Fruits Basket Snake

When my neighbor's daughter-in-law falls pregnant, my neighbor issues a few "decrees" in a group chat for all residents in the area. "Number 1: Anyone whose family has daughters has to avoid leaving the house when my daughter-in-law does. I don't want them to hurt my grandson! "Number 2: Every family has to purchase meat and expensive fruits once a week and present them to my daughter-in-law! "Number 3: After my grandson is born, I will bestow upon everyone the honor to bask in his fortune. Every family has to give us 300 dollars as a gift. I will personally visit each family that doesn't!" She even singles me out with a message. "Unit 401, I want you to immediately stop feeding stray cats. I'll also give you three days to get rid of your cat! My daughter-in-law is scared of cats, and the creatures are covered in germs. What if she catches a virus from your cat when she goes downstairs for a walk? What if you hurt my grandson? "I command you to immediately bring me one thousand dollars as a deposit and guarantee. If I catch you feeding stray cats one more time, I'll confiscate the money!" I transfer 20 thousand dollars to her, yet she grovels at my feet and begs me to take the money back.

On the day of my 30th birthday, my CEO wife, Sabrina Langford, leaves hurriedly at 3:00 am. She claims that there's something urgent going on at the company and that she won't be home the whole day. Later on, Timothy Cross, the low-income university student that Sabrina has been sponsoring, updates his social media feed. In the photo, I see Sabrina standing at the side of the road in a bikini. Two big apples are balanced on her 36D bust. The caption of the photo is, "The beautiful and hot CEO has personally come over to my house to help me sell the homegrown apples. You'll regret it if you don't buy these apples from me!" My brows are drawn into a frown immediately. When I call Sabrina, the call goes through rather quickly. "I told you I'm very busy at the company right now. If you disturb me again, I'm not going to forgive you this easily!" After that, Sabrina ends the call. But right before the call gets cut off, I can hear a car honking in her background. I'm not mad at her at all. She likes helping others to sell fruits, right? I might as well lend her a helping hand. So, I share the social media post to the company's group chat. The message I've drafted is, "Does anyone here want a batch of rotten apples? I'll even throw in a second-hand wife for free."

On the night of our wedding, my husband told me he wanted to have a child with his teacher’s daughter. When I confronted him, he turned it back on me. “Teacher is seriously ill, and her only wish is to see three generations under one roof. My junior and I are just doing IVF. It’s not like anything is actually happening between us!” “Besides, you were also her student. How could you refuse to help fulfill her last wish?” However, the next day, when I went to visit our teacher with a fruit basket, I saw my husband and his junior locked in an embrace at the corner of the hallway. The moment was like a bolt of lightning. I turned and walked away. The following day, my husband sent me a text: [I’m going with her for the IVF. Let’s postpone the family gathering for a few days.] I did not reply. Instead, I went back to my hometown alone, visiting each of my relatives to personally apologize. Then, I went to a lawyer. “I’d like to sue my husband for bigamy.”

To hide the secret of her bloodline, Hazel White endured the rejection of her fated mate, but fate made her marry her friend out of desperation to save her adoptive mother. She left her first mate's pack after being humiliated by the present Luna and went to her now husband's pack, where her mother got the necessary medical aid and Hazel got a home. What she didn't know was that fate still had something twisted in its basket for her. Her world turned upside down when she met her husband's elder brother, and the alpha of that pack, Alexander Nickelson. Her wolf screamed "Mate" inside her, making her feel dizzy because her second chance mate was her brother-in-law too. What she would do? Would she give in to the mate bond and divorce her husband, who had always been with her when she needed a shoulder to rely on? Would she reject him too because he was also an alpha, and she didn't want to be a puppet in the hands of an alpha because of the secret of her bloodline? Would Alexander be able to seduce his stubborn mate or would he accept her rejection just because she is wolf-less omega to everyone?

After a venomous snake bites me, my husband, Daniel Dawson, injects the only antivenom into my adopted sister, Grace Winton. Before I black out, I see my parents, Daniel, and my son, Ethan Dawson, all gathered around Grace, while I lie alone on the grass, completely ignored. When I come to, my colleague shakes his head and tells me the toxin has already spread. Within 48 hours, my body will begin to rot from the inside, and I'll die in unbearable pain. I give up the conservative plan and swallow a potent painkiller instead. Over the next two days, I transfer the hospital my grandfather gave me and every asset in my name to Grace. I divorce Daniel and place both his and Ethan's hands into Grace's. When I put Grace's name on the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis treatment protocol I've spent five years developing, they finally smile, hold my hand, and tell me we're finally a real family. I stay silent and only smile at them. I wonder what their faces will look like two days later when they see my body.

Fae’s been in love with Carl Easton for a long time. Orphaned by her mother when she was two and by her father when she was fourteen, she was fostered by the wealthy Eastons until she was eighteen. Fast-forward ten years, Fae attends a wedding and watches Carl marry her snake of a bestfriend. That night, she begs Carl's best buddy Jigo to help her forget. Hands down, he is the most gorgeous, sexiest man she has ever met. He is way out of her league and she will never have the guts to proposition him if she isn't drunk. Stoic and brooding, wealthier and more successful than Carl, he vibes power. She can never guess he was such a molten lava of emotions and the sweetest teddy bear behind closed doors. She spends part of the weekend in his bed then ran from him before she can get addicted to his brand of passion. She needs the distraction but he is more than she can ever dream of. It is foolish to hope for more. But he appears in her doorstep and seduces her to make him her willing rebound for as long as she needs him. No way will he let her go until they are done. And they spiral so fast that Fae can’t tell where distraction ends and falling in love begins…

"But all these scars, they will always remind you of the beast that I am." He said in a hushed tones, caressing the scars on her face. "Not when they can be turned into beautiful scars." Her response echoed with confusion and incredulity to him. How could all the pain he had inflicted on her turn into something good? A broken and desperate, depressed Billionaire, and the poorest of all naive girl who just lost everything in a blink of an eye, and her mother just traded her like a piece of trash. They are to be bound together by a contract as husband and wife for just five months. Everything seems to be under control, until one night of total madness that complicates everything. She had done and sacrificed so much for him, asking nothing in return or ever complaining. In return, he asked for one night to treat her like the loving wife she is supposed to be. One night they surrendered and lost their souls to each other, marking the beginning of their unquenchable thirsts for each other. In the short run, a bond is formed. What happens if the two of them break the major rule of the contract? Who will bear the blame? What's the punishment for such an offense? When feelings arise, can they embrace them? But what happens when his real love returns? His crush. His first love. The one he once went insane for. She doesn't return empty-handed. She is seven months pregnant with the son he thought she lost. What will he do? Wait... His passionate nights with his contract wife bore fruits too. She is expecting his child. Will he marry both of them, or who will he choose?

The carnivorous ways of the Aswang leave little room for love - much less a forbidden one between a queen and human girl. Little did Aswang Queen Catarina know, soon, her life would be changed by a plucky American biologist. A blue eyed, blonde adventurer, Rose Smith from California, who would make Catarina question all she knew, and want to make a human Her Aswang Woman King. ___ Catarina Rosales Marquez, 26, is the Aswang Queen of the Domminga Mountains, but she abhors eating humans. She has genetically engineered the fruits of her goddess Ikapati to produce human proteins in order to bring peace to Mindanao - but the Aswang do not trust this revolutionary, peaceful Queen - and are wary of the American biologist she has taken under her wing. Rose Smith is a German-American biologist doing her dissertation on the elusive, endangered Phillippines Eagle. Having studied the Tarsier in her undergraduate semester abroad in Manila, she fell in love with chicken adobo, pandesal - and Filipina women. Eager to be the first American biologist to do a longitudinal study of the Phillipines Eagle, she sets out into the Domminga Mountains on a bus with a one-way ticket - not afraid of the local's warnings of the rabid Iktapati Aswang Clan that eats humans, and roving bands of Tikbalang werehorses that stampede trespassers to death. When Catarina and Rose collide, it is oil and flame. Catarina, expected to marry a King, finds herself questioning the very cosmos of relationships - can she take a Queen, and a feisty American grad student at that? And can Rose come to terms with the elusive, seductive courts of the Vampiric Aswang? When the Iktapati clan rebels, the Tikbalang war, and the wind spirits coquette, Rose and Catarina must team up to save the humans of Mindanao - and the Phillipines eagle!

Young, rich, happy go lucky, a womanizer. That is Enrico Joaquin Montefalco's life. But in one snap everything has changed. May nag iwan ng bagong silang na bata sa labas ng kanilang mansiyon at siya ang sinasabing ama nito ayon sa sulat na nakalakip sa basket na pinaglagyan ng munting anghel. Sa dami ng babaeng dumaan sa buhay niya, hindi niya alam kung sino doon sa kanila ang ina ng bata. Hindi niya kayang alagaan na mag isa ang bata lalo na at may negosyo siyang kailangan siya. Kaya nag hire siya ng yaya para sa anak niya. Nadia Carnaje-isang ulila, magaling na mang aawit at raketera na nangangarap na makapasok sa mansyon ng mga Montefalco. Pangarap niyang maging isang sikat na mang aawit, ngunit mas pinili niya ang maging isang yaya ng anak ng babaerong si Enrico Joaquin Montefalco. Ano ang maging papel ni Nadia at Baby Gio sa buhay niya, is it good or bad? Is he accept the fact and reality na isa na siyang ama o magpatuloy sa buhay na kinasanayan niya? Ito na ba ang karma sa pagiging babaero niya?

"I'm Aiden Hart's secretary!" I shrieked over the phone. "Calm down, Charlie. It can't be that bad." I heard amusement in Emily's voice. My roommate's attitude did nothing to soothe my nerves. "It's not bad; it's a disaster!" I convinced. "I can't work for someone as hot as him! I can't breathe around him!" I might have been on the verge of a panic attack. I was supposed to work for his father, the well-respected sixty-eight-year-old Alexander Hart, not his youngest son! This wasn't what I agreed to! Less than a month ago, my dear friend died while working at Hart Global Corporation as the CEO's secretary. Now, I was about to replace her while investigating the truth behind her death. I thought I was prepared to enter the snake's nest, but I clearly underestimated the enemy… Aiden Hart was the purest embodiment of my sexual fantasies, and believe me, after four sexless years, I had more than too many of them twirling inside my brain. Every day, I found my boss more and more alluring, and I could only protect my weak heart by repeating my newly created mantra... "Don't fall for Mr. Hart... Don't fall for Mr. Hart... Don't fall for Mr. Hart."