she left him, she waltzes into his club to warn him of Sabin's new evil plans. When she learns that Declan has a new woman Dec sees the heartache, and now he doesn't know what to believe about what happened two years ago. He's determined to find out, though.

Katherine trusted the love of her life so much that she declined the offer placed on a platter of gold by her parents to marry Cross the oldest son of the richest family in town, even when they threatened to disown her. Instead, she kept a huge sum of money with her boyfriend whom she trusted so much, she decided to elope with her boyfriend only to find out that she has been both emotionally and financially scammed by the person she trusted the most, leaving her stranded, she had no choice than to become the prodigal daughter who crawls back to her family but they refuse to go back on their words. Left with only two choices, either to live a lowly and finance less life or beg Cross whom she hated to marry her. But Cross also has his own rules, If he is going to accept her. Will she choose to live a lowly and broke life and work her way back to the top for revenge or can she cope with marrying Cross while planning her revenge?

During Christmas break, my boyfriend, Trevor Hayes, asks me to stop by and feed the dog that his childhood friend, Evelyn Summers, keeps at her place. I bring a bag of kibble over. But the second I open the door, a huge pit bull lunges at me and bites into my face and arms. Luckily, a neighbor hears me screaming and pulls me out of its jaws, but the damage is already done. The scars will stay with me forever. I break down, but Trevor blames me instead. "You must've done something wrong when you fed Mojo and set him off. You just got a scar, but Mojo's dead!" The weight of it all crushes me until I climb a rooftop and jump. After dying, I see Trevor holding Evelyn in his arms. "Honey, you're so clever. Starving Mojo for a few days really worked. Now, she's dead. We can finally be together." When I open my eyes again, I'm back on the day Trevor asks me to go feed that dog.

A week before summer break, my boyfriend’s childhood sweetheart threw a fit, insisting on going to Tanond to watch a strip show. She even convinced our entire class to go with them. I kept warning them that it was not safe, that it could be some kind of new scam, and begged them not to go. When they refused to listen, I secretly reported it to the police. On the day of their departure, the police stopped them right at customs. A few days later, a male stripper suddenly went viral overnight. When she found out about it, she got so furious her eyes turned red. “It’s all Zoey’s fault! If it weren’t for her, we could’ve seen an international superstar's strip show!” On the first day we went back to school, they drugged me and made ten men teach me how to dance. “Didn’t you stop us from watching a strip show? Then you can perform one for us yourself.” The next day, my photos of strip show were all over social media. After that, I jumped off a building out of despair. When I opened my eyes again, it was once again the day his little sweetheart demanded that trip to Tanond.