I Ll Be The One

Everyone is envious of me for having someone like Dominic Cruz, who's love-brained, as a husband-to-be. He's rich, handsome, and highly educated. I smile without saying anything, but I nod happily. However, on the day I'm misdiagnosed, he goes missing. He's so engrossed in his secret lover that he forgets all about me. So, I jilt him before he can do it to me. I turn him into the city's laughingstock. Later, I hear that he drinks the bar dry every night. He scours Marina City but fails to find his missing bride.

In my previous life, my husband, Lucien Walker, tells me he wants to take care of his widowed sister-in-law, Lina Morgan, and take her as his second wife. After I refuse, Lina throws herself off a cliff while pregnant, killing both herself and the pups. As the Wolf King, Lucien chains me on a clifftop and lets vultures tear at my flesh day after day. He gouges out my eyes and snarls, "You lied about your fertility to trick me, then drove Lina and her unborn pups to their deaths! This is your punishment!" My son, Pierce Walker, whom I pour my life into raising, stabs me 9,999 times. "If Lina were my mother, I would be strong. This is all your fault!" They never know that without my gift for bearing children, Lucien has no heir at all. When I open my eyes again, I'm back on the day Lucien proposes taking Lina as his second wife.

Marshall Locke, the assistant working for my wife, Amelia Stone, leaves out three zeroes on a contract. It leads to ten million dollars in losses for the company. The factory that has collaborated with us on the project goes bankrupt, and its owner jumps off a building as a result of the situation. All Marshall does is shed a few tears, and Amelia immediately pins all the blame on me. She claims I single-handedly managed the entire project. I get sued in court, which leaves me ten million dollars in debt. When the deceased's family posts about me online, the entire internet curses me out, saying that I should die too. My entire industry blacklists me. The career I've painstakingly built up for myself is destroyed just like that. But when I confront Amelia about this, she simply looks at her freshly manicured nails and says airily, "Marshall is young and inexperienced. You've been in the business for so many years now. It's not like this has caused any damage to you." Recalling the way she and Marshall had been wrapped up in a passionate kiss before I came in, I pull out the divorce agreement I prepared in advance and toss it at her. "Sign it."

My adoptive parents' long-lost daughter came back. She's a wellness influencer. She eats from crystal bowls she "cleansed." Sleeps with a white noise machine. She will only ride in a custom, climate-controlled car. That's not all. She filled our family's Manhattan law firm with Himalayan salt lamps and energy crystals. The espresso in the conference room? Replaced with gluten-free, organic dandelion root tea. "The energy here is so murky," she'd say. "We need to cleanse the world with love and light!" My guilt-ridden parents gave her everything she wanted. Even my fiancé told me, "Ava, you stole twenty years of her Upper East Side life. Can't you cut her some slack?" The day of the final hearing for our firm's biggest case, the entire court had to wait for her to finish her "emotional cleansing meditation." The judge was furious. I stood up. Delivered a flawless closing argument. I won our client $500 million and secured the future of the firm. But at the party, she had a drunken breakdown, fell into the pool, and drowned. My parents and my fiancé blamed me for everything. "You always have to win, don't you? It was a simple, open-and-shut case. You couldn't even let her have that?" They had me committed to a psychiatric hospital. They destroyed my law license and my reputation. They even had me injected with a fatal overdose of sedatives. I died full of hate. The next time I opened my eyes, I was back. Back to the day she was crying on her Instagram Live, begging for the case. This time, I walked straight into our rival's law firm. This "sure-win" case? I'm going to make you lose everything.

"Mommy, Mommy! Look at that mister! Will I be as handsome as him when I grow up?" Liam's question forced me to look at where his finger pointed. "Holy f—" I cut myself off, trying not to curse in front of my son. Why, why, why did I have to run into Alexander Ravenford as soon as I walked out of the airport?! Among the millions of people living in New York, I surely didn't want to meet one—Liam's biological father. Five years ago, my scumbag of a boyfriend cheated on me, and I decided to go on a genuinely therapeutic weekend in the Bahamas. I wasn't looking for a rebound, but somehow I ended up spending a decent amount of time having sex with a man who was basically a stranger—a divinely hot, insanely mouthwatering, and ridiculously irresistible Alexander Ravenford. The morning after brought a disappointing hit in the gut, which assured me that for my Prince Charming, I was only a one-time adventure. But screw that, and screw him! I had plans. I was ready to pursue my dreams and study in London. But then fate decided to throw me another curved ball... I was pregnant, and Alex was the only possible father. I didn't give up. I came back as a successful interior designer and the mother of an amazing boy, Liam. I thought that I would be able to avoid Alexander, but it turned out to be almost impossible. But then it got worse… The arrogant, annoying, and even hotter than before CEO of a multibillion-dollar company became friends with my son—his son! And I have a feeling that the sweet little devil who calls me "Mommy" has a mischievous plan to bring his parents together. Should I give this insane relationship a chance?

Just as Justin proposed to me, a phone call interrupted him. Standing close by, I clearly heard the voice on the other end of the line. “Justin, I’m hurt. My leg hurts so much!” Justin snapped the ring box shut and looked at me. “Alice is injured. I’ll have to do this another time.” With those words, he sprinted away, leaving everyone around us staring in astonishment. I had never met Alice, but her presence lingered in every corner of our lives.  At meals, Justin would mention her fondness for sweet desserts.  When I dressed, I came to know her love for soft lavender hues. I argued, I wept, I lashed out, but Justin always countered with the same line. “You’re so jealous. Everyone has their first love. She’s my past, but you’re my future.” So, I turned to a man who had once called me his first love—Quentin—and made a bold proposition. “Let’s get married.”

On the anniversary of my mother’s death, my girlfriend told me she had to work overtime. However, her first love later posted something on social media: [Thanks to Camelia for coming to celebrate my birthday with me!] My chest tightened and my hands shook as I called her to demand an explanation. She replied calmly, “It’s Grayson’s 25th birthday today. It’s important. I didn’t want to miss it.” That was it. I let out a bitter laugh and looked down at the cancer diagnosis report in my hand. It was alright. I would be dead soon anyway.

After being reborn into a new world, the system assigned me four male leads and a mission to complete. As long as I successfully won over one of them, I would be able to come back to life, as I had died in a car accident in my original world. However, I failed with all four. Every one of them fell in love with the female lead of that world instead. Because of that, they turned their hostility toward me, hurling cruel words and even telling me to die. In the end, I failed my mission, and I chose to leave that world. Only when they saw my body did they completely break down.

Maude Ellington's fiance sends a message to his first love before their wedding. "You've always been the one I wanted to marry." With their wedding fast approaching, Maude watches him meticulously plan every detail with his first love in mind. She quietly lets it all go. Because she no longer wants the wedding. And she no longer wants him.

Does the heart remember who it once loved? What happens if someone else possesses this heart and the actual owner is gone? How can he fight the feeling if his rival is his best friend? And worse, she is his best friend's first love. Should he just let go, even though he knows he will be hurt a second time, or follow his heart even if he hurts someone else?