Five Years After A John Matherson Novel

Five years ago, Anastasia Hansom was framed by her family and barely escaped with her life. Now, after five years, she returns with a pair of sons, determined to find her daughter. However— "Mommy, Daddy said it's a buy-one-get-one deal. If you want me back, you have to marry him," Qin Anchun stated with great seriousness. Anastasia Hansom looked at the man kneeling before her. He was strikingly handsome, noble and elegant, and incredibly wealthy.

Love wasn't what brought us together, but making this marriage work was what I've held on tightly to for five years. Enduring every pain he caused me, and when I lost our baby, he didn't care. And after five years of torture... when I had nothing to offer him now, he threw a divorce paper in my face and said icily. "Sign the paper, Eloise. Rose is pregnant with my child, and I don't want her to feel uncomfortable with you around here." "You can't do this to me, Lucas. I'm pregnant with your child." I tried to save our marriage... I still held on until the end, but as I drowned in fire and called him to save me, he went for his mistress instead, and left me to die. And as I breathed my last, I only had one wish... To be reborn. So I could make them pay for everything. And just when I thought it was all over, I woke up... This time, I was reunited with the important person that I once lost... My ex-boyfriend. This time, they will regret everything...

I died the day my husband forced the doctors to take our baby from my womb. I thought I’d never love again after losing my ex-boyfriend to a heart attack. But fate gave me a second chance. I married the man I adored, a billionaire named Maxwell. Just when I was about to share the joyful news of my pregnancy, I caught him getting cozy with my best friend, Morgana. Worse, he believed her lies: I was a drug addict. The truth? I was battling a severe mental illness triggered by my ex’s death. I needed medication to cope, but Maxwell never cared to understand. He refused to believe a word I said. They locked me away in a private rehab clinic. But that place wasn’t for healing, it was a trap. Morgana used it to cut me off from Maxwell and torment me without consequence. And just when I thought things couldn’t get worse… Maxwell signed off on a surgery to take my baby. I lay on that cold operating table, tears streaming down my face, and died in the fire that followed—broken, betrayed, and alone. But I never expected to wake up again. This time, I have a new life. A new family. And even one of my children survived. Maxwell, Morgana—this time, I’m coming back. And you’re both going to pay.

I married the man I believed was perfect, but the illusion shattered. His betrayal came with an affair and when I confronted him, he called me barren and delusional. In my need for revenge, I had a one night stand with a mysterious man and he became my little obsession. Aria Nicole is known as the "queen of romance," a New-York best-selling marriage author celebrated for her wisdom on love and relationships. But behind closed doors, her own four-year marriage is void of passion, and the spark she writes about feels like a lie. On her fourth wedding anniversary, Aria’s carefully crafted world crumbles when she catches her husband in bed with his secretary. Heartbroken and desperate for escape, she finds herself at a nightclub. What begins as a night of sadness ends in unexpected turns, a one-night stand with a mysterious man. He became her little addiction but what happened when her family is strongly against their relationship and she is forced to chose.

The seventh time Claire Fisher bailed on our marriage license appointment, I finally cut her out of my life—for good. From then on, if she was at a party, I wasn't. When she was scheduled to perform at our college's anniversary celebration, I made sure to leave early. The moment my company announced a collaboration with hers, I resigned without a second thought. Even on Christmas Eve, when she showed up at my parents' house with gifts, I slipped out with a half-hearted excuse about "visiting a friend." I blocked her number. Deleted her from my contacts. Burned every bridge and salted the earth behind me. No calls. No texts. No social media. I didn't reach out. She couldn't reach me. Simple as that. For the better part of my life, I was hopelessly in love with her—waiting on her, caring for her, putting her first in every way that mattered. I gave her all of me without ever holding back. But after the seventh time she left me sitting alone at the City Hall, something inside me broke. I was done. If that meant spending the rest of my life alone, so be it. Better that than sitting in an empty apartment, listening to the silence, holding on to hope for someone who never planned to show up.

A year ago, I was a rising star in the legal world. But everything changed when I uncovered evidence that my fiance's first love had caused an accident. She lured me to an abandoned factory and ruined my face, then pushed me into a toxic asphalt pit and left me to drown. Little did they know, I was pregnant with my fiance's child when I died. After my death, he had the audacity to claim that I had accepted money from a murderer and had fled the country. His actions turned me into a pariah. Meanwhile, he and his precious first love walked down the aisle together. A year later, the abandoned factory I had died in was being demolished, and someone stumbled upon my body in that asphalt pit.

"NO… Don't hurt my baby, PLEASE!" That day, Aria knelt on the freezing cold floor of the operating room, her desperate cries echoing off the sterile walls. But Kane’s cruelty cut deeper than any scalpel. "She is unworthy of being the mother of my child." Those words shattered her. In a final act of heartbreak and defiance, Aria threw herself out of his world—and out of his reach. Years later, she returns. Not alone. By her side is the daughter Kane never knew existed—the living proof of the love he once so cruelly denied. Now the man who cast her aside is the one left shattered—haunted by regret, consumed by obsession, willing to tear the world apart to claim what he lost. Her. Their daughter. Their second chance.

Natalie Brooks, the young lady of the Brooks family, hid her identity to marry Samuel Morgan for love. The three-year cold marriage ended with a divorce when his first love, Lily, returned. Natalie left proudly, returning to her home, the most powerful Brooks family in New York, with her four talented brothers. Natalie gradually transformed into a strong businesswoman. Samuel was surprised because Natalie was completely different from the image of the weak wife she had been before. He began to waver, remembering the years of living together, but was still surrounded by Lily's weak pretense. Although Natalie was divorced, she still had lingering feelings, but she chose to strongly confront him, determined to prove her worth. From here, she continuously confronted Samuel and Lily, both to regain what she had lost and to force them to regret ever looking down on her. Meanwhile, Lily always played the role of the "weak girl", taking advantage of Samuel's pity, but she increasingly revealed her jealousy and hypocrisy. Natalie's brothers – especially Nathaniel Brooks and Henry Brooks – were fiercely protective of their sister and wanted Samuel to repent for what he had done to Natalie.

In her five years of marriage, Elsie loved her husband, Oswald, with all her heart. Even when their life wasn't happy. But now the man she loves so much is looking at her with a hateful look, slandering her without proof. "Tess is awake, she told me everything! You fu*king murderer!" Tess, Oswald's beloved woman, and if she hadn't had the accident, it would have been Tess, not her, who would have become Oswald's wife. And now Tess was awake. Her dream had awakened instead. She didn't want to have to explain. She didn't want to have to go through countless detentions and begging... Elsie looked at Oswald, who was still indifferent, and said, "Let's get a divorce..." Oswald doesn't believe that the greedy Elsie can give up her life as a rich madam, and he assumes that she will come back and beg him for money. Until Elsie's true identity is revealed and everyone is stunned...

Ruby married her fate mate, Lucas, only to endure his repeated betrayals with his first love. In the end, she lost everything—her child, her parents, and her hope. But when she’s reborn on the night of her wedding, she vows to rewrite her fate. Determined to protect those she loves, Ruby finds her former enemy, Caleb, Lucas’s brother—the man who will one day kill Lucas and become the Lycan King. Caleb had never shown up at her wedding before, but this time, Ruby looks into his eyes and says, "I want you to be my husband." Can Ruby take control of her future, or will the past haunt her forever?