On Thin Ice Chapter 4

This is what we do. We fight, we fuck, and we pretend it's fixed. He rips his shirt over his head, the sound of tearing fabric loud in the silence. And I freeze. My hands, which were reaching for him, stop. There. Coiling over his ribs, wrapping around his side, crawling up toward his heart, is an identical replica of Madilyn’s tattoo. "Charlie," he breathes, but it doesn't sound like his voice. His hands are rough, grabbing my hips. One hand slides, pressing hard against my stomach. No. The baby. My baby.

My sister and I are twins, and we both have kidney failure. After a long wait, we finally find two matching kidneys. The doctor is prepared to transplant one for me and one for her. However, she breaks down in tears in my fiancé's arms—she wants both kidneys for herself. When I object, my fiancé locks me up at home. He has my sister undergo surgery to have both kidneys transplanted. "You haven't been sick for as long as your sister has. She just wants to live like a normal person—how can you be so selfish? Can't you wait for the next matching kidney?" He doesn't know that I can't wait any longer, though. I'm going to die soon.

I stand before the judges at the jewelry design competition and admit to plagiarism. Then, I announce my withdrawal from the contest, along with my resignation as Design Director of Fairchild Group. My fiance, Caleb Fairchild, shoots daggers at me. "If you walk away from this competition, our engagement is off!" My father follows up by slapping me across the face. "First, you plagiarize your own sister, and now you're breaking off your engagement with the Fairchilds? Are you trying to ruin our family?" "Oh, I'm not just calling off my engagement. I'm also cutting off my ties with you," I respond apathetically. I make this decision because I have been given a second life. In my previous life, my stepsister and I competed in this contest. First place earns the title of the nation's top jewelry designer and 50 million dollars from Fairchild Group. However, round after round, her designs are exactly the same as mine, and she submits them before I do. The judging panel gives me a pass because of Caleb and lets me advance to the finals, but not without a warning to never plagiarize again. I refuse to believe it. I switch to a brand-new computer, lock myself in my room, and pour everything into a new design. Yet, when the final designs appear on the big screen, history repeats itself. In the end, my sister takes first place and walks away with everything that should have been mine. The reputation I painstakingly built is ruined, and my name is dragged through the mud online. My parents are ashamed of me. They knock me out and sell me off to the countryside to marry an old man. Ultimately, I die after endless abuse. When I open my eyes again, I'm back at the semifinals. Everyone is pointing at me as they stare at the two identical designs.

On the day of my birthday banquet, Grandpa asks me which of the Sterling family's daughters I want to marry. I choose the Sterling family's fifth daughter without hesitation, which surprises my family elders. After all, everyone in our circle knows that I, the eldest son of the Hamiltons, am deeply in love with the eldest daughter of the Sterling family, Violet, spoiling and indulging her to an outrageous degree. In my previous life, I did marry Violet. But after only three months, I discovered that Violet was having secret meetings with my illegitimate half-brother, Sebastian Hamilton. At the time, her eyes filled with tears as she looked at me pitifully. "Please, I'm begging you. This really was just an accident." My heart softened, but Grandpa still found out and ordered people to send Sebastian far away to another country. Violet assumed it was my doing and hated me to the bone. In the years that followed, the company's confidential information was stolen. I was killed in a car accident on the very day she discovered she was pregnant. Given a second chance at life, I decide to let the lovebirds be together. But unexpectedly, after the news of my engagement is announced, Violet appears in a wedding dress, crying and begging to marry me.

"Just because we're married, doesn't make us a real couple. Take it as a contract" He said in a business tone before leaving. "Like I want to be with you" I muttered under my breath as my tears threatened to spill. Natalie learns that she has been promised to the eldest son of the mighty and powerful Maxfields. She has no choice but to accept reality and decides to proceed with the arranged marriage her parents and grandparents had fixed, long ago. Little did she know that she would be treated as a contract wife. ------------------------------------------- "You force your children to get married. Force them to fall in love as if they were key operated toys and now that they've fallen in love, you want to separate them?" Natalie questions, tears threatening to fall, her voice almost on the verge of breaking. ------------------------------------------- Read more to find out All the images that I use in the story belong to the rightful owners. I do not own any of them.

During the mating ball, Rhea, the omega she-wolf who lost her parents for unknown reasons, finds out that her fated mate is no other than Matthew- her childhood friend who became a handsome man. However, he rejected and despises her as his fated mate because his father unfolds the truth about her identity that she has a witch running through her vein. Being a cursed Omega witch, she ran from the fear of becoming the most hated woman in the entire pack. What fate awaits Rhea and how determined is Matthew to fight for his childhood sweetheart knowing that his father would do everything to separate them? What is the real reason behind Rhea's parents' death? Are they still together when the world seemed to be against their romance?

*Abandoning ship isn’t my style. It wasn’t hers either, but our circumstances ripped us apart. Now it’s not just a literal ocean standing between us. Francine Chirilova has no direction. After coming out of the closet leaves her without a family at age 18, the quick witted 25 year old has been forced to survive on her connections and kind personality. Throw in a rapidly decreasing appetite and a tendency to gravitate toward abusive women for a epic shit show. While recovering from her latest 4 year long mistake, she makes a strong, yet unlikely connection with her virtual best friend. Que in recovering alcoholic Vasilisa Krovopuskova, aged 26 from Siberia, Russia. After surviving a grueling upbringing on her own, trust is a difficult concept to grasp. Already having experienced heartbreak once before, she wasn’t looking for anything serious when Francine crash landed into her life via an online sanctuary for lesbians. With an ocean separating the two, neither Francine nor Vasilisa know which direction to swim in. Will they stay on their side of the world, or drown trying to get to the other? *Disclaimer* - Strong mature content. 18+, please Book one. To follow is book two: “Our Blank Canvas.”

When a child mysteriously disappears from a small town and even his mother seems indifferent, it’s time for the new sheriff to step in. Meet Chris Baker, the new sheriff of the quiet Adirondack town of Clifton Heights. As one inexplicable case after another forces him to confront the townsfolk in The Skylark Diner, it’s the furtive Gavin Patchett that hands Chris a collection of not-so-fictional short stories that tumbles him into a world of monsters, ageless demons, and vengeful citizens. As Chris reads through the stories the veil starts to lift, and he soon questions what is real and what’s not, and whether he really wants to know. Nothing will ever be the same again. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Jack immigrated to an equal world and locked on to a Judge System that gave compensations to rebuffing evil. Subsequently, an Adjudicator of Death who remained exempt from the rules that everyone else follows was consequently conceived. A livestream channel named Deathstream Channel subsequently showed up in different major livestream stages, with an appointed authority's pen and a Death Notice shipped off each lawbreaker.

My husband threw me into the crocodile pit to help his childhood sweetheart, who was a KOL, gain popularity. To make the live stream more realistic, he personally tossed bait at me. “Have you not eaten? My grandma can run faster than you!” He watched as I bled from my abdomen, believing I was just pretending to be pitiful. When I asked for a divorce, he kicked me to the ground. “Since you love pretending to be pitiful to ask for a divorce, why didn’t you just let the crocodile kill you?” I handed him a medical report. “My child died because of you. Does this count as pretending to be pitiful?”