Gasps

At the team dinner, everyone started hyping Peggy Madoff and me up to call our partners. Before I could even move, Peggy—runner-up to my top spot—whipped out her phone. "Babe, everyone's making me call you!" she giggled. On the line? Gerard Busch. Yeah, the CEO. He laughed. "Guess I'll be counting on you all to look after Peggy," he said. Cue the gasps and cheers. I just kept downing my wine. Because Gerard? He was my husband.

Every where was dark, the bush surrounding her as she seems to be lost, she was frightened, they were frightened. Where was her brother and her friends, where was her pursuer. She gasps suddenly as she felt a hand touch her from behind. ________________ Five years ago, twenty five people got missing and every investigation leads to the infamous Bear Forest said to inhabit dark souls. State police can't find a trace of all twenty five tourists until five years later when nine students decided to investigate for themselves. They soon learnt why the forest was dreaded as they all were stranded in the same place twenty five people got missing, are they going to go missing as the twenty five. Or are they going to do whatever it takes to survive?

At the underground auction house, tonight's grand finale was billed as a 'premium wolf pet'. Inside the cage, a male wolf knelt with a bite-prevention muzzle locked around his neck. He was clearly a prisoner, yet his eyes held no trace of submission when he lifted his head. Instead, he looked like he was judging every single person in the room. His gaze cut through the crowd and locked onto me. My heart stuttered as excitement flooded my system. I finally knew what true attraction felt like. A well-dressed man in the front row raised his paddle. "$100 million." Gasps erupted across the venue. It was an astronomical opening bid. I smiled and slowly raised my paddle too. My voice brought the hall to dead silence. "$500 million."

I am Athena the first born child of the Alpha Caden. I have come back to take my rightful position." She paused.  "As Alpha." Gasps and murmurs of wonder disbelief rose in the crowd. It had never been recorded in history that an Alpha werewolf should give birth to a female as a first child. But everyone saw the uncanny resemblance between her and the first queen the heard the Alpha voice of authority in her. But it how was it. She let the noise die down before she continued. "Although I never knew my father, you all knew him, Alpha Caden kind, considerate, passionate and respectful of his people. He entertained complaints from the lowest of ranks. Joined in manual labor and from time to time visited the poor. He was loved by many." She let the whispers of agreement die down. "I am nothing like him."

On the night of Natalie’s biggest achievement...winning the Actress Award....her world came crashing down. Just as she stood in the spotlight, soaking in the applause, Richard, the man she once loved, walked up and handed her divorce papers in front of everyone. The gasps from the audience drowned out the cheers, and her joy instantly turned to heartbreak. Determined to move on, Natalie poured herself into her acting career. During an audition, she met Liam, a talented playwright whose words reignited her belief in love. His kindness and passion helped her heal, and soon, they grew close. But just as Natalie was ready to start over, Richard came back, asking for another chance. Now, she faces an impossible choice....return to the man who once broke her heart or embrace the new love standing right in front of her. Which path will she choose?

"Yuliana, are you really moving abroad? You're not even going to talk it over with Charlie?" Madelyn Gardner asks. Yuliana Beckett lets out a self-mocking laugh. "We're already divorced." "You got a divorce?" Madelyn gasps, staring at Yuliana in disbelief. "Charlie actually agreed to that? After everything you've done for him these past three years, even a heart of stone would've softened by now." Madelyn speaks up for Yuliana, indignant on her behalf. But it's only after Yuliana boards her flight and leaves the country that Charlie Zimmer finally realizes what he's lost. He chases her across the ocean like a man possessed. In the face of his remorse, Yuliana has only one thing to say. "I don't love you anymore."

Aria Lin was once the perfect socialite... Obedient, elegant and married to the city's most powerful CEO. But on the night of their 5th year anniversary, he made her signed over her company to him and then killed her. But fate? It gave her a second chance at life and she had decided to make him pay for every single betrayal. Right at the moment of his grand proposal, Aria did the unthinkable. She walked right up to her brooding assistant and kissed him right on the lips. Cameras flashed and the crowd gasps, but Aria? Didn't mind them at all. This right here? Was her statement. And her quest for freedom and revenge has begun with an impromptu kiss and a contract. Or has it? When her supposedly brooding assistant turned husband ended up being more possessive than her ex?.

She is the forbidden blood that ignites his hunger. He is the ruthless king who has sworn to destroy her kind. But fate has other plans. She is his enemy, the one thing he has sworn to destroy. But one bite, one taste, and she becomes his obsession. She fights him. He hunts her. And in a world teetering on the edge of war, their desire might be the deadliest weapon of all. ************* Celest’s back slammed against the cold wall, her breath coming in sharp gasps as Magnus caged her in, his body heat searing into hers. “You keep running, little bunny,” his voice was thick with dark amusement, but beneath it lurked something raw, something canal. “Yet, here you are. Right where I want you.”

The day after I returned to my home country, my old classmates ambushed me with an invitation to a reunion. In the hotel, I ran into my ex, Shawn Quinn, whom I hadn't seen in five years. The room froze when he pulled out a ring and proposed. Gasps rippled through the crowd. They all expected me to jump at the chance, given how hard I had chased him back in the day. They forgot the gut-punch of our graduation day. Shawn had sided with another woman, letting her paint me as a plagiarist, a cheater, a bully. The school authorities revoked my diploma and kicked me out of the ceremony. Humiliated, I fled abroad, leaving behind a shattered heart. Now, his best friend told me, "Shawn pulled strings to get your diploma back despite your past mistakes. He never forgot about you. He has been waiting for you all these years. You're his only love."

"You're a whore, a whore does not change overtime and you know that." He whispers back, loud enough for the older couple sitting across to hear. And they couldn't help but gasps in shock, as the older woman soaks her teeth in distaste while the older man frowns. "What did you just call me? Ethan, what did you call me? If you can't trust me, then maybe we shouldn't be together." She said, her voice barely above whisper and her eyes teary. But she felt like this was all a dream, they have been quarreling lately but not like this. It has never been like this. Earlier today when she told her sister, Eloise, about this dinner, they all hoped for an engagement. But this doesn't look like an engagement dinner, or does it?. This was some of the last words Aurelia heard from her boyfriend before she stumbled heartbroken into a bar where she meets the man who changed her life.