Gotham Wayne Manor

Winter, 2025. Seattle is shrouded in the cold mist of its endless rainy season. For the sake of a single recommendation letter to Stanford, Catherine Hale—a destitute but proud art student—knocks on the doors of the Highlands Manor to return a restored Song Dynasty porcelain. She intends to leave as quickly as she came, but instead stumbles into the world of William Sterling, the young, enigmatic patriarch of an old and powerful family. Cold, noble, and unfathomable, William draws her into a game of testing and maneuvering that plays out in the cracks between social class and self-esteem. From their first meeting on a rainy night to a silent rescue amidst the vanity fair of high society, Catherine fights to escape a glittering vortex she doesn't belong to, only to find herself falling step by step into William's gentle trap, lingering with the scent of cold cedar. In this rain-soaked city, a forbidden attraction blooms across the divide, unaware that fate has already secretly marked the price of its gifts.

Before heading out on her undercover mission, my daughter Anna Stone left me a farewell letter. My husband, Wayne Stone, who adores her, reads it and immediately posts her photo on Instagram. His caption reads, "I heard Anna's on a mission. Let's see how many drug dens she'll take down this time." Anna's devoted husband, Gabriel Morrison, barely glances at the letter before dropping her exact location online. Anna's twin brother, Casper Stone, has always been inseparable from her. However, after reading the letter, he goes straight to the drug dealers and brings them to her. Anna's cover is blown, the mission fails, and all 37 officers are wiped out without a trace. I collapse in despair, lashing out at them with desperate questions, only to be bound and sent to Mirewick, a notorious criminal den. When I open my eyes again, I find myself back on the day Anna sets out on her mission.

Five years in a coma. That’s how long Ava Jameson’s world was on pause. She woke expecting love and care from her husband, only to find her husband, Ethan, married to her sister Clara and raising a boy. It breaks her heart. She's sent to Blackwell Manor to recover at the mansion of her husband's stepfather, Damian Blackwell, a billionaire CEO with a reputation for ruthlessness. Damian has no interest in messy family drama, until he sees Ava. She awakens something he thought had died with his wife. This is dangerous and their attraction is forbidden. But when Ava is pressured to give up her settlement and is pressured by Ethan to live quietly, Damian offers her a shocking deal, a fake marriage in return for revenge. But now Ethan wants her back, and she finds herself caught between her past and her present, especially her father-in-law makes her feel things, her Ethan never did.

When my stepsister, Kate Lawrence, is poisoned at the full moon ceremony, my father, Jack Blackwood, condemns me at once, convinced that I am the one behind it. He clamps silver chains around me and drags me into the manor's dark underground cell. His eyes burn hatefully as he snarls, "You wretch! How could I have a daughter like you? Rot in here!" I drop to my knees on the cold floor and try to explain, but the sentence he throws over his shoulder as he turns away snuffs out the last of my hope. "Even if she dies in there, no one shall go in! Whoever lets her out will die with her!" The cell severs the mind-link completely, so no one hears me screaming. Seven days later, he finally remembers me, not knowing that I'd already died on the fourth day when the silver burned through to the bone.

I am the wife of Anthony Caster, don of the mafia family in New York. When I was nine months pregnant, he brought a woman named Evelyn Graves into the manor, claiming she’d saved his life. That was the day my nightmare began. She put something in my food. Next thing I knew, I was doubled over in pain. And she had the nerve to blame it on me—said I was being reckless with what I ate. She lost her footing and fell down the stairs, but she told everyone I was the one who shoved her. Every day, she’d cry in front of Anthony about how saving him had left her wounded and unable to bear children, how seeing a pregnant woman broke her heart. But the moment she turned to me, the tears were gone, replaced by a cold smile. “As long as I’m here,” she whispered, “your babies will never be born.” Anthony was convinced I was jealous of her. He locked me away in the abandoned attic of the manor and said, “Reflect on your actions and stop bullying Evelyn.” On the first day they shut me in, the contractions began. I screamed, I begged, I banged on the door. The butler heard me and went to inform Anthony. He said, “Amelia, your due date is three days away. Stop putting on an act. Three days in a snowstorm and you came out fine. This? You can handle this.” On the second day, my water broke. I screamed at the top of my lungs, my fingernails digging into the cracks of the wall, blood spilling all over the floor. The butler went to Anthony again. Evelyn said, “Anthony, she’s making all that noise because she wants you to feel sorry for her and let her out. If you give in now, she’ll only grow more reckless later.” He believed her. On the third day, I stopped screaming. Anthony thought I had finally learned my lesson, unaware that I had already died from the difficult labor. When he finally opened that door, all he would find was my rotting, putrid body.

Jasper Oakley's first love, Pauline Simmons, is about to get married. In order to make her regret her decision, Jasper volunteers to guard the border. In doing so, he chooses to abandon the General's Manor and me, his wife. I've written 99 letters to him, yet I've never received a response from him. On the third year, I don't write any letters anymore. One day, I'm sitting on a chaise lounge while drinking supplements delivered from the palace when Jasper suddenly returns to the manor. As he stares at my pregnancy bump of six months, he gnashes his teeth together angrily. "You never came to the border to visit me in the past three years of our marriage. Whose spawn are you pregnant with?" I remain nonchalant. "Since you refuse to treat your own wife nicely, someone else needs to pick up the slack, right?"

My world ended when my mate’s brother died. Caspian, Alpha of the Shadowmoon Pack, took in the widow, Vivian. He said it was his duty to provide for both households. He sent her son to the elite Lunaris Academy. He sent my son to the toxic Grey Zone, called it "building resilience." He gifted her the Blackwood Manor, bought her armored vehicles. He called me wasteful. He said my child was a burden. He threw us into the Omega slums. My son died fighting for a moldy crust of silver-tainted bread. I died soon after. My skull was cracked open in a dark alley for a few coins. As my spirit faded, I finally saw the truth. Every step of our ruin was her design. I woke up gasping, back in my old bed at the Shadowmoon Packhouse. The moon was high. Tomorrow was my Binding Ceremony to Caspian. This time, I knew what to do.

I am Alpha Liam’s fated mate. But at his Alpha ceremony, he publicly chose a low-ranking Omega to accompany him on his trials. His eyes were cold as he told me, “Chloe is a skilled negotiator. She can help me forge alliances with other packs. Even as my fated mate, you can’t compare.” What he didn’t know was that I was a trained negotiator, too. And just like that, everyone knew I had been rejected by my own fated mate. Four years later, Liam returned with a pregnant Chloe in tow. Seeing me in the manor, his gaze was strained and complex. “I can’t believe you waited for me for four years… but Chloe is already carrying my child.” “To make it up to you,” he said, “you can remain by my side and care for my heir.” But he had no idea that I had already married his uncle, the Alpha King, and become the Luna Queen, the most revered wolf in the world.

Vanessa’s life was falling apart. Her marriage has failed, her company made her redundant and the lease on her apartment is up and the landlord plans to sell. Fed up, miserable and alone, she buys a country manor and vows to start a new life. When she arrives, she discovers a house almost in the same condition as her life. The roof needs fixing, the plumbing is older than some countries and the draft blowing up her skirt seems to be the only thing brave enough to go near her lady parts for years. Then comes Clay. Gorgeous with smouldering green eyes and a V that can make any girl forget the rest of the alphabet, but 15 years younger than herself. Clay seems to be the handyman she needs to get everything sorted, including between the sheets. But with the town gossip ladies against them due to the age difference and Vanessa’s ex dead set on destroying her, could handyman Clay be the fresh start her heart desperately craves?

It had been ten years since Julliane was cast out by the very people she once called family. Her own mother and stepbrother had driven her away from Magnolia Manor-the grand estate owned by the Dankworth family. Now, after a decade of silence, Lance Dankworth, the eldest son of the man her mother had married, stood at her door. He came bearing grim news, her mother had been in a tragic accident. An event serious enough to require Julliane's return to the manor she had long left behind. Julliane couldn't forget how Lance used to see her. He'd branded her a troublemaker, a slut, even when she was just a girl. To him, she had brought nothing but shame and pain to his family. And yet, here he was, asking her to come back with him. She knew he despised her. So why, after all these years, was he suddenly asking her to stay-and worse, to marry him?