Beau Of The Fifth Column

By the fifth year of my marriage to River Grayson, I had stopped checking his call logs and chat records. Instead, I spent my nights drinking and partying with my girlfriends at the poolside bar. When his ninety-ninth missed call lit up my screen, I let out a cold laugh and tossed my phone straight into the water. It didn't take long before he came storming in. The moment he pulled the strawberry-scented condom out of my pocket, he turned grim and banned me from leaving the house after 7:00 PM. "Joanne, you weren't like this before." I thought back to last month, when I had run into him at the hospital. He had lied about being on a business trip out of town, but there he was, holding Yvonne Sinclair's hand. I still remembered his words. "You lost your uterus from saving me back then. My sperm is perfectly fine. I'll give you a child—with your mother's help." Now, staring into his furious eyes, I said coldly, "Don't worry. There's no going back for us anymore."

A little over twenty six years after the war with Black Haven, Melody and Teddy have settled into their roles of King and Queen of the American werewolves. But tensions are brewing again as a sinister force is at work in Europe.Lucy, daughter to Melody and Teddy, is having her twenty fifth birthday and has been hard at work learning the ways of royalty to take over for when her mother and father abdicate the throne. During her birthday party, she is kidnapped by someone who was purely after the stone, her capturers deciding to sell her to the highest bidder. A lot of wolves would pay to add the blood of a Goddess to their line.Adam is a rogue with the knack for cat burglary, enjoying collecting rare gems and jewelry. When he hears of a European estate that has just gotten their hands on one of the most precious gems of all, he can’t help but test his luck. What he didn’t expect though was to find his mate chained up and already trying to reject him. He’s not one to give up though as he helps her get away with the stone, their pursuers hot on their trail, especially when the growing threat of the Black Sanctum pack catching wind of who Lucy really is.

Heavily pregnant, she was kidnapped and thrown into a life-or-death gamble. Her husband paid a hundred million dollars to save his first love, while she was left to die in a raging fire. At death’s door, she finally remembered the identity of herself. Five years later, she returned—not as the obedient wife of the past, but as Elianna Carrington, the esteemed Fifth daughter of the powerful Carrington family in Bryston. Loved by her father, cherished by her brothers, adored by her son, and pursued by the elites, her life was perfect. Joseph Kensington finally realized the truth. This elegant, untouchable woman was the wife he’d been searching for all these years. Desperate, he took her to court. Elianna: Give it up, Joseph. Both sons are mine. Joseph: The kids are yours. You’re mine. Overnight, Bryston was shaken. The dominant heir to a financial empire had now fallen at her feet. To win his wife back, he risked everything—his pride, his life, his heart. Too bad his two sons were his biggest obstacles. Eldest son: Daddy, my credit card swipes faster than yours. Second son: Scumbag dad, get lost!

After I refused to donate my kidney to Queenie Dunn's first love, Zayn Chance, she used my parents as leverage over me and forced me to sign the kidney donation agreement. "You can still survive without a kidney, but Zayn's case is different. He will die without your kidney." After the kidney transplant surgery was carried out successfully, Queenie purposefully brought Zayn on a trip around the globe in order to punish me for being selfish. On the fifth year after I died from kidney failure, Queenie finally had her fun. She decides to focus on her family again. But no matter how much she tries, she can never find me. Furious, Queenie calls my parents. "Tell Steven to get his ass home right now, or else I'll divorce him right away!" But the one answering the call is my son, Sean Sutton, who has just returned from his kindergarten. He sounds very meek and scared over the phone. In fact, he sounds like he was about to cry. "My dad has already passed away a long time ago, miss…"

“What do you want?" A smile played on his lips. “I'll tell you five things.” He slowly walked around me. I tried not look at him as I waited for whatever he wanted to say. “One, I will make love to you and you will enjoy it.” He smirked when he saw the look on my face. “You're insane if you think..” “Second, I will make love to you over and over again, any day, anytime I want.” He grinned when I got uncomfortable. “Mr. Grey ..” “Third, you will not tell anyone, not even Vera. You will not tell her you've been fucking her husband.” He smiled. “I want to see you try.” I snapped. “I will not let you get away with this.” “Four, I will divorce Vera because it's you that I want.” My heart skipped a beat. Why is he doing this? “You will not hurt Vera like that. I will not let you.” I said, moving closer to him. “Fifth, we will get married and live happily ever after and you'll give me babies and you will not feel bad for your sister.” He concluded.

On my son's fifth birthday, my Alpha mate allowed his childhood sweetheart Sarah to pick him up from school. I discovered through the tracking device on his watch that he was near the edge of the forest. Having heard reports of rogue wolves attacking in the area recently, I anxiously rushed over, determined to bring him back immediately. He refused to leave with me. While we were locked in this standoff, several rogue wolves burst from the treeline and attacked us. During the fight, I was wounded badly, blood streaming down my face, while I kept my son safely behind me, completely unharmed. But when my Alpha mate arrived to rescue us, he ran straight toward his childhood sweetheart who was hiding off to the side. "Aunt Sarah is a delicate Omega with no fighting ability, Dad. Save her first! Mom, you're so strong, just hold on a little longer!" my son called out. I watched them leave, a bitter smile forming on my lips. They all seemed to ignore the silver dagger piercing my heart as I protected my son. I was dying.

Jeanne Blanchard’s world shatters after the loss of her first child. As grief consumes her, so does the growing distance between her and her husband, Edgar De Villiers. Once loving and devoted, Edgar now barely acknowledges her, and the weight of blame from those around her becomes unbearable. On their fifth anniversary, when Edgar doesn’t even show up, Jeanne knows—his love is gone. Then, by chance, she meets Hector Éclair. Charming, attentive, and everything Edgar no longer is, Hector becomes the light in Jeanne’s darkness. With him, she rediscovers warmth, passion, and the love she craves. When she learns she is pregnant, she leaves Edgar behind—only for him to realize, too late, what he has lost. But Jeanne’s new beginning comes with a dangerous twist. The man who healed her heart is not just any man—he’s a ruthless mafia lord. And while Edgar, a dedicated policeman, may have failed her in love, he will not fail in his duty. Now, Jeanne is caught between two powerful men—one who let her slip away, and one who may never let her go.

On our fifth wedding anniversary, my wife, who had struggled with fertility for years, suddenly felt nauseous. The college student we had been sponsoring panicked and rushed her to the hospital. Half an hour later, she called me. "I'm pregnant." I was thrilled, until her next words froze me in place. "The father's the college student, the one we've been supporting. He got sick that night and I felt bad for him, so I stayed over. I didn't think anything would happen. We have to keep this quiet. He's graduating soon and joining our company. We can't let this mess things up for him. "And you need to quit your job, so he can take your position. I'm going to need you home to take care of me." The sheer audacity left me speechless, but I kept my voice level. "Okay." She hung up, satisfied. What she did not know was that years ago, someone had made me a promise. If I turned 30 years old and still did not have a child, she would give me one. Today was my 30th birthday.

I've been caught in a relationship with a divorced man for eight years. We've broken up and reconciled too many times to count. In the end, I tallied ninety-four breakups and five divorces between us. One more would make it an even hundred, but I'm too exhausted to continue this cycle. The first breakup happened when I was giving him my virginity. Halfway through, his ex-wife called asking him to pick up some bread, and he simply left. The fifth breakup occurred when he abandoned me, newly pregnant, on the highway to comfort his ex-wife who was having complications with her own pregnancy. I ended up in a car accident and miscarried. He arrived at the hospital with his clothes disheveled. Despite all the pain he caused me, I could never bring myself to truly leave him. Our most recent divorce happened for an equally absurd reason. His ex-wife and their child were participating in a family reality TV show that required them to appear as a complete family unit. To protect his ex-wife's public image, he divorced me yet again. When filming wrapped, he called to discuss remarrying. This time I refused, because I'm going to marry someone else.

My best friend and my husband, Lorenzo Bartoli, fought every time they met. Lorenzo was the Don of the family, while my best friend was his Consigliere. She always fiercely opposed his most ruthless, high-risk decisions. Tempers explode every single time. But there was one rule that they both agreed on without any hesitation. No one was allowed to touch me. Because of them, no one in the city dared to cross me. Until the fifth month of my pregnancy, when I went down to the basement vault to organize Lorenzo's guns for him. I opened the safe to see stacks of letters, hundreds of them, all unsent. I picked one up. The moment I opened the letter, cold dread overwhelmed me. The receiver of the letter wasn't me. [My dearest Sofia…] I quickly scanned downward to the final lines of the letter. [If I don't make it back alive, everything in the Swissie accounts goes to you. As for Vittoria, she's a good woman, but I have never loved her.] With trembling hands, I tore open the rest of the letters like a hysterical woman. Three hundred of them in total. Every single one was addressed to Sofia Finzi. Sofia was not a stranger. She was my best friend.