Riego Family Tree

I always thought my wife was just an ordinary "brother-loving sister," the kind who would do anything for her brother. But one night, I watched in frozen horror as she dismembered her brother in our storage room. Then, as if nothing had happened, she turned and looked straight at me. She flashed her usual gentle smile. "Honey," she called softly, her voice sweet and familiar—exactly the same as always.

The fake daughter married my boyfriend. My mouth was taped and I was being chopped into pieces by her admirer. The entire family took turns to call me. My mother said, "How ungrateful you are. I should not have brought you home back then." Father added, "Don't bother coming back if you do not attend Samantha's wedding." Brother said, "Let me tell you, you shall root in hell if you choose not to attend the wedding." At that moment, I didn't even have the energy to shout for help due to excessive blood loss. Everyone lost their patience, "Speak up! Are you dead or what?" I could only see the calls being disconnected. One thing they did not know, I was really dead.

After five years of marriage, the doctor told me I was pregnant. It was something I had waited for so long. Yet, along with that good news came a nightmare. My medical tests showed that I had cancer, and it had already spread. The doctor gave me less than a month to live. I froze, gripping the report so tightly my knuckles turned white. Tears streamed down my face as I thought about how my unborn child would never get to feel a mother's embrace. My grief was interrupted by the ping of an incoming text message. It was from Mom. [Since you're so selfish and refuse to donate a kidney to save Nattie's life, you should divorce Davon. Let him marry Nattie instead. At least that way, you can fulfill her dying wish.] My tears fell harder. It was not that I refused to donate a kidney to Natalie Rivera, my sister, who was in the final stages of kidney disease. In truth, I only had one kidney left. Five years ago, I had already given one to Dad. Now, with my life counting down to its final days, I decided that I would donate my remaining kidney to Natalie. I would also let my husband, Davon Parker, go with her. Before I went into surgery, my parents praised me for finally being thoughtful, saying I had finally learned to care about my sister. They said that once the surgery was over, the whole family would go on vacation together. Davon even said he was proud that I was no longer selfish and promised he would make it up to me in the future. None of them knew I did not have a future. After the surgery, what would be pushed out of the operating room would be a cold, lifeless body.

When enemies came seeking revenge, my brother was off with his first love, chasing a golden sunrise over the mountains. I didn't beg him to save us. Instead, I dragged my sister-in-law to safety, dodging killers. In my last life, my brother rushed home, but his first love got caught in an avalanche. Before she passed, she texted him, accusing me and my sister-in-law of humiliating her with money and threatening her to leave him. The fateful trip was her final wish. Her death crushed me with guilt, but my brother dismissed it, holding a perfunctory funeral for her before moving on. I thought he had recommitted to his family, but while my sister-in-law recovered from childbirth, he slipped poison into our meal. "How do I have such a vile sister like you?" he spat. "And you... I only married you for family interests. You two killed the love of my life!" He set the house on fire, burning us alive. Even his newborn son wasn't spared. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on that fateful day.

When my mind-link request had been ignored by my parents for the twentieth time, I went to the Werewolf Council, clutching the report on silver dust corrosion in my hand. “Hello. I’d like to renounce my pack identity—effective immediately.” Ten minutes later, my parents burst in, dragging my adoptive younger sister, Elsa, with them, panic written all over their faces. The door burst open with a bang, and my Beta father charged in like a storm. His fangs bared, claws twitching. “You’re nothing but a spoiled brat craving attention! Stop this pathetic act. You’re an embarrassment to a Beta’s name!” My mother, a forensic specialist for the pack, immediately snatched the report from my hand. After a brief glance, she let out a cold sneer. “You faked this report just to get our attention? You’ve been a liar since you were a pup.” Elsa clung to both of them, tears in her eyes as she sobbed, “I’m sorry, Jenifer. It’s my fault for holding the shifting ritual. But please... don’t lie to our parents just to make them feel guilty!” Blood was still pouring from my nose, but I wiped it away calmly and stood tall before the werewolf councilors once more. “I haven’t had a real family for a long time. Please—remove all my personal records from the pack. I just don’t want my funeral—scheduled for three days from now—to be delayed.”

I’m Isabella Russo, the mafia princess everyone loves to hate. Adrian Moretti—ice-cold underboss in a tailored suit—was sent to “discipline” me. I torched his villa, wrecked his meetings, even tried to make him lose control. At night, he did. Against glass, leather, marble—he taught me surrender and I hated how much I craved it. Then I learned the truth: Adrian was only a mask. His real name is Leon Moretti—heir to the empire and the fiancé promised to me since birth. It should have been a fairytale. Except my parents crowned a miracle sister who wasn’t a miracle at all. Elena slipped into my room, my heirloom, my future—and into his arms. When I was framed, caged in a walk-in freezer, whipped for a lie, he chose her. So I sold the engagement for $200M, left a single recording as proof, and vanished. By the time Leon becomes Don, he finally listens—to the tape that proves Elena’s an impostor… and to the echo of my footsteps leaving him for good. Now the most dangerous man in New York is done being careful. He’s hunting the woman he broke.

After being pushed down the stairs by my husband's first love, I suffered a difficult labor with our second child and died in a corner of their family's private hospital. Before I died, my six-year-old son cried and begged for his father to save me. The first time, Shawn sneered. "Your mom's gotten smarter, using you to play the victim and trick people." After that, he flung my son's hand away and left heartlessly. The second time, my son told him I was bleeding uncontrollably. Shawn was clearly impatient. "She's being so dramatic, it's just a miscarriage, nothing serious. She's always made mountains out of molehills!" After chasing my son away, he even told the doctors not to care for me. "It's my fault for spoiling her. She'll know what she did wrong once I let her have a hard time for a few days." The last time, my son went to my husband's first love Jasmine, kneeling in front of her and knocking his head on the ground, begging her. Shawn flew into a rage and ordered bodyguards to throw my battered and bruised son out of the hospital room, allowing others to laugh at his misfortune. "If you come bother Jasmine while she's resting again, I'll kick your mom out of our family! She'll never see you again!" My son crawled to my side, leaving behind a long trail of blood. And so, I laid there helplessly as I felt the warmth escape both my son and I. 'Are you happy now, Shawn? You'll never see us again.'

I was growing up as the much-hated "fake heiress" in a wealthy family, and my life took a devastating turn after my death. My childhood friend who lived next door leaked my nudes online, branding me as manipulative and promiscuous. This ignited public outrage, with strangers celebrating my demise at my family's home. My parents, eager to sever any connection with me, destroyed our mansion that very night, even going so far as to feed my ashes to the dog. Everyone said I deserved it. On the day the true heiress married my childhood friend in a grand, live-streamed wedding, I gave them a unique wedding present from beyond the grave.

Lyra Mae Miracle considers her life perfect just as it is. Amazing friends, decent enough grades, the best family, and an annoying brother with his equally annoying friends. But when the past that she's worked so hard to forget comes back to bite her, she learns that her life is far from perfect. With a downhill spiral of her life, she finally learns to accept help from those who want to. She blocked people out because of her past, even if it was unconsciously. But she can't let the past take control of the present. So she's going to end everything. Set the line, and accept reality. All to obtain what she would most definitely consider, a perfect life. But nobody and nothing is perfect, and imperfections is what makes perfection. Perfectly imperfect.

My mother marries into the Patterson family with me after her divorce. She marries Thomas Patterson, the dean of a veterinary hospital. Meanwhile, I marry Walter Patterson, a firefighter captain and Thomas' son. On this day, there's a huge storm. I'm almost due for labor, but I still head to the hospital to pick my mother up after an operation. We head to the subway, but it ends up being flooded. I endure the labor contractions and call Walter with trembling hands, wanting to ask for help. He finally answers after hanging up on me 18 times. "What the hell do you want? How stupid can you be, calling me in such a huge storm? "I'm saving lives here! Tracy's foot was cut by glass while being saved, and I've just bandaged her wound. Now, I have to take her dog to Dad's hospital so he can save it. The dog is hanging by a thread; if you need help, get some other firefighter to do it! Don't pester me!" Later, the rescue team arrives. My mother and I are pushed to the back of the crowd, and people won't stop shoving us around. The floodwater rises, and I have no choice but to carry her on my back while trudging along the corridor. This continues for three hours. When we're finally rescued, my mother is already unconscious, and I end up losing my child, who's almost to term. My mother and I look at each other tearfully in the ward we share. I say, "Mom, I'm getting a divorce." She says, "It's not a big deal, sweetheart. I'll do it with you. I've done it once before—I know how this goes."