Clotted Cream Cookie

On my fifteenth birthday, I begged my mom to teach me how to make a cream cake from scratch. We only had cream at home. No flour. So we went out to buy some. When we came back, we didn't walk into a birthday surprise. We walked in on my father pressing a strange she-wolf down onto the dining table. Cream was smeared all over her bare body. That night ended with my parents signing the Mating Dissolution Agreement. From that day on, cake became my nightmare, a taboo I could never touch. The night I mated with Alpha Kaelen of the Shadow Pack, amidst the pain and pleasure of his marking bite, I whispered in his ear. "Honey, if you ever want to end our mating, just bring me a cake." He frowned, his eyes burning with possessiveness, and kissed the words away. "Don't talk nonsense, Seraphina. You are my fated mate. How could I ever let you go?" Later, on his birthday, his intern secretary Elena ordered a three-tier luxury cake. Kaelen went into a rage, throwing both the cake and the intern out the front door. Back then, I was moved, even telling him not to be so harsh on a low-ranking wolf for my sake. But six months later, Elena had been promoted to Kaelen's personal assistant. On my birthday, she walked into my laboratory, swinging her hips, holding a burnt, homemade cake. I called Kaelen, asking him to remove the provocative item. On the other end of the line,his tone was casual. "Elena put her heart into making that for you. It would be cruel to throw it away. Be a good girl, don't be so sensitive. Have the grace of a Luna." The phone slipped from my hand. It turned out my mother wasn't wrong. Cake really is best served with a side of rejection papers.

At my engagement dinner with Greg Willis, the Rossi mafia family’s underboss, his assistant, Sydney Carlson, casually tossed a half-eaten cookie on his plate in front of everyone. Greg didn’t react. In full view of the guests, he calmly picked it up and ate it. That night, after we returned, I told him I wanted to call off the engagement. He rubbed his brow with his fingertips, his voice steady in that familiar, composed way of his, yet there was distance beneath it. “All this,” he said, “over a cookie?” “She already took a bite,” I corrected him. He fell silent for a moment before replying in a low voice, “Zoe, you’ve always been sensible. Why get hung up on something so small?” “I’m not hung up,” I said evenly. “I just don’t want to settle.” When he saw that I wouldn’t back down, something complicated flickered in his eyes. Then, his tone hardened, almost like a warning. “Think it through carefully. Don’t you regret it.” He was certain I couldn’t leave him. After all, he was a mafia underboss. There were countless people eager to take the position of Mrs. Willis, and I was nothing more than a minor employee at his company. What he didn’t know was that I had never coveted the title of his wife. All I ever had for him was love. But now, that love was gone, and once I turned away, I would never look back again.

Lacy’s small cookie cutter world is smashed to pieces when alpha Rafael who she had been having a secret affair with banishes her from her pack. Suddenly she is without rudder and flailing aimlessly in a world she knows nothing about with three children to take care of. In comes Blaine – the cursed alpha king and he saves her. Years later, once more she is caught up in the middle of a prophesy that she wants nothing to do with and her life and those of her children is plunged into danger. Love as well as more betrayal and sorrow linger around the corner. Would she get back with alpha Rafael? Would alpha Blaine allow it or would her entire world crumble as everyone fights for their own interests?

There's literally no one that you can love more than your childhood best friend. You shared baths, ice cream, lunches, everything together and even a bed at times, even when it was in secrecy. Feyi and Ayo didn't have it any different, but they'd been separated for a really long time, so what really changes after that? What happens when you're just...split into North and South with no explanation. And now you're back together, gathering butterflies in your stomach and teasing with small touches, glances and nicknames.

Reed had always been a tough cookie, with his powerful charisma and billionaire status, he always got away from any trouble. Nobody dared to question him, Reed did what Reed wanted. His love for power and control manifested in his fighting career. He was a renowned MMA fighter, a notorious heartbreaker and a careless prince. His love life stayed in the shadows, always in the dark of night, never crossing the sunlight. Until one day, his mortal wound brought him to Han Yeri, whose personality mirrored him and challenged the status quo. For the first time in his life, Reed's life turned upside down - all because of a woman, an unexpected one at that... one that crossed the sunlight.

My husband took our six-year-old son to meet his first love, using him as a cover. At some point, he sent our son to buy burn cream. My sweet boy then encountered a lunatic who stabbed him to death. The pain in my heart was unbearable. When I saw the burn cream still in my son's hand, I broke down in tears. Yet, my husband called to berate me, "Look at the son you've raised, Shayla Joy! He burned Claire and didn't even apologize. Get him back here right now!"

Lindsey Johnson asks her fiance's true love, Stephanie Sullivan, to repay her debt. The next day, Jacob Whitaker throws at her a ledger that she had never seen before. Every single expense from their five-year relationship is recorded inside. From small things like two-dollar ice cream to the expensive items like the luxury bags he gave her. Even the costs of hotel stays and condoms are recorded in the ledger. "I'll split half the hotel bills with you. After deducting the 100 grand Stephie owes you, you still owe me 2.08 million. You have one month to transfer the month to my account."

After her boyfriend breaks up with her on her birthday, Shelly Champman goes back home with her two friends to drown her sorrows in a bucket of ice cream and a sappy romance movie. She ends up criticizing the female lead of the movie, having an argument with her best friend, and driving out that night to a bar. She gets into an accident and wakes up in the bedroom of the female lead in the movie she had criticized. This time, she's the one who decides how the movie ends to get back home and meet her true love. How will Shelly, daddy's spoilt rich brat handle this task?

At a company party, Taylor Kennedy plays a game of mouth-to-mouth cookie biting with his female assistant as everyone watches. I blend into the crowd and laugh along. The room instantly falls silent. The assistant bursts into tears and plays the victim. Taylor lets go of her, turns to me, and coldly scolds me in front of the entire company. He berates me for not knowing how to read the room and being a buzzkill. Then, without hesitation, he wraps his arm around the assistant and kisses her deeply as I watch. If this were before, I would've stormed over in a rage and ripped them apart. Then, I would've humiliated her in front of everyone, not caring whose pride I trampled. But now, I feel nothing. Not even as I watch them kiss. Not even though today marks my ten-year anniversary with Taylor.

I ordered an incubus online, but when the package arrived, there were two of them. One was gentle and obedient, the other was hot-tempered and unpredictable. I immediately messaged customer service to ask if they'd sent the wrong one—I had only ordered the gentle kind. The reply came cheerfully. "Congratulations, you've unlocked the hidden variant! This model is a bit special—buy one, get one free!" Wait… what? I remembered hearing people say that raising an incubus is like raising a puppy, only better—they keep you warm at night and don't shed. Well, if that's true, whether I had one or two made no difference. So I ended up paying the price of one and getting two—what a steal! Or so I thought… until I went to feed them. That's when I realized I was the cookie in the middle of a sandwich. Apparently, "keeping me warm at night" was a strenuous activity.