Cookie Crumbles

“You don’t have to go through with this if you don’t want to, Lilliana,” Dante reassured me, standing in his tuxedo, looking far too delicious to be saying that on my wedding day. “But everything is settled,” I said, trying not to smear too much of my makeup as I cried uncontrollably. “Why doesn’t he love me, Dante?” A sob tore through me. “Come with me,” he said, his voice low and dark—practically a command. “What?” I asked, looking up at the stoic, dangerous man in front of me. “Come with me,” he repeated, holding out his hand. “I’ll make sure everything goes away, fiorellino.” I looked down at his hand, at the tattoos swirling around his fingers. And even though a hand like Dante Gallo’s should have scared me, nothing had ever felt so safe. So I stepped forward, took his hand in mine, and looked up at him. “Take me away.” ** Two ruthless men. One stolen bride. A love too wild to be contained. Lillian thought she had finally secured the life she always dreamed of — until her perfect engagement crumbles in one night of shocking betrayal. Whisked away from the wreckage of her wedding by the dangerous and devastating Dante Gallo, she finds herself caught between two powerful forces: Dante, the mafia king who has loved her from afar, and Damien Volkov, the lethal enemy who refuses to let her slip through his fingers. Torn between loyalty, passion, and a fierce desire for freedom, Lillian faces a choice that could break all three of them. But what if she refuses to choose at all? In a world of power, obsession, and forbidden love, some hearts aren't meant to be divided — they're meant to be shared.

'THE BIG FOUR': Steven Chase Baron Sage Iphan Carter Kane Richmond A group of gangsters who for their own interests, build up a conglomerate with the label, 'X-HABIT'. Their activities are no different from vices, but their main aim is to keep the money rolling in, Kaching! Kaching! In hard, hard currency. Betrayed by one of them, the conglomerate fades into fragments of two: X-HABIT and ICE, syndicates of their own, tugging at each other's throats. Steven's regime faces out, but he leaves behind an heir, who continues the game: shuffling, dealing and cutting cards, playing tit for tat. The heir? He's Adrian Chase. A drop dead gorgeous billionaire, an Adonis and New York's shaker. Out of the blue comes 'THE MEN', a rival who watches Adrian keenly and has eyes on everything he's got. This only lengthens the saga, creating another pile of screwed up shit. Aside from Adrian's lethal life, he's got an allergy - WOMEN. Only a quartet add up to his living: his daughter, his step sister, his step mother and his nanny. The rest are no lesser than muddle-headed, fatuous bitches. Well, there's that 'bitch', a naive Megan Stones whose world crumbles when the cold jaws of death snatch her parents away, leaving her with a mouth to feed. She is a college drop-out who's a waitress and a washer-up by day, a stripper at night. Fate punches some buttons, Chase and Stone happen to meet. Strings are pulled and sparks fly. She quenches his allergy and ignites in him, an addiction: HERSELF. Their love story has its fair share of thorns but after many times of falling and rising, they solemnize their love in holy matrimony. After tons of games, gut flaunting and bloodbaths by these rival syndicates, X-HABIT is ascribed the glory.

Sage Casey Ember-Brooks, who goes by Casey, is a fast-food worker and aspiring fantasy novelist whose ordinary life crumbles when mysterious strangers ask cryptic questions about her dragon series. Her recurring dreams of golden coins suddenly make terrifying sense when Marcus Chen—a businessman with eyes that flash gold—reveals that dragons are real, living hidden among humans for centuries. Casey's unnaturally accurate fantasy writing stems from awakening genetic memories. She's a rare "Convergence" bloodline capable of harmonising opposing elemental forces. The revelation comes at a critical time: a new cryptocurrency called DragonCoin, featuring symbols identical to her dreams, creates magical interference that weakens concealment spells protecting dragon society. At the Crossroads shopping complex where she works, disruptions cause dragons to flicker between human and true forms in full view of witnesses. Caught between Marcus (a traditionalist who wants to hide her with the Dragon Council) and the enigmatic Xaihuang (who advocates ending the masquerade entirely), Casey discovers an underground chamber housing ancient dragon artifacts. When she touches a magical coin, visions reveal three futures: chaotic revelation leading to war, continued concealment resulting in magical extinction, or a mysterious third path of integration. Casey realises DragonCoin wasn't created to expose dragons, but by another awakening hybrid like herself—someone in Seattle whose unconscious dragon heritage channels ancient power through modern technology. As magical concealment fails worldwide and dragons begin manifesting publicly, Casey must race across the country to find this unknown programmer before the interference between magic and technology tears reality apart. The story explores themes of identity, integration versus assimilation, and the collision between ancient power and digital-age innovation. With her awakening abilities growing stronger and the masquerade crumbling around her, Casey faces a choice that will determine her fate and the future relationship between the hidden magical world and human civilisation.