Helga G Pataki Hey Arnold

Excerpt; Mate!” I placed a shocked hand over my mouth. I hadn't intended to blurt that out, but it had just happened. My wolf had just growled that out. Aaron was my mate? So he had not been lying when he’d said I was his mate? This was the strangest thing to have ever happened to me. I had no idea how to respond, I sat still, watching him. “Finally, you agree too.” His face was blanketed in some emotions that had something within my chest moving funny. “I…I…” I swallowed, my gaze transfixed on him, in his eyes, unable to look anywhere else. His sterling grey eyes staring as though they could see through my soul. He drew nearer, I felt my body leaning towards him too. And in seconds our lips had locked on each other’s. Fire exploded in my mouth down to the other parts of my body. I wound my arm around his neck, taking the kiss deeper. Even within the confines of the car where body contact was limited, I was still feeling the flame of attraction burning me up greedily, eating away at my resistance and rationality. His thumb trailed over my breast, the moan that escaped my lips was involuntary and the liquid pull below my stomach grew intense. Abruptly, he broke off the kiss, our lips were a swollen evidence of what had happened. “Let me take you inside.” Humiliated for almost all her life and then thrown out of the pack she had grown to call home, she didn't expect that fate could ever smile at her. Once a taunted girl, now an Alpha's stepdaughter. What more does fate have in stall for her? "Hey mate! Wanna play?"

"Oh, dear officer, would you like to play a game?" The Mafia asked, twirling a knife in his hands. "Game? The only game I know it's sending you to jail," Wade took out the handcuffs and wanted to cuff his hands. Suddenly before Wade knew it, he was spun around and pushed against the wall. Shit! Did this bastard just handcuffed him?! "Hey! How dare you -" "Handcuffed an officer?" The man laughed wickedly. Wade's face paled and he froze. Fuck! This bastard tricked him! "Officer," the man dragged his finger across Wade's lips seductively, "How dare you enter my territory without my permission?" "Y-you," Wade's body shook with rage. Who was this man?! His fighting skills were obviously better than his, yet he had been pretending all along! "You must be curious about me," His fingers caressed the curve in Wade's back, sending a shiver down his spine. What happens when duty clashes with an irresistible attraction to a dangerous enemy? Newly appointed police chief Wade Harrington is on a relentless mission to cleanse the city of crime. As he delves into a perplexing missing person case, he stumbles into the lair of the world's most notorious criminal, the enigmatic Mafia King, Vincenzo Luciano. Vincenzo is a master of getting under Wade's skin, challenging him at every turn, and haunting his dreams. As their confrontations intensify, the lines between duty and desire blur, igniting a fiery passion neither can deny. Destined to be enemies, like oil and water, Wade and Vincenzo are inexplicably drawn to each other. Their encounters spark a dangerous game of cat and mouse, where Wade's attempts to capture Vincenzo only lead him deeper into the Mafia King's seductive grasp. Will Wade uphold his duty, or will he succumb to the magnetic pull of his greatest adversary?

My husband's protégé boasted she could disarm bombs blindfolded, relying on her so-called intuition. Her reckless misjudgment triggered a bomb's secondary detonation sequence, endangering an entire building. I intervened, using the dangerous liquid nitrogen condensation method to save the day. As a result, Rita Smith was removed from frontline duties and placed under investigation. Patrick Munoz tried to defend her, but I stopped him cold. "If you back her now, you won't just fail to save her. You'll be dragged down with her." Crushed by the pressure, Rita staged an accident that killed her, leaving a letter blaming him for abandoning her in her hour of need. He said nothing, only preserving her letter in his study. Years later, he became a nationally renowned bomb disposal expert. During a terrorist attack, I was strapped to a timed explosive. He arrived to defuse it but repeated Rita's fatal mistake. As the timer ticked down, he gave a bitter laugh. "Rita was just nervous back then. If I'd supported her, she'd be a hero today." The bomb detonated, leaving nothing of me behind. When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the point when he tried to defend Rita. He didn't know that the building housed the nation's top-secret core server.

Three years ago, my rich boyfriend, Steven Delaney, went into bankruptcy. He decided to break up with me so that he wouldn't drag me down. As I looked at his broken expression, I steeled my heart and ripped the overseas college application I had just received. "I'll stay with you. Together, we can rebuild your legacy." Everyone told me that I was nuts. Still, I decided to move into a damp basement room with Steven. After that, I took on a job out in the streets that allowed me to earn money the fastest, which was promoting beer to the customers. One day, when I'm delivering beer to the customers, one of them calls out to me. "Hey, this lady looks like you!" There are two screens being shown on a livestream, that's being replayed. The left screen shows me crouching at the doorway of the basement while washing shirts for Steven. It's so cold that my fingers have gone completely red. The right screen shows him all dressed up in a smart-looking suit. He has an arm wrapped around a beautiful and well-dressed woman, and they're both sitting in a luxury car. Steven smiles at the camera and says, "This is my third year lying to my girlfriend about my financial situation. Till now, she still hasn't realized the truth! She really is a pathetic idiot!" The live comments keep popping up on the side. "You really know how to make things interesting, Mr. Delaney! I can't believe you're capable of coming up with the whole 'pretending to be broke in order to test your girlfriend's humanity' act!" "What exactly is that lady aiming for, honestly? She's just someone who sells beer! Does she seriously think she's in a romance drama?" "Oh, this is hilarious! That penniless girlfriend of his is even washing underwear for him! The truth is, the underwear belongs to the Delaney family's household staff!"

"What am I to you? A trash picker?" I asked him sarcastically, looking at him from head to toe in disdain. "Lauren." he growled, clenching his fists tightly, glaring at me in disbelief. "Yeah, I know this is my name. You don't need to remind me, and please don't pop up in front of me like an unwanted ad in the middle of an interesting scene. You irritate me the most in this way." I scolded him, still with an ugly expression in disgust on my face. "So, now I disgust you, huh? Why didn't you disgust before when I." "Because I was a fool back then. I assumed a filthy rock as a gem and paid a heavy price for that." Before he could complete his sentence, I interrupted him, scolding him in a loud voice. His already widened angry eyes widened more in shock this time. I took a step forward while locking my gaze with him. "A scum like you who used me when he needed me and then slapped the divorce paper doesn't deserve even a glance from me, Gabriel. Never bother me again, or else what I will do to you, you can't even think about that." "Hey, babe. Why are you here?" I beamed when I heard his magnetic voice calling me from behind. I immediately moved towards him when Gabriel held my wrist. "You are making a mistake, Lauren," he warned me in a stiff voice. I yanked my hand from his grip and threw a disgusting gaze on him before walking towards the boy who treated me like a treasure. Gabriel’s devotion to his first love made me realize that loving myself is the only thing that can make me happy forever. I grabbed Vincent's arm with a beaming smile.

Mom and I board a flight to Fangoria to visit Alicia Carter, my wife. She's a special forces soldier who's here on a peacekeeping mission in this foreign country. But the moment we walk out of the airport, we're ambushed by a group of kidnappers. One of them holds a gun to Mom's head and says, "If you don't give us the ransom in three days, we'll blow her head off!" In a panic, I make a video call to Alicia, my hands shaking as I beg her to help me. "Calm down, honey. I'll put in a request to lead a rescue mission. We'll save her within 24 hours!" But the next day, I keep failing to get in touch with Alicia. After I blow up her phone with multiple calls, one finally connects. Amid her rushed panting, she tells me, "Sorry, honey. I just got assigned to an urgent escort mission. You guys just hang in there. I've arranged for the local authorities to—" Her voice is abruptly cut off by a familiar male voice. "Alicia! Thank goodness you came over just to pick me up. I didn't have to spend 100 dollars on a cab after all! That cab driver didn't even have a license, and I can't believe he tried to ask for more money…" The three-day deadline passes, and the kidnappers keep their word, letting me hear the gunshot myself. As I clutch Mom's cold, dead body, Alicia calls me out of nowhere. "Hey, honey. I just completed the escort mission. How are things on your end? Have the kidnappers released her?" I look down at Mom. Her eyes will never open again. I gently wipe the blood off her face as I reply to Alicia in an eerily calm voice, "Yeah. They have."

"Oh my goodness! This is exactly what I've been saying!" Mikan said, annoyed. "Why do you still refuse to break up with that Jiro? What does he have?" "M, it's normal for lovers to have disagreements," I replied calmly. "K, he's always the one causing issues. Aren't you tired of it?" Selena asked me. I shook my head. "I understand him, girls. Sometimes I'm moody too. Maybe his temper just flared up at the wrong time." I've been defending Jiro to them since we started dating in my second year of high school, and now we're in our fourth year of college. We had another argument recently, and I've been apologizing to him since the other day, even though I didn't know what I did wrong. But he hasn't been answering any of my texts or calls. So tonight, even though I didn't want to go with them to the Spade Club, I had no choice because they dragged me along. I just hope Jiro doesn't find out about this because he doesn't like it when I go clubbing without him. It might make him even angrier. "I think there's nothing we can do about Kylie. She's head over heels for Jiro," Ariana said. Ariana isn't this quiet usually when she's drunk. They all laughed while I forced a smile. Go ahead, laugh at me, but when you fall in love, I'll be rolling on the floor laughing. "Alright, cheers to Kylie's love madness," Mikan raised her shot glass, and A and S followed suit, while I watched them. I just sighed. "Hey! K, don't be a killjoy. Come on, raise your shot glass!" Selena shouted at me because the music was loud in the Spade Club. It was already ten in the evening.

“Two weeks. That’s how long it took my husband to ruin everything.” Kennedie Peterson thought she had it all, married to her childhood sweetheart, fresh off a dreamy honeymoon, and ready to start a new chapter. But her fairytale crumbles when she walks in on her new husband tangled in the sheets with her best friend. Betrayal slices deeper than heartbreak, and suddenly, the life she thought was hers vanishes overnight. Humiliated and furious, Kennedie doesn’t fall apart, she plots revenge. Enter Desmond Knight is a ruthless billionaire, her late father’s former protégé, and a man who owes her family more than he’ll admit. Cold, calculating, and dangerously magnetic, Desmond offers her the perfect opportunity for payback. She’ll be his, at least on paper. A fake relationship, a strategic alliance... and maybe, just maybe, a way to take back her power. But revenge is a treacherous game. As Desmond pulls her deeper into his world, one filled with corporate warfare, family secrets, and seductive tension. Kennedie realizes she might have traded one dangerous man for another. Lines blur. Hearts race. And when everything starts to feel real, she’s left wondering: In a world built on lies, betrayal, and twisted loyalty... Is love just another illusion? Or the ultimate revenge?

A month before the SATs, I, Jenny Reid, could see my score. Literally. It was just floating right above my head. But there was a catch. Every time I cracked open a prep book, my score would drop by ten points. But if I skipped a day of school? It jumped right back up by ten. So, I played the system. For a whole month, I barely lifted a finger. And on the day of the test, the number glowing over my head was a solid 1560. When the scores finally dropped online… I'd scored a 500. And the 1560? That was my little sister Patricia's score. My parents lost it. As punishment, they got me a grueling night-shift job at a local electronics factory. That first night, a bunch of guys I'd never seen before cornered me in the parking lot and beat me half to death. Fading in and out of consciousness, I heard my sister's voice right by my ear. "You just had to one-up me, didn't you? Thought you were so smart… but you never figured out I was the one controlling that number over your head." The truth hit me like a physical blow. The score had been her trick all along. I opened my eyes—and I was back. One month before the SATs. The number above my head read exactly 1300. "Hey," my sister said, all fake sweetness. "Want to study together tonight? We can go over the practice tests." I looked at the stack of papers in my own hands. Without a word, I pulled out my lighter and set them on fire right there in the driveway. "Exams are coming," I said, watching the flames. "I'm not studying." My score ticked up to 1310. My sister's face was this perfect mask of disappointment, but the second I turned away, I caught the sly smile she couldn't quite hide. She had no idea… the real performance, the one I'd been rehearsing just for her, was finally about to begin.

At a high school reunion, my wife, Hillary Sheffer, known for her great luck in gambling, ends up losing three million dollars to her first love, Shane Norris. This amount included the two million dollars that we had set aside to buy a new house as well as the life-saving money that I needed for my mom's brain surgery. I'm so furious that all I feel is iciness permeating my pores. Then, I question Hillary angrily, "Did you lose to Shane on purpose? I've never seen you lose before when you gambled during family gatherings!" But Hillary turns her head away from me righteously. "There's no such thing as full confidence in winning every game when it comes to gambling. All I can do is cough up the payment whenever I lose. "Besides, it's difficult enough for Shane to raise his own kid after getting divorced. What's wrong with me lending him a helping hand? "You're a grown-up now, Lucas. Stop being so stingy and petty." As Shane wraps an arm around Hillary's shoulders, he pushes the die toward me. Mockery can be seen plastered all over his face. "Hey, Lucas, you should be a good sport and know how to accept defeat gracefully. You already have Hillary as your wife. Meanwhile, I just want some money from her. Isn't this fair enough? "Then again, I can give you a chance. Let's go for one more round, you and me. If you win, I'll return the money to you." Everyone else begins cheering us on, eager to watch an exciting drama unfold. I don't respond to Shane at all. Instead, I pick up the die. After leaving Harkensalle, I've sworn that I will never touch anything related to gambling ever again. I never thought that I'd end up breaking that vow in less than three years.