Novel & Cerita Gideon The Ninth

My husband had a severe addiction for physical intimacy. However, in the seven years of our marriage, he never touched me, not even once. To suppress his urges, he soaked himself in bone-chilling ice water every night. His arms were covered in needle marks from constant injections. It broke my heart to see him like that. I offered myself to him many times, but he insisted on simply giving me a restrained kiss on the forehead before saying, “Don’t be silly, Summer. I’m not like those animals. How could I ever bear to hurt you? For you, I’d gladly live the rest of my life in a platonic marriage.” This strange, almost obsessive restraint of his lasted seven years. Despite the numerous times he pushed himself far enough to end up hospitalized, he still refused to cross that line. Then, on our wedding anniversary, a young woman named Anna Brandt came in for her ninth hymen restoration surgery. After the anesthetic was administered, her cheeks flushed red. As her mind grew hazy, she started crying weakly like a lost kitten. Looking at the love bites scattered across her body, I shook my head and assumed she was just another girl who had gone astray. That was until I heard her last tearful whisper. “John Shaw, you jerk.” My hand trembled and I nearly dropped the scalpel. Because my husband’s name also was John Shaw.

This is the ninth year Dante and I have honored the Month of No Masters. The Corinni family's heir apparent believes this will make our relationship last longer. For one month after our dating anniversary each year, he is free, and we stay out of each other's lives. If either of us finds someone more suitable, we are to wish them well. If not, we go back to the way things were after a month. Around me, the men of the family are spraying champagne with abandon. "To another year of freedom! Congratulations to our Underboss on reclaiming his bachelor status!" "The family betting pool is open! Place your bets on the left if you think they'll still get married, and on the right if you think it's over for good!" Through the hazy cigar smoke, I sat on the corner of a leather sofa, a cold observer, as if this whole farce had nothing to do with me. Dante's hand was curled around Scarlett's waist as he brushed past me, whispering, "Don't get any ideas. You'll always be my only Donna." "I'm a kite. No matter how far I fly, the string is always in your hand." I pressed my cold fingers against the gentle swell of my belly, my expression a blank mask. Dante, this time at the family's betting table, I'm putting my money on "the end." I'm going to vanish from your world completely. That kite string you're so proud of? Tonight, I'm cutting it myself.

At the very moment Phoebe Stanton miscarries, her husband, Connor Russell, is celebrating the return of his first love. To him, her three years of devotion and companionship mean nothing more than being a live-in maid and cook. Phoebe gives up on him and decides to divorce. Everyone in their circle knows that Phoebe is clingy and impossible to shake off. "I bet she'll come crawling in a day." Connor sneers. "A day? That's too long—half a day at most." But the moment Phoebe signs the divorce papers, she decides never to look back. She throws herself into a new life. She revives her career, which she once abandoned, builds new connections, and meets new people. As time goes on, Connor no longer sees even a trace of Phoebe at home. He begins to panic. At an industry summit, he finally spots her, surrounded by admirers. Desperate, he pushes forward. "Phoebe, haven't you had enough of this tantrum?" But Gideon Blackwood suddenly steps in front of her, shoving Connor aside, his very demeanor chilling the air. "Don't touch my woman." Connor has never loved Phoebe. But now that he does, it's already too late. There's no longer a place for him in her world.

"Can I taste you down there?" He said and I swallowed. "I want to claim you." His words disrupted my thoughts and I inhaled in a sharp breath. "When you fell on my hands before practically falling on the floor, I knew I just had to have you." His deep voice reverberated throughout the empty room. He was sounded confident—no he was confident. "Even if it's for a night." “I want to feel your skin on fire. I want to inhale the sharp of your breath as blood rushes through your body. Tell me bunny, are you wet right now?” He asked and I inhaled sharply. He growled. She was Fire, and he wanted to consume every bit of her. It was supposed to be a one night of fun, letting go and celebrating graduation from college. That was all Emma had bargained herself for. He was Gideon, the owner of the biggest club in New York and few other countries. A typical player? No that wasn't the type of man he was, but that didn't mean he didn't mind having some fun occasionally. Or maybe more than occasionally. What then happens when the one night of fun revolves into a forever when an unnerving situation binds both parties together? Would they be able to make the best out of the situation or would it turn out to be a disaster?

After Cain called off our mate-bonding ceremony for the ninth time—calling it off for the sake of his childhood sweetheart—the Alpha himself came to the Abel family estate to deliver an apology in person. "We are prepared to offer an additional 300kg of frost iron, three hunting territories west of Silvermoon Forest, and nine forges in the pack compound," he announced. "Consider this reparations for the nine broken betrothals." Before his words even faded, Cain's laughter crackled through the phone speaker. "Dad, is she honestly worth that kind of price? I could toss her a half-rotted beast bone soaked in moonlight and she'd still come crawling. You'd be better off funneling those resources into Lina's beast-training arena." The old Alpha ended the call without a second thought. His golden wolf eyes shifted toward me, heavy with visible unease. The gathered wolves stifled their snickers, their throats rippling with suppressed laughter. Every pair of eyes fixed on me, gleaming with anticipation of the show. They all expected me to swallow the humiliation, just as I always had. After all, every wolf in Silvermoon Pack knew the tale: I, the Abel family daughter, had been pining for Cain, the Alpha King's youngest son, for years. Pathetic and devoted. But I'd endured this exact scene eight times before. I was done with it. And more than that, I was done with him. A beat of silence passed. Then I lifted my gaze, searching the crowd until I found the one face Cain despised most: his older brother, Cass. A slow smile curved my lips. "Whoever I claim as my mate inherits the Alpha title," I said. "Does that promise still stand?"

At the County Clerk's Office, Logan Dunne's adopted sister folded our marriage application into a paper airplane and launched it across the room. For the ninth time. I was done. Then she went nuclear. "I just don't think you're good enough for Logan! Like, what are the odds you got pregnant five times and lost every single one? Maybe they weren't even his. Maybe you got rid of them on purpose! You're just a used-up tramp!" The whole lobby turned. Every stare hit like a slap. Even the clerk who'd just been calling Raine out now looked at me like I was trash. I started to snap back, but Logan's mom, Claudia, cut me off. "Raine's only acting out because she can't handle Logan leaving her. She was abandoned as a child. She's suffered enough. Be patient with her. "And you're Logan's fiancée. You should understand. Be the bigger person." I looked at Logan. He was smiling, patting Raine's head like she'd stolen a cookie. "You little troublemaker. Don't do that again." Then he faced the clerk. "Could we get another form? She'll behave this time." I slapped my hand over his. Be the bigger person? Big enough to let her trash my name in public? Big enough to let her wreck our marriage license appointment? Fine. I'd be generous. I'd give Logan back to her. I didn't want him anymore.

For five years, Gideon—my brother's Beta—and I had a secret. We were supposed to announce our mating at the pack's Winter Solstice festival. Instead, he breathed hot against my ear. "Babe, we've been sleeping together for five years. I'm bored with you. Find someone else for the marking ceremony, alright?" I didn't cry. I just gave a calm, simple nod. "Alright." Only because in my last life, I had begged him through tears to complete the bond. After he finally marked me, he grew cold. He never again woke me by rubbing his stubbled chin against my forehead. Even when we made love, he kept his eyes shut, as if he were with someone else, just using my body. When I was in agony giving birth to our pup, fighting for my life, he left me. He was going to comfort his savior, Aveline. The old wound she suffered saving him had relapsed, sending her into a mental spiral. In that moment, I finally understood. A mark I had to beg for was nothing but a curse, a wound that would never heal. This time, I pulled away with a smile, removing his hand from my waist. "You're right. I'm tired of it, too. We're done."

"I would rather die than be your mate!" I spat, a look of blooming hatred in my eyes. "Oi Sweetheart, you don’t negotiate with me.” his hands caught my throat gripping it tight. My lung burned as my feet lifted from the ground. I pressed my hand on his trying to free myself. “Please leave her alone Ryker, she’s innocent!” Father begged, struggling on the chair he was tied on. Ryker smirked and leaned in, his hot breath brushing against my ear. “Any more resistance darling, and I swear by the moon to slit your father’s old throat bathing your face with his blood.” Iris had everything in the world every person would wish for. She was the only daughter of Alpha Gideon of the winter pack, her father showered her with all types of care and gave her anything she wants. Iris thought she would be happy forever, until her eighteenth birthday when she woke up from her evening sleep and found her father tightly tied to a wooden chair and tortured by a strange man who hold an Aura of power and death. Alpha Ryker of the Blackthorn pack came to seek revenge on Iris father for killing his pregnant wife. When he first saw Iris he knew she was his second chance mate and took away from her pack forcing her to be his Breeder. Will Iris survive in his cruelty of self revenge? or will she crack his stone heart and gain his compassion?

"I told you once, Obi... power is the only truth. Your father taught me that while I bled in his gutters. Now, I’m the one with the power, and you’re the one on your knees." In the cold, ruthless world of the Shadowfang Syndicate, the weak are nothing but collateral. Obi Ashford was born the "runt" of the most powerful mafia dynasty in the country—the Black Eagle. Deaf, sickly, and discarded by his own father, Duke Gideon Ashford, Obi lived as a ghost in a gilded cage, bearing the literal scars of his family's cruelty on his back. But when the empire falls, the ghosts come back to haunt the living. Cassius Okoye has returned. Once a high-born heir himself, he spent ten years as a branded slave in the Ashford household after the Duke razed his family to the ground. Now, he is the Sire of the Syndicate, the man who conquered the Ashfang Dominion in a single night of fire and blood. He came for vengeance. He came to destroy every last Ashford. When Cassius finds Obi trembling in the Hollow Pit, he expects to find a monster's son. Instead, he finds a broken boy who can’t even hear the threats whispered in his ear. Cassius promised to give the Ashford heir hell. He intended to use Obi to break the Duke's legacy, claiming him as a slave, a toy, and a debt to be paid in the bedroom. But as he peels back the layers of Obi’s past, he discovers a horrifying truth: the boy he wants to destroy was never the enemy—he was the first victim.

Everyone’s turning she had witnessed came with its surprise; Camila had passed out, and Gideon had released a howl that made the pack deaf for some minutes, but finding out she was a bastard on the night of her turning was the least surprise she was expecting. Asides from the humiliation that came with it, it meant she wasn't going to be alpha, not in Craw Pack at least. Then the surprises didn't stop as she watched the man she called Father slay her mum like she wasn't Luna, she looked him straight into his eyes while he sentenced her to a lifetime of bondage. The Wells family were fighters, and so she fought for her freedom but ended up as a slave in another pack, hiding her identity to save her life. The white wolves to whom she belonged were thought to be weak, but Isha was ready to change that narrative, even if it meant getting her white dirty. From betraying the one who learned to love her, to taking the lives of the closest persons to her, she avenged her mum's death, built an army, and got everything she wanted, except the trust of the Alpha who meant the world to her. They say you can't just have anything you want, but Isha was convinced she was born to break rules, but she underestimated who was standing on the other end of the line; Holly Smearson was not the girl to cross, not with an Alpha-in-line by her side. Isha would soon understand why the love of her life had wanted Holly by his side in the beginning. Too many lies, too many ties, a white wolf, insides too dirty.