Arti Moving On

A wedding she never wanted. A man she never met. A love she never saw coming. When carefree heiress Elizabeth Knight is called back home from her lavish vacation, the last thing she expects is a forced marriage to Aaron Vanderbilt, the cold billionaire heir of her family’s greatest rival. The marriage is meant to save her father’s company from bankruptcy and end the feud between the two families. Instead, it throws her into a web of dangerous family secrets and betrayal. Her new husband, Aaron, makes it clear that the marriage is for business and not real, and he doesn't want to be around her except when necessary. But when her first love returns to town, she's torn between returning to the first man she had ever loved or exploring the growing spark between her and her arranged husband. Will she fall for the stranger she married? Or return to the love she lost? What happens when she finds out shocking family secrets surrounding her birth and a deadly plot that could ruin her life?

When my identity as a spy for the enemy nation was exposed, my two childhood friends faked their deaths and made a bet. Whose memorial tablet I chose to marry at the altar would be the one to protect me. One was Rio Murray, the young general to whom I was betrothed. The other was Prince Bayram, who had concealed my identity as a spy for many years. But I chose neither for the simple fact that I had lived this life twice. During my first time, I chose Rio, only to be buried alive by the prince, who had “returned from the dead.” During my second time, I chose Bayram, only to be torn to pieces by vultures sent by Rio. Later, I learned that all those years of care had been a facade. It was because they had mistaken me for their dream girl, who had been abducted by the enemy nation in childhood and vanished without a trace. They hated me for usurping her place. So under the pretext of eliminating a rival, they subjected me to the agony of slow torture! This time, I ignored both memorial tablets placed before me. Amid the gasps of the crowd, I produced the Royal Decree and declared while enunciating every word clearly. “I am already betrothed; I’m afraid I cannot choose.”

A heatwave swept across the surface of the Earth right after the end of boot camp. Temperatures rose to 200 degrees Fahrenheit, and all electronic items stopped functioning. Even our water source had all dried up. I was lucky that I never liked the taste of water in college, and I always had five boxes of bottled water standing by in my hostel room. If I rationed my water, I could sustain myself until help arrived, but our instructor suddenly requested everyone to hand in their water to be managed by one person. "We're a group, and it's only by working together that we will be able to sustain ourselves until help arrives! Whoever doesn't hand in their bottled water will be considered the common enemy!" I had no choice but to hand in all the water I had. However, the instructor was not fair with his water rationing. He would give the women one bottle a day, while I only had one bottle cap's worth of water. "You're a man, aren't you? It doesn't matter if you have less water. Do you really want to fight the fairer sex for a little water? The ladies should be pampered like princesses. Can't a man like you bear some responsibility to take care of them?" I wanted to argue with him, but my girlfriend, who was also my childhood sweetheart, helped the instructor tie me up and flung me under the sun to be burned to death. When I opened my eyes next, I had returned to the day before the heatwave. This time, I moved all of my water into a cave and watched gleefully as that lecherous instructor got thrown under the sun by his pampered female trainees to be burned.

Three days before my marking ceremony, someone set fire to the bridal shop while I was inside trying on my ceremonial dress. Alpha Marcus threw the arsonist into the pack prison, sentencing them to the harshest punishment our laws allowed. I lay in the hospital bed, my body covered in third-degree burns, refusing to wake fully as the reality of my disfigurement sank in. In my semi-conscious state, I heard Marcus speaking with the pack's healing witch. "Alpha, we can still heal her completely with the ancient magic. If we wait any longer, Sarah will bear these scars for life! You just want Miss Rachel to be your Luna at the marking ceremony. This is cruel beyond measure!" "Let her keep the scars. I'll provide for her for the rest of her life, but if she's healed, she'll definitely cause trouble at the marking ceremony." "I promised Rachel that her pup would be welcomed into the pack with full honors. Only when Sarah is completely disfigured will she be grateful enough to raise Rachel's child as her own. The scars are necessary - at least this way, she won't dare mistreat the pup." In the corner of the room, where no one was watching, a tear slid down my burned cheek. So this was the truth. The marking ceremony I'd dreamed of was nothing but a lie. The mate bond I longed for would be my death sentence. If that's how it had to be, I would give him what he wanted.

I would say all I wanted was to find my mate and live a peaceful life, but I would be lying; all I wanted was to go to the palace, give up my life, and have them send me to the other side of the world. If it were up to me, I would have done that the very first day everything turned upside down, but that’s far from what Alpha Zander wanted; he wanted me to experience hell on earth; he said death was more than I deserved; accidentally killing not one but two of his mates would cost more than my life; he kept me alive as a slave, tortured, humiliated, and if possible, took my soul, so when I turned out to be his mate as well, it didn’t come as a surprise for him to reject me and bound my powers and send my wolf into a deep slumber; it was no surprise his parents chose him a chosen mate; those people adored their perfect luna, Jocelyn, my dead sister—his first mate. And just when I thought my life couldn’t get any worse, I found myself on the auction stage, men bidding for me like I was some kind of property, and next the ruthless Alpha, who, by the mention of his name, people trembled bought me, “bride, not slave,” his three words. I learned that even though he was ruthless, he was soft on me, and not only that, we had a common enemy (Alpha Zander), and he was willing to help me get my revenge. Oh, Alpha Zander, get ready to be on your knees because my mate and I are coming for you!

A week before my death, my Alpha mate's childhood sweetheart Sarah returned to our pack. That night, he didn't come home. The next day, I received his mind-link. "I've purchased a mate-bond severing potion from the pack witch. Come home now so we can break our bond." In our pack, the Moon Goddess was very serious about mate bonds. Once two wolves chose to form a mate, the mate bond could not be severed, unless the witch's potion was used. This potion was very expensive, costing up to $500,000 per bottle. I smiled bitterly. He was very generous to sever the bond with me. I coughed twice before answering, "I'm in the healing center." His voice turned ice cold. "I don't care where you are. Even if you're about to die, you need to come back." I calmly replied, "Fine." He didn't know that I really was dying. Three years ago, during a rogue wolf attack, I blocked the silver dagger for him to protect him while he was unconscious. I was poisoned by silver and became weaker and weaker over the past three years. I only had one week left to live. On the day of my funeral, my mate was busy holding his marking ceremony with Sarah. Later, he knelt before my grave in pristine white ceremonial clothes, clutching my headstone and whispering through tears. "If there's another life after this one, I still want to marry you." That day was his marking ceremony with his childhood sweetheart. It was also my funeral.

During a critical heart transplant, my doctor husband insisted his intern assist despite her garish nail art compromising the sterile field. When I called her out, he abandoned the patient mid-surgery to comfort her. I begged him to return, but he snapped, "Giselle is upset. Can't you wait? This is nothing compared to her feelings." 40 minutes later, the patient bled out and died. Later, they discovered that he was our highly respected mayor and placed the blame on me. "If it weren't for you causing a scene and kicking us out of the operating room, the mayor wouldn't have bled to death. This is all your fault!" Defenseless, I was sentenced to life in prison, tortured, and died in agony. My husband and his intern walked down the aisle, enjoying their happy life. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day of that fateful surgery.

I woke up naked beside a man I hadn’t seen in eight years. Before noon, the scandal was everywhere. By noon, I’d lost my position as CEO, my name, and my marriage. But the worst betrayal wasn’t the headlines. It wasn’t walking in on my husband and my best friend planning my downfall and mocking me. It was finding out the man I loved, my sweetheart of five years, made me a surrogate without my knowledge. The twins I'd been carrying for seven months weren't mine. But it failed to break me. It only made me stronger. After all, I wasn't just a mother—I was a CEO.

One night, my family sat together watching the New Year’s Eve Live on television. My little sister, Stella Larson, said she had to pee and hurried to the washroom. Half an hour later, she still had not returned. When I went to check on her, the washroom was empty. “When did Stella leave the washroom?” I asked my parents. Both of them were stunned for a moment before feeling my forehead and saying, “What are you talking about? You’re an only child. Who is Stella?” They forcibly pulled me back to my seat. My mind went blank. Did the three of them just pull a prank on me? After finishing his drink, my father clutched his stomach and rushed into the washroom. I stared fixedly at the washroom door. A long time passed, but no one came out. My father had vanished, too. My hand trembled as I pointed at the bathroom. My mother stepped forward to go in. “Don’t go in! Dad and Luna disappeared in there!” My mother looked grief-stricken as she said, “Sweetie, it’s been just the two of us for the past twenty-plus years, remember?” Her words hit me hard. I was in total disbelief. I explained myself frantically, but the more I spoke, the more confused my mother became. She finally shook me off and said, “Why are you doing this to me? I’ve raised you your whole life! Why do you have to ruin New Year’s Eve?” She walked straight into the washroom, and the house soon fell into a dead silence. Terrified, I called my best friend, Kathy Scott, who lived nearby. I rambled incoherently as I begged her for help. But her words utterly crushed me. “What family members? You’re an orphan.” I hung up the phone, rushed out, and pounded frantically on the neighbors’ door.

On the day of my wedding with Hannah Hawkes, her first love, Lucas Tate, sends his critical notice to her. He mentions that he wants to wear a wedding tuxedo one last time at a wedding before his death. In order to fulfill Lucas' wish, Hannah locks me up in a lounge and gets ready to attend the wedding with him. Her impatient voice echoes outside the door. "Why are you so cold-blooded? Lucas is about to die, you know! What's the harm in letting him have his way?" Some time after that, Freya Jensen, the young woman who lives next door, gets up to the rooftop and begs me to marry her. With red-rimmed eyes, Hannah asks pleadingly, "Are you going to give up on our seven-year relationship because of her?" I merely slap her hand away. "Am I supposed to watch Freya die? It's just a marriage registration. Stop being cold-blooded, will you?"