Buy Then Build

My mate, Rowan, and I had gone through life and death to build a powerful pack. Our eternal mate bond had been witnessed by the Moon Goddess. That was until he brought back the teary-eyed Omega, Riley. She was a scheming woman who lied about being homeless. For her, Rowan used his Alpha's dominance on me in front of the pack to humiliate me. For Riley's pup, he accused me of jealousy and called me unworthy of being a Luna. When I was pregnant with our pure blood heir, I asked for his help as I was about to die from the enemy's attack. He turned away to comfort the pup, who only had a scratch on his arm. All Rowan did was leave me with cold words, blaming me for not being able to protect myself as a Luna. He told me I should reflect on that. My mate killed our pup with his own hands.

The temperature starts to drop once we reach the top of the mountain. My two childhood friends, who swore to protect me with their lives, don't even spare me a glance. One is hastily wrapping all his clothes around Lisette Locke, while the other is warming her with his body. I'm so cold that my heart condition acts up; I beg them to save me. However, they're infuriated by this. "How can you still be trying to get our attention at a time like this, Cecilia? Run around for a while if you're cold!" "We'll buy you that white down jacket you wanted when we get back, but you can't take it from Lise now!" The rescue team arrives, and I barely make it out alive. I'm hospitalized for a week, but neither of them come to visit me. I see from my social media that they're busy celebrating Lisette's birthday. We've been friends for over a decade, yet I mean nothing when compared to the driver's daughter. I call my father and say, "Dad, "I'm willing to marry into the Jorgensen family!"

At my wedding rehearsal, my fiancé's colleague, Haley Rhodes burst in and tore apart the carefully arranged decor. "Ryan promised he'd marry me!" she shrieked, storming closer, "Who do you think you are?" Without warning, she lunged, grabbing hold of the wedding gown, which was worth a fortune. But she only got so far—she was too heavyset to even squeeze it past her head. I let out a mocking laugh. "Don't tell me you're too big to fit even a plus-size wedding dress?" That really set her off. With grim determination, she forced herself into the gown. But as soon as she did, the delicate fabric tore, leaving absurdly stretched holes across her back and waist. "Too bad the dress is ruined now. But who cares?" she sneered triumphantly. "Ryan loves me. He’ll buy me another wedding gown, anyway." But when the actual wedding began, she got the shock of her life. The groom walking down the aisle wasn’t Ryan at all. It was their boss — Ryan and Haley's boss. Well, I never said this was my wedding.

After being reborn, the first thing I did was forge a medical report diagnosing chronic kidney disease. In my previous life, my nephew had been diagnosed with kidney failure, and he needed a transplant to survive. I rushed to get a matching test and donated one of my kidneys to him. But over time, my health deteriorated. At twenty, my body felt like it belonged to someone eighty. Even simple chores like sweeping the floor left me exhausted. I couldn't go out to work or earn a living, yet my brother and sister-in-law scolded me for "pretending to be sick." "It's just a kidney." my sister-in-law snapped. "Do you expect to leech off our family forever?" She even went so far as to buy a pair of fresh pig kidneys and smash them in my face. "Since we took one of yours, here's a new pair. Happy now?" Because I had lost a kidney, I died before the age of thirty, alone in a rented apartment. The next time I opened my eyes, I was back—before my nephew's diagnosis even came in.

I am one of the most ancient and powerful vampires in existence, with wealth accumulated over centuries. When everyone learned I had fallen for a dying human named Damien and turned him into my Childe, they were shocked. Five years ago, I transformed him from a penniless artist into an immortal vampire. I also turned his dying family into vampires, granting them eternal life. Every month, I took $450,000 from my accounts just to support their lavish lifestyle. Damien’s sister pleaded that they had never attended any vampire events and wanted to see what it was like. So I spent $4 million to buy them seats at a grand vampire gathering that only happens once every fifty years, where participants have the chance to gain greater power and become higher-ranking vampires. But before the gathering even began, Damien demanded that I give my seat to his childhood sweetheart Victoria. The whole family supported Damien's decision without a thought for me. So I changed my plans. I severed their immortality, reclaimed my estate, and removed them from my bloodline. That's when the family started to panic...

When Levi Ezra and I got married, he had solemnly vowed he would love me for a lifetime. Seven years later, he got another woman pregnant — a woman he had so carefully tucked away in a luxurious estate, complete with everything money could buy for a perfect, pampered delivery. By the time I discovered the truth, his mistress's belly was already round and heavy. Her due date was just around the corner. Levi had hesitated — for barely a second — before instinctively shielding her behind him, as though I were some threat. He said, "Nikki, you're terrified of childbirth. Now that this baby is coming, the Ezra family will finally have an heir. You won't have to suffer anymore. We'll still be the same as before. Nothing will change." I clutched the freshly issued pregnancy report in my hand — the one confirming my own child — and let out a laugh so sharp and brittle that it shattered into tears. The day his mistress went into labor, I terminated my pregnancy. I left the divorce papers on his desk, packed my bags, and boarded the first flight to a foreign land.

On the night before I'm set to officially marry Shawn Ford, he keeps losing to his godsister, Tiffany Lynch, at the poker table on purpose. "We're just playing for fun. Aren't we a family? Everyone here knows that Tiffany and I are as thick as thieves since young." Tiffany plays with a poker card absent-mindedly. "Surely you don't mind, right? Shawn told me that if I were to win this round, he'd give me the funds meant to renovate your marital home so that I can buy myself some bags." The other players begin to cheer on Tiffany at that moment. "Hell yeah! Tiffany is really lucky when it comes to poker! Joanna, there's no use saving that meager salary of yours. Why don't you just bet everything on the table to spice things up?" I don't bother speaking afterward. All I do is pull out a chair and sit across from Shawn. Then, I dig out a property deed from my bag. "You wanted to spice things up, right? I just bought this property at full price. Do you have the guts to put everything you have on the stake?"

Layla McDermott is the perfect example of from grace to grass. Her father loses everything after making a bad business decision and going into partnership with the evil, Jason Stanford. He is devastated at the loss and chooses to commit suicide. His wife is broken by her husband's death and tries to kill herself by jumping from a third story window. She narrowly misses death, but both of her legs are crushed and she is confined to a wheelchair. She becomes the breadwinner of her family, taking care of her mother and baby brother while studying for her degree and trying to build her career as an abstract painter. Jason Stanford however had not done enough to the mcdermotts. He is determined to get their land which is in Layla's name. Not because the land has any value, but because he wants to completely emasculate them. He is determined to do whatever it takes to get the land even if it means getting his son to feign love for Layla.

Just before our Luna Ceremony, my mate, Alpha Killian, rejected me—moments after we'd mated. "The pack needs a gentle Omega for a Luna, Mia. Not a Beta with blood on her hands like you." His face was a cold mask, his Alpha command washing over me, snuffing out the lingering scent of our passion. I swallowed the pain in my heart and watched him slam the door. A moment later, a notification hit the pack network. I was stripped of my position as Lead Beta. In my place, Killian appointed Mia as the new Head Warrior. The empire I'd spent eight years helping Killian build was gifted to her on a silver platter. With my heart shattered, I walked away. It wasn't until I became Luna to Alpha Damien of a rival pack that Killian started showing up at my new border, crying and begging me to come back.

On the morning of her wedding, Nadia Reeves walks in on her fiancé and best friend in a betrayal that shatters her world. Devastated but defiant, she drowns her fury in a Las Vegas hotel bar, where enigmatic billionaire Dominic Marcello makes an outrageous offer: marry him in a cold contract to stabilize his empire, and she'll gain the perfect weapon for revenge. What starts as a calculated alliance ignites into a dangerous obsession. Dominic, scarred by a tragic explosion that stole his ability to feel, discovers Nadia's touch awakens sensations long dead. But as corporate enemies close in, revealing deadly secrets from his past, Nadia must confront whether this devilish union is her salvation or her undoing. In a whirlwind of passion, power plays, and profound healing, two broken souls learn that true love isn't possession, it's the risk of being truly seen. Can they build an unbreakable bond, or will betrayal's shadows consume them?