Face Fake

I’m the real daughter. When I came back to my “real” family, the fake daughter never lost her place. She’s still the one they love. The one they protect. They even had me marry a disabled man for her. I agreed—for my own reasons. Thought that would be the end of it. But the second I married into that family, she changed her mind. Told me to get the hell out. Said I stole her husband. And then my husband realized something. I wasn’t the bride he was supposed to marry.

I grew up with the Vipera brothers. They have always considered me their younger sister and spoiled me silly. But after that car accident, my relationship with them changes completely. The accident leaves me with severe burns on my body, and I'm in constant agony. On top of that, my face is disfigured too. The moment I'm wheeled out of the ICU, I call the Vipera brothers to let them know that I'm safe. However, the only response I get from them is an impatient dismissal. "Sofia, Bianca hurt her fingers during the accident. We're taking care of her now. Don't bother us by throwing a tantrum." Soon, Bianca Rossi uploads a selfie of herself with the Vipera brothers in a luxurious hospital room. She's wearing three wolf fang bracelets on her wrist. I'd given those to the Vipera brothers as a Christmas gift last year. To get the fangs from the particular species of wolves they liked, I trekked through the jungle alone with a gun and battled feral wolves the entire night. I completely let go of any remaining feelings toward the famiglia that raised me and decide to leave them for good. When the Vipera brothers see me again at a grand banquet held by the Ferro famiglia, they are overwhelmed with regret.

I'm dying at seven months pregnant, and the one behind it is my husband. Hearing that a premature baby's blood can save my sister, he conspires with a shady clinic to take the baby out through surgery. After draining the baby's blood, he walks away—leaving my fragile preemie to die. Later, my parents say, "You owe Yvie. It's time to repay her." My husband says, "We can always have another child. A baby's life can't possibly be more important than Yvie's, can it? The overwhelming rage and grief cause me to bleed to death. My soul floats above them as I watch them prepare my sister's surgery. They don't even bother to change me into clean clothes. No one mourns me. No one loses their mind over my death. Without a care, they wheel me into the morgue and celebrate Yvonne's recovery. When I open my eyes again, I've gone back three months earlier—to the day my whole family forced me to divorce.

I was once the only younger sister of the Alpha family, and my quadruplet brothers treated me like a princess. But three years ago, they accidentally ran into their “real sister” and I turned out to be the fake one. From being the family's most cherished daughter, I gradually became the target of their bullying under the schemes and traps of the “real” Alpha daughter. After I finally decided to flee from the quadruplets, and from the toxic family, I realized they are my fated mates on my 19th birthday...

The most powerful Godfather in the mafia underworld—Dante Costello—had an expensive diamond signet ring custom-made to fit my finger perfectly and sent straight to our home. He said that whoever could wear the ring would become the lady of his family. The Monroe family had long since fallen from grace. All that remained were four women. On ordinary days, we fought endlessly, tearing each other apart. Every single one of us wanted to marry Dante because marrying him meant preserving a life of dignity and comfort. In the first life, the fake heiress, Blair, secretly had the ring resized smaller and married into the family. Dante took one look at her, then had her thrown into the river to drown. “Not her.” In the second life, my cousin, Chloe, underwent plastic surgery to alter her fingers and force the ring on. Dante gifted her a staged car accident. “Still not her.” In the third life, my stepmother, Catherine, clenched her teeth and forced the ring onto her finger. Her blood hadn’t even dried when she married Dante. He coldly slashed her face, then locked her in the basement, where she slowly wasted away until death. By the fourth life, all three of them were terrified. None of them dared to marry him anymore, so they hurriedly pushed me forward instead. I put on the ring. This time, the size was perfect. Just when I thought my good days had finally begun, Dante stabbed me to death on our wedding night, his eyes burning red with madness. After my rebirth, the consigliere of the Dante family delivered the ring once again. This time, all four of us avoided it like the plague.

I was growing up as the much-hated "fake heiress" in a wealthy family, and my life took a devastating turn after my death. My childhood friend who lived next door leaked my nudes online, branding me as manipulative and promiscuous. This ignited public outrage, with strangers celebrating my demise at my family's home. My parents, eager to sever any connection with me, destroyed our mansion that very night, even going so far as to feed my ashes to the dog. Everyone said I deserved it. On the day the true heiress married my childhood friend in a grand, live-streamed wedding, I gave them a unique wedding present from beyond the grave.

On the day of my wedding to Elliot Wendell, a fake heiress committed suicide. In the second year of our marriage, we ended up enemies. He hated me, the true heiress, for returning and causing Celeste Dent’s death. I hated him for loving the woman who had taken my place as an heiress for twenty years. During the ten years of our marriage, we fought each other with vicious words and wished for the other to die. Then, there was an earthquake, and he shielded me beneath him. He protected me with his back. The building collapsed, and he ended up a mangled and bloody corpse. As he lay dying, he whispered into my ear, “If I had known that she would die, I would’ve never taken you home.” “If we ever meet again, it would be better if I were your only family.” In the end, I still died in the secondary quakes. When I opened my eyes again, I found that I had gone back in time. It was the day when he brought me to the Dent family to regain my rightful place among them. Elliot suddenly changed his mind and said, “Samantha, I was wrong. You’re not the daughter the Dent family lost twenty years ago.”

It had been ten years, and Ethan—my mate—and I still didn’t have a pup. One day, he suggested we adopt one from the Werewolf Orphan Charity Agency. “My mate,” he said gently, “pregnancy is too hard for you. You’d have to go through so many checkups and herbs. Your wolf shouldn’t have to suffer like that.” When others heard this, they all said Ethan loved me deeply—that he couldn’t bear to see me in pain. But I saw the truth with my own eyes. He took an infant pup from another she-wolf. “Luckily, Mia isn’t pregnant,” he said. “That way, the excuse of adopting an infant works—and the pup can have a legitimate status in my clan.” I knew that she-wolf well. The same one Ethan used to call a “stupid omega.” Swallowing the bitterness in my heart, I called my mentor at the Werewolf Research Academy. “I want to devote myself to herb research,” I said calmly. Three days from now, during the pup’s first New Moon blessing, I’ll fake my death in a fire. No one will be able to stop me.

I have known since childhood that I was destined to marry Kaden, the Alpha heir of the Moonstone pack. As the only one with the Moon-Blessed bloodline, I am the only person capable of breaking the curse that has haunted the Moonstone Alpha lineage for generations. A century ago, the Moonstone ancestor publicly insulted a fallen female Alpha during her funeral. He mocked her, saying, "She’s just a she-wolf. Why such an extravagant funeral? How could a woman ever protect our kind? She probably slept her way to the top." Goddess Selene was enraged. She cast a perpetual curse: every direct Alpha heir of the Moonstone pack would develop female traits on their eighteenth birthday, regressing into a lowly Omega. Only by mating with a Moon-Blessed wolf can the curse be lifted. I had been in love with Kaden for years and wanted nothing more than to save him. Maya claimed she also possessed the Moon-Blessed bloodline. Kaden tried to marry her, but I exposed her lie and stopped him. Forced by his parents, Kaden finally made me his Luna. After he marked me, Kaden didn’t regress into an Omega, but he didn't awaken his Alpha King bloodline either. That same night, a heartbroken Maya went for a walk in the woods alone, where she was cornered by a group of rogues and torn to pieces. My parents and Kaden hated me for it. They claimed I was a fraud whose bloodline was impure, which was why Kaden never truly ascended. They were convinced Maya was the real Moon-Blessed one. They believed my jealousy and lies had killed her and robbed Kaden of his chance to become the Alpha King. On a night of the full moon, Kaden tore my throat out in front of the entire pack. He tossed my body into a silver pool to let it corrode. The last thing I heard was his roar: "You lying bitch! Maya’s death is on your hands!" When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the day Kaden arrived at the Silver Moon pack to propose.

“To escape a monster, she ran straight into the arms of a devil.” Lila Vance was a debt payment. Wrapped in fifty thousand dollars of French lace, she was minutes away from marrying Marcus Thorne—a man who whispered that she was nothing more than his "property." But Lila refused to be broken. With a ripped dress and a heart full of terror, she bolts from the altar and into the private elevator of the Grand Imperial Hotel. When the doors open, she finds herself in the lion’s den: the penthouse of Adrian Sterling, her fiancé’s most lethal rival. Adrian is a man carved from shadows and sin, a billionaire "Shark" who destroys legacies for sport. When Marcus comes to claim his prize, Adrian offers Lila a choice: go back to the man who will break you, or sign a one-year marriage contract with the man who will own you. As the line between their fake vows and real desire begins to blur, Lila must face a terrifying truth: Adrian Sterling didn't save her out of mercy. He saved her because she is the final piece in a game of revenge he’s been playing for years. In a game of power, who will be the first to break?