I Chose

After the 100th failed fertility treatment, my husband, who had been previously diagnosed with a low sperm count, spoke coldly. “Lucy is very fertile. She gets pregnant after our first time, unlike you. You just can’t conceive.” Lucy was my adoptive sister. While holding her hand, he laid out three options for me. I could either ignore their affair and retain my title as the CEO’s wife, take the ten million dollars and disappear, or walk away with nothing at all. The whole town knew how proud I was. They also knew how deeply I loved him. They surely expected me to be mad with jealousy and choose honor over compromise. But I neither cried nor made a scene. I calmly slid the check back across the table. “The child will call me Mom. I’ll stay and be Mrs. Carter.” After all, this was my third time to live such a life. The first time, I chose to leave with nothing but my dignity. The second time, I took the money, but had to live in shame. Both decisions ended in tragedy. For the third time, perhaps three of us could just... make it work.

Everyone in the pack knew that my mate Damien loved me fiercely. After our mating ceremony, Damien gave me three bonding gifts. The first was a protective amulet he'd prayed three days and three nights for at the Moon Goddess shrine. The second was a sculpture he spent months carving with his own hands. The third was a diamond ring — the symbol of the Luna — priceless, and with it came the authority to govern the pack. On my birthday, he went searching for a moonstone and was ambushed by rogue wolves. He fell off a cliff. When he woke, his memory was gone. A bar hostess had rescued him. They fell in love. But the day before their mating ceremony, his memories returned, and he came back to me without hesitation. Just when I thought he'd ended things with her, on the very day I found out I was pregnant, I received a video — an intimate recording of the two of them together. Vivian was already carrying his child, nestled against Damien like a helpless little bird. "You're carrying my child. I won't abandon you. As for Elena — a few sweet words and she'll do whatever I say." I turned off my phone and sent a mind-link to my father. "Dad. The arranged mating you set up for me — I accept."

In order to avenge Lily Bauer, an orphan staying with the Frostfang pack, Ethan Hawkins doesn't show up at the agreed time on the day of our betrothal party. He only sends his Beta to my door with a message. "Last time, you injured Lily with wolfsbane pollen, humiliating her at the pack gathering. Today is just a lesson. Apologize to Lily and send over the necklace she likes, and then we'll get betrothed." Overnight, I become the laughingstock of the entire pack. My brother, Ryan Fuller, says, "Lily just lost her parents. Let her vent her anger. Ethan is meant to be your mate anyway. Delaying your betrothal by a few days is no big deal." Really? It isn't a big deal? The Frostfang pack's ancestral token isn't something just anyone can covet. I turn around and grip the wolf-shaped crest offered by the Blackwood pack. "I accept the Blackwood pack's proposal for a mate alliance."

It’s been a stormy three weeks for Benita Dawson. It all started when Gaby fell ill, then it took the most unexpected turn. The truth behind her marriage of ten years unraveled! Benita Dawson wasn’t loved, she was being used. She had chosen him against her father’s wishes, only to uncover that she was just being used? They were the dream couple in college. For them, the word “college sweethearts” was formed. Was it all a lie? When Benita discovers the truth, she will stop at nothing to bring him down. With his billionaire brother by her side of course. Cilian Dawson is finally out of prison. He has vowed to take down his enemy, the one who put him there. “I’m not just taking back what’s mine— I’m taking everything he’s values. The company. His status. His perfect little wife. One by one, I’ll strip him bare. And you’ll be the first thing he loses.”

Before the day of my husband's succession as the Don, my stepsister personally tattooed the "Inverted Angel's Eye"—the mark of a traitor—onto my back. My husband didn't just turn a blind eye; when the family vendetta broke out, he withdrew all the elite guards to protect my "pregnant" stepsister, leaving me alone in a defenseless city to face the slaughter.  "Elena, you are strong enough to protect yourself. But Sophia is fragile, and she is carrying my firstborn. She needs the protection more than you." Facing a siege of heavy firepower, I survived by the skin of my teeth. He thought I would swallow the insult for the sake of the family's reputation. He didn't expect that I would kick open the doors of his coronation ceremony wearing mourning weeds, flanked by the FBI and the Commission, and personally strip him of his title. "Goodbye, Lorenzo. This time, I choose to be the Don."

The 99th time my fiancé, Draven, hung up on me, I dragged myself to the family's church, my diagnosis of end-stage renal disease clutched in my hand. "Father, I wish to renounce the Rocci family and break off my engagement to Draven Frost." The words had barely left my lips when my parents burst in with my adopted sister, Bianca. My father, the family's Consigliere, didn't hesitate. He slapped me across the face, right there in front of the priest. "Your fiancé is a respected Capo in our world, and you choose to insult him like this!" "You're dragging our family's name through the mud in front of the whole organization!" My mother snatched the diagnosis from my hand, sneering after a brief glance. "Playing sick for attention again, are you? What is it you want this time?" My adopted sister, Bianca, clung to our parents' arms, her voice choked with tears. "I'm so sorry, sister. You can have my place at the gala. Please, just stop making trouble for Mom and Dad!" I wiped the blood trickling from my nose and calmly repeated my words to the priest. "I am no longer a daughter of the Rocci family. I am not worthy of an alliance with the Frosts." "I will be dead in three days. I want this engagement broken before then."

When I was eight months pregnant, I received an anonymous email. The attachment was a security camera recording. In a dimly lit VIP booth at a bar, my husband — a vampire who had lived for three hundred years — was holding a human woman in his arms, kissing her. At the end of the video, the woman smiled and asked him, "Adrian, do you really love me?" Adrian's voice was low. "Of course." "Even though you're human, I'll make you the happiest vampire bride in the world." He had said those exact words to me ten years ago. In that moment, my hand rested on my belly. The baby kicked once. As if reminding me. It was time to wake up.

My husband, Theodore, was about to take his childhood sweetheart, Rosalie, around the world in a hot-air balloon when I was kidnapped by his enemy. They were about to throw me into a snake pit. I gave up asking Theodore for help and called my father-in-law instead. In my previous life, I begged Theodore to save me, even kneeling in front of the phone camera. Hence, he abandoned the hot-air balloon ride with Rosalie and rushed to negotiate with the kidnapper. Rosalie was all alone and angry. She took another hot-air balloon, but it exploded mid-way, causing her to die on the spot without even leaving behind an intact corpse. Hearing the bad news, Theodore showed a rare calm expression. He seemed to forget about Rosalie's existence and took me on a trip around the world. As we were sailing in Norwol, he suddenly pushed me into the sea. "I should never have saved you. Snake pit? Kidnapper? How could they have had the courage to push you into it? I should've never saved you if I knew it'd kill Rosalie. You should go to hell sooner!" When I opened my eyes again, I had come back to the day I was kidnapped. This time, I chose not to call for help. Humble love would only leave you bruised and battered.

My Alpha fiancé made me drink a witch's memory potion on our mating ceremony day so he could bond with my stepsister instead. "Serena is under a vicious curse. Only bonding with a powerful Alpha can break it." "Aria, you're the only one I love. I don't want to hurt you, so if you drink this memory potion, you'll temporarily forget the person you love most. Once I help Serena break her curse, you can take the antidote and recover your memories." "Then I'll break the bond with Serena and make you the most honored Luna of our pack." I didn't hesitate. I drank the entire vial in one gulp. But he didn't know the witch never created a corresponding antidote. In seven days, I would forget him forever.

At 4:30 in the morning, my husband answered a call from his ex-girlfriend and accidentally put it on speaker. "Jason, my daughter, Alison, has a fever—over 104. I can't get a ride..." The sudden sound of sobbing jolted me awake. Jason hurriedly turned off the speaker and lowered his voice. "Send me your location. I'll come right away." It seemed he had forgotten that today was my first prenatal checkup.