Drowning Sorrows Novels & Stories

Ayana Rivers had spent the last three years working as the secretary to the CEO and cofounder of Sterling conglomerate the most powerful tech force in Los Angeles. Working schedules, running after and clearing Ruan’s public messes was not new to her but what Ayana doesn’t know is that Ruan Sterling’s life doesn’t end in boardrooms, fancy newsletters and red carpets. By day he is the CEO of Sterling Conglomerate. By night he is an Alpha, one bound by ancient pack laws that threatens to strip his entire lineage and him of the throne and alpha title if he does not take a wife. When Ayana’s family is drowning in debt and every door closes on her, Ruan offers Ayana instead of help, a marriage, Ruan has no interest in Ayana beyond the contract. She is human, harmless, ordinary, and perfect for protecting his secret. A wife on paper. Nothing more. When Ruan’s dark world creeps into Ayana’s carefully controlled life. Desires beyond control and heat amidst silence grow between them. Except secrets have a way of unraveling especially when she discovers that the man she married is not the most dangerous secret in the house. She is.

On the day of the Sacred Forest Rite, my Alpha father and Luna mother were mysteriously murdered. Soon after, my fiancé Jem abruptly broke off our engagement and held a bonding ceremony with his childhood friend, Sarah. While I was still drowning in grief, Jem's elder brother, Nom, came to me with a proposal. He swore he would uncover the truth and bring my parents' murderer to justice. So I married him—and brought what was left of my pack into his. Seven years passed. No killer was found. No justice delivered. Then today, I overheard a conversation between Nom and his Beta outside the study. I learned the truth. Someone had seen Sarah at the scene of my parents' deaths during the Sacred Forest Rite. However, Nom silenced that witness. He shut down the investigation, convinced Sarah was innocent—that her presence was nothing more than a coincidence. However, my mother died with Sarah's earring clenched in her hand. It was never justice. It was a cover-up. Seven years of marriage, built on a lie—his way of protecting the one truly responsible. This time, I will take vengeance into my own hands. Alone.

Grandma lay bedridden, her dementia taking hold as she repeated Scarlett Hayes's name over and over. Tears streamed down my face as I dialed my wife's number. When she picked up, Scarlett sounded irritated. She said she was working late tonight and would call me back when she was free. I could clearly hear the sound of a man's laughter in the background. The moment I hung up, Grandma gasped sharply. She called out my wife's name. It was her last breath. While I sat drowning in grief, Scarlett's male best friend Chase Morrison posted a video update, geotagged at a couples' hotel. In the video, their fingers were laced together. The woman's arm bore a distinctive black mole I recognized instantly. The caption read: "When two hearts become one, why care what anyone else thinks?" In that moment, my heart turned to ash. I gritted my teeth and left a comment. "Let's file for divorce tomorrow. Then you two can be together openly and legally. You'll even save on the hotel fees. Win-win, right?"

Olivia’s POV The moment Armando left, the dam broke. I sobbed into the silence, my chest heaving with the weight of everything I’d pushed down for so long. I wanted to hold him tight. To kiss him and to tell him how much I loved him and how much I wanted his protection but I just couldn’t because I didn’t trust anyone else and because I never wanted anything to do with love after James. I hated myself for pushing him away. But more than that, I hated that I felt anything for him at all. I sat there, drowning in the storm of my own heart, knowing that love was a battlefield I might never cross again, and yet, for the first time, I wished I had the courage to try. Armando’s POV Back in my study, I poured myself a glass of whiskey, my hand trembling as I lit a cigarette. The tears came slowly at first, hot and unfamiliar against my skin. I hadn’t cried since I was ten years old. But tonight, I wept. For her. For me. For everything we could never be.

To pay for the sins committed by Luisa Duarte against his family, Edmund Stark approaches her sister, Isabella, with a hidden agenda. He traps her into a forced marriage contract, but things don’t quite go as he planned. Will they be able to fix their differences and enjoy their marriage or would they end up getting a divorce? ~ “I told you before, you’re mine! You’ll marry me and bear my children and you’ll be my property until the day one of us dies!” He growled, running out of patience. “Am I to be your possession, your prisoner?” She glared at him with all her might. “Call it as you wish! You have nowhere to escape to!” He declared before pulling her into his lap, holding her tightly in his arms. He crashed his lips against hers, forcing his tongue in her mouth. Against her will, her body loosened in response, she lost the ability to breathe. She could not hear, she could not see, she could not feel anything else, except Edmund taking her mouth like a drowning man in need of oxygen. ‘Isabella is fucking mine! My woman! Nothing is going to change that!’

On the day the SAT scores were released, the police showed up at my front door. They said I had murdered three of the top students in my class. The evidence was conclusive. However, on the day it happened, I had been sitting alone at home, drowning in regret over my poor exam performance. "Worthless girl! Useless burden! How did this family end up with a monster like you?!" My grandmother screamed at me, hurling insults as her fists and kicks rained down. The only thing that could have proven my innocence—the security camera—had been unplugged by her the night before. She said the camera gave off radiation and claimed that we installed it to harm her. In an instant, I became the disgrace of everyone around me. After I was convicted, my parents couldn’t bear the blow. They both took their own lives. As for me? Under the crushing weight of public outrage and endless condemnation, I spiraled into depression and died. Even at the very end, I never understood why every piece of evidence pointed straight at me. Then I opened my eyes again and found myself back on the night before the scores were released.

Somewhere between staying silent and screaming for help… she existed. Seventeen-year-old Maren has mastered the art of disappearing in plain sight. Haunted by past trauma, locked in a toxic relationship she can't escape, and drowning under the pressure of school and a world that never cared to understand her, she begins to wonder if life is even worth staying for. No one sees her pain—until he does. The new boy, Kade, has his own shadows. He’s blunt, observant, and completely unafraid to call her out—making him an instant enemy. But when he overhears a moment no one was meant to witness, he realizes the truth: the girl everyone overlooks is barely holding on. As Kade steps deeper into her shattered world, their connection becomes a lifeline. But secrets run deeper than he imagined, and when Maren goes missing, no one believes she’s worth finding—except him. Fighting time, silence, and the lies that built her cage, Kade refuses to give up. Because sometimes, saving someone means proving they were never invisible at all. A heartbreaking, haunting, and ultimately hopeful story about survival, truth, and what it really means to be seen.

He straddled me, his hips swirling in slow, maddening circles. His body was right there, pressing into mine, and I couldn’t escape it; I didn’t want to. His hands found mine and guided them to his chest, and when my palms touched his warm skin, I was gone. My pulse was a blur of frantic beats pounding in my ears, drowning out the crowd's cheers and whistles. With his face inches from mine, Alec leaned in. His breath ghosted over my lips, his smile, cocky, knowing, playful, and somehow tender all at once. “You okay there?” he asked with an amused tone, and I opened my mouth, desperate to say something—anything—but nothing came out. My throat was dry, my skin was on fire and my mind was completely blank. All I could do was stare at him, completely mesmerized by how his body moved against mine and that wicked smirk on his lips. Before I knew it, heat pooled low in my belly, spreading downward, and I instinctively clenched my thighs together to stop the throbbing that ignited between my legs, but it was too late as I dampened the soft leather.

"It wouldn't be the first nor the last time any one of you Titan Gods had affairs with ‘Greek Gods’ you know," Thaelia twisted her lips. Lukas face hardened and he tried to keep it like that, but one look at her face and a smile broke out of him and he's laughing hard. She accompanied him and chuckled softly, adorably, and it drove the son of Helios crazy. "Didn't know moon princesses could contain that much spite." "What can I say?" She lowered her voice, licking her lips. Her beauty was much more obvious, with her eyes the color of the sea, lined with gold, and lips rose. It was enough to make him realise he's drowning again, only this time it's on the color of her eyes. "You... inspire me." "Inspire you?" "Yes," She smiled sweetly *** There's two things that strikes Talia as she starts reading the book of her past—Lukas was a reckless son of Helios, Ajaxson was the son of Ajax who's head over heels in love with her while she was a moon princess desired by both of them. To add a Greek Goddess Hera made it impossible for her to stay happy with Lukas. It was just not written in the stars. ***

"You belong to me, Crystal. And I’m going to remind you of that.” His husky breath fanned her ear. Crystal Lin is drowning in the debt her father left behind, a deadly 10 million dirham IOU to a ruthless Dubai loan shark. With just two months left before her organs become the payment, Crystal juggles two lives: waitress by day, stripper by night. But everything spirals when she unknowingly gives a lap dance to the heir of the Al-Fayad empire. Amir who is a cold, commanding, and dangerously powerful. Amir doesn’t want love. He wants an heir. And he’s offering Crystal a marriage contract worth millions to get it. Desperate to survive, she agrees. But fate has one more cruel twist, Ahmad. Amir’s kind-hearted twin who turns out to be the mysterious stranger who once stirred her heart with a glance. Now he’s her husband’s brother and he's the man she can't stop thinking about. Torn between duty and desire, caught in a billionaire’s twisted game, Crystal must decide. To lose the life she’s barely clinging to, or risk it all for a love that was never part of the deal.