Eight Hundred Grapes

"Jamie, I've decided. I'm ready to join you at Hillridge as your exclusive screenwriter. I'll be there by the end of this month!" Melanie huddled in a quiet corner on the set as she made the call, a pregnancy test report clutched in her hand. She tried to shake off the chill from the freezing weather, but her hands and feet still felt painfully cold. Jamie's voice at the end of the line was a deep and pleasant baritone. "Your talent has long deserved a bigger stage. For eight years, you've turned me down nearly a hundred times for Ken's sake. Are you ready to leave him this time?" "Yes. I'm leaving him for good!" She clenched the pregnancy test report, her lips a bitter smile.

Celia Johnson, my boss's sister-in-law, joined the company as the finance director and announced that all reimbursements must strictly follow the standards. I spent an entire week running around for the company and finally closed a five-hundred-thousand-dollar deal. Because the client had used two extra packs of paper towels, the per-person amount for their meal ended up eight dollars over the limit. Celia folded her arms, glanced at the reimbursement form on my desk, and sneered. "Five hundred and eight dollars?" "Yes. Last night at The Peak Restaurant, where we closed Richard's deal. Zack was there too," I explained patiently. "Eight dollars over the per-person limit. Not reimbursable," Celia said coldly. I tried to reason with her. "This was a special case. The client is high-level, and the deal amount is large, and Zack personally said it would be fully reimbursed last night." She returned the reimbursement form to me. "I don't care who said that. Don't think closing a five-hundred-thousand-dollar contract lets you ignore company rules. Reimbursements must all follow policies. Everyone will follow them to the letter." I took a deep breath. I knew arguing with her head-on would get me nowhere, so I called Zack directly. Zack said, "I did say it would be reimbursed, but I never said company rules could be ignored. It's just five hundred. And you still get commission from closing the deal. You young people need to have perspective." I stopped arguing. I turned around and refused the delivery containing the hard copy of the five-hundred-thousand-dollar cooperation contract, smiling as I explained, "Company rules say all cash on delivery packages must be refused. "Also, today is my last day here. Starting tomorrow, I work for Richard's company. As the client, I will be setting the rules this time."

My first reaction when I encountered the landslide was not to run, but to immediately call Ethan. After all, Ethan always nagged at me, and I can almost hear him saying, "You can't do anything right; I always have to come to help." The phone rang for ages before it finally connected, and by then, the landslide had knocked me to the ground. "Yes? What is with you? Calling eight hundred times a day… Don't you ever get tired of it? I told you I'm working; I don't have time. "Hello? If you're not going to say anything, I'm hanging up. I've got other things to do." Beep, beep! Before I could say a word, Ethan impatiently scolded me. Typical. That had been Ethan Lang's attitude five years into our marriage. He might not have to put up with me anymore after this, though, because I might never see him again......

“That’s a wrap, this little rogue has been sold for eight hundred thousand dollars,” the woman cheered. She came towards me with an evil smirk. “Please,” I whispered. “You’re so tough, dear child, your new master will enjoy taming you,” she grinned before I felt a prick in my neck. “Ow! What did…” I didn't finish my question before a wave of dizziness hit me and I passed out. *** Mia faces a heart-wrenching choice to save her mother. Betrayed by her own family, she finds herself imprisoned and at the mercy of a ruthless captor. But hope flickers in the form of two brothers who come to her rescue, revealing a hidden world she never knew existed. As Mia grapples with her newfound destiny and a forbidden love that could unravel everything, she must outsmart her pursuer and navigate a treacherous path to secure her family's future. Will she escape the clutches of darkness and rewrite her own fate?

Three years after our breakup, I never thought I’d see Connor Rogers again. He was no longer the ordinary man I once knew. Now, he was the head of a powerful corporation. And me? I was broke, scraping by every day just to survive. All the love I once felt for him had turned into hatred, every ounce of pain tracing back to him. I straddled him, naked, driving him wild with desire. Leaning down, I whispered in his ear, “Give me the contract.” The moment his eyes clouded over, I knew I had won. The smile I gave him was one I had rehearsed a hundred times, until it looked real. No one could see what lay behind it: my mother’s death, and the baby I lost at eight months in my womb—our child. Now he was begging me to come back, even defying his family for me. But I... hesitated.

In my previous life, my three sons told me they wanted to set up a Family Bond Fund for me. Each of them would deposit three thousand dollars every month. I cried with gratitude, truly believing that decades of sacrifice had finally paid off. One of them even said, "Mom, you've given us so much. It's our turn to take care of you now." However, eight years later, I was told I have uremia. That was when I discover that the bank card, which supposedly held the fund, couldn't even cover the dialysis deposit. Soon after, my eldest son video-called me. He said he wanted to buy a better apartment in a good school district. He was short of 150 thousand dollars for the down payment and asked if I could lend it to him first. My second son came to the hospital with his wife and daughter. He didn't ask about my condition at all. Instead, he kept showing off his daughter's piano competition trophy, hinting that he needed 50 thousand dollars to enroll her in a prestigious international piano program. My youngest son was even more straightforward. He said he had his eye on a limited-edition pair of sneakers and wanted me to pay 30 thousand dollars for them as a birthday gift. The moment they realized the bank account didn't have enough money, their faces fell. "We each put in three thousand dollars every month. Over eight years, that's at least eight hundred thousand dollars. Mom, are you hiding the money from us?" To force me to reveal my savings, they took turns pressuring me, switching between sweet talk and threats. They even told relatives that I had dementia and had been scammed out of my money. Unable to take it anymore, I yanked out my IV late one night and walked out of the hospital, only to be hit by a car, dying instantly. When I open my eyes again, I find myself back on the day of my hospital checkup.

Valkyrie of the Scarred Moon found herself easily entrance with her human mate, Sage. Yet she is doubting to claim her as hers forever fearing that she is going to be caught up in their world of violence. The unending cycle of war between the Triad which started eight hundred years ago has continued to brew towards another phase of endless death. Their enemies, the Phantom, started to create a hybrid army, targeting human lives as sacrifices for their supremacy. Along with her pack, they must survive to protect their loved ones from the danger coming to rip their lives apart. Sage Reese Sullivan is just an aspiring landscape photographer who just wants to explore the world once she finishes high school. But she seems unaware of the mysterious realm of the place she's born into until she met the beautiful woman with a pair of bluest eyes. She is certain that there's more outside her dreary town and yet she has these strange impulses to rather stay inside the eccentric presence of Valkyrie Irvine, the new pretty face of Storm Hill.

I'm eight months pregnant when my Alpha mate abandons me at a hunting ground. He leaves to welcome his ex-girlfriend, who's returned from her travels. From that day on, I disappear without a trace. Initially, my mate doesn't take this to heart. He's even in the mood to make a bet with his subordinates. "She'll be back in three days at most!" Ten days later, he freezes my credit cards and sends me a threatening text. "You can starve to death out there if you still refuse to come back!" A hundred days later, he barges into my best friend's home and forces her to hand me over. "Where have you hidden her? I admit defeat, okay? I've had enough of this hide-and-seek game!" My best friend sneers as she throws photos of my body, which has been pierced through by countless blades, at him. "Wake up, you fool! Your Luna is dead, and you're the one who led a team to dig her body up from the trap! Have you forgotten?"

⚠️ Warning: This collection contains taboo age-gap romances, raw passion, and forbidden encounters that will leave you breathless. Read at your own risk. One hundred nights. One hundred forbidden desires. One hundred ways to surrender to the fire. In this raw and unapologetically steamy collection, boundaries are crossed, age gaps burn hotter than reason, and taboos become irresistible pleasures. From powerful men who should know better, to innocent souls who can’t resist temptation, 100 Nights of Forbidden Fire takes you deep into a world where the rules don’t apply, and every encounter is hotter than the last. Whether it is the allure of the older neighbor, the danger of the untouchable boss, or the thrill of a love that society calls forbidden, each story is a pulse-racing escape into passion without limits. Are you ready for a hundred nights of raw, forbidden fire?

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.