Santa Muerte Prayer Card

“You’re a blank, John. A hollow shell. Do you really think I’d tie the future of the Card family to a man who can’t even manifest a drop of instinct?” Caleb’s voice was like a wire garrote, tightening around John’s throat. “Carl is the heir. You’re just the mistake we kept in the basement.” John Mark was the Syndicate’s golden prince—until his power never came. In a world where the Hale Mafia rules through raw, predatory instinct, being a "blank" is a death sentence. When his biological brother, Carl Cole, returns to claim his birthright, John isn't just pushed aside; he’s erased. His brothers look at him with loathing, his father treats him like a stain on the ledger, and his fiancé, Caleb Card, discards him for the new, powered heir. But the city is rotting. The Abyss King, Morcant, demands a soul to keep the shadows at bay. With nothing left to lose and fifteen days to live, John signs the Sacrifice Certificate in secret. He’ll give his life to save the family that hates him, paying back his debts in blood. He dons a red coat and a porcelain mask, becoming the nameless "Red Savior" the city worships—while by day, he is the "useless" son the Hales kick into the dirt. As the clock ticks toward the final jump, John discovers his power didn't vanish—it was stolen. Now, trapped in a house of vipers, John must decide: Does he reveal the truth and watch his family’s world burn, or does he leap into the dark to save the monsters who broke him? The Abyss is hungry. And the man they called a failure is the only one who can feed it.

In the underground casino, my ex-fiancé Don Dante Castellano threw the card in my face. His arm was around Sabrina—his first love—and his eyes were ice as they shoved me toward the table. "Your father owed mine a life. The thing in your belly isn't mine." He pressed the card flat against my cheek. "The daughter pays the father's debt. Tonight you're the living chip on that table." The paternity test was fake. The child was his. I knew. He didn't believe me. That night, with a gun pointed at my head, I took off all my clothes in front of everyone. Two years passed. Two years later, in Vegas, he saw me again. I was in a red silk dress with a gold chain around my neck, the other end of the chain held by a yellow-toothed gambler. "This bitch is cheap. Bark for me, and all these chips are yours." I picked up the chips, practiced. "Woof. Woof." Sabrina pressed her face into his chest, covering her nose. "Dante. This is disgusting. Let's go." He didn't go. The veins rose along his temple. He was staring at the bruises on my knees. Then he kicked the gambler across the room. He bent down and took hold of my chin. Hard. "Sienna. Money, and you'll do anything at all?" He was close enough that I could smell him. Soap. Two years, and still the same soap. I closed my eyes, opened them, pulled my mouth into a smile for him. "That's right, boss. Pay up and I'll cooperate with whatever position you want. Care to buy a round?"

Her name is Nancy Wilson, a last year history student at the city collage. Not a topper but still manages to get good grades in the finals to show her report card to her elder brother proudly. Her life is simple and ordinary with some basic regular issues like she's too broke to buy an iPhone that even saving her pocket money for an entire year is not enough for her to afford it and too clumsy to pull up something hot so that she could fancy a boyfriend for herself who could buy her one, she's a ordinary next door girl but everything is about to change as someone is about to intrude in her life and turn it upside down.

I logged into my girlfriend's account to sell her DSLR camera on a secondhand marketplace. The transaction went through fine. The next morning, the messages started showing up, and they were nothing I was ever meant to see. "Great shots this time. What's the rate for the outfit in the middle?" That’s when it hit me–the camera's memory card had not been wiped. However, the photos inside… were nothing I had ever seen before. Revealing shots. Intimate poses. Not meant for me. I forced myself to stay calm and tried to explain the situation to the buyer. His reply stopped me cold. "Drop the act. It’s not like this is the first time I've bought from you."

Betrayed by her best friend and banished from her pack by her mate, Lana Connor ran into the hands of a rival pack where the Alpha damaged her the more. Thrown out to the fields and left to die, she prayed to the Moon Goddess to give her one more chance as she took her last breath. Unfortunately, before her prayer was answered, she was already dead. However, the Moon Goddess gave her a second chance. Out of the ashes, she rose. Lana found herself rescued by a Rogue pack led by Alpha Tyler. A weak and rejected pack. They decided to remain that way as their weakness had brought peace to them throughout the years. Lana, driven by fury and hatred for all those who hurt her, slid into Alpha Tyler, her second chance mate, training, educating, and preparing him for war using her knowledge to make him undefeated. He is her key to revenge and she is his way to find out a secret he never knew existed. Alpha Tyler is more than just the Rogue Alpha.

I won eight million overnight. The first thing I did was rush to the hospital to pay for my son's surgery and treatment. That was when my phone rang. Ian, a coworker from the company, called, "Something urgent came up! You need to get back here right this instant!" My wife, Mara, took the bank card from my hand, and said with an gentle and understanding voice, "You can give me the PIN. I'll take care of our son's hospital bills. Go. Work is important. Don't worry about us." In my previous life, I didn't hesitate one bit. I trusted her completely and hurried back to the office. My son never made it into surgery. Instead, the police came for me. It turned out that Mara and Ian had conspired together to frame me, pinning the crime of embezzling company funds on me. The very money Ian had stolen. With no money for treatment, my son died in the hospital. My parents, shattered by grief, suffered fatal heart attacks one after the other. And I, rotting in prison, ended my life in despair. After my death, my soul drifted to the holiday villas of Moldeves, where Mara was on vacation. I heard her laughing as she spoke to Ian, "That idiot won a fortune and wasted it on that useless sick kid. He dragged me into a miserable life." Laughing even harder, she added, "Now, their whole family is dead, and we get to enjoy wealth for the rest of our lives. Consider it compensation from that idiot! Haha!" Then, I opened my eyes. I was back in the hospital corridor, at the exact moment my wife reached out and took the bank card from me. This time, I still told her the PIN.

Adira was once a Luna in name only. Married to a cold Alpha who never loved her, hated by his powerful family, and betrayed by the very pack she sacrificed everything for. When rogues hunt her down and set her and her daughter ablaze, she dies with her daughter in the burning fire. Adira took her last breath with a prayer: Give me another chance. And she got a second chance. Reborn two years in the past, Adira wakes up at the exact moment her fate was sealed on the very day she was asked to marry the man who let her burn. But this time, she says no. No to the loveless marriage. No to the lies and cruelty. No to dying quietly. But the past is shifting. The enemies that killed her once are moving faster. Secrets are buried deep in the shadows of the pack, and the more she uncovers, the closer death creeps in. She’ll protect her daughter. Expose the traitors. And if love comes again... it will be on her own terms. They rejected their Luna once. This time, she’ll make them kneel. ...This time, the rejected Luna won’t burn quietly…

Leah was born into a poor family of six. Since she could remember, their family has suffered from debt and debt collectors, which led to their parent's divorce and the reason she stays with her father while the other stays with their mother. It was either her or the younger one, and she couldn't for the life of her allow her younger siblings to stay with their irresponsible father, who drinks half his life away each day wallowing in sorrow and debt. Her prayer for an escape was answered alongside her most cherished wish, as she received a letter containing her admission letter and a scholarship to Lora's fashion school. Her life became easy and peaceful after moving to the institution and away from her father, well the peace lasted a while. She found herself on a rollercoaster of intense events after saving an injured man with a knife wound close to her apartment building. Plunged into the world of the mafia, crimes and invading feelings, she found out their family debt wasn't what she always thought they were.

Aurora just wanted a second chance at life. Raised in the system with no real childhood, she knew what it meant to survive. It was not surprise that when the opportunity came, Aurora took it. One way ticket, and there was no looking back. Kyram Vladimir knew who she was the moment he saw that mark on the back of neck. Then Aurora became the sharpest card in his deck. Under him, she was hidden from the world and most importantly protected from anyone willing to take her. With Kyram's past tangled in Aurora's future, and the Vladimir bloodline tightening around her throat, the question isn't whether she can escape them. Can she survive Kyram’s fate?

I suspected my husband was a detached ascetic. Every night, he'd skip to the backyard, muttering prayers under the stars instead of sharing our bed. When I slipped into something slinky, he'd frown and clutch his prayer beads like a lifeline. Now I was done with the cold shoulder, slapping a divorce agreement in his hands. That was when his thoughts started leaking into my head. "She touched me. Her hands are like silk. I'm dying to kiss her. When is she gonna be okay with me being a snake? I just want to cuddle her." "A snake?" I thought. "Does that mean he's packing two things? I have to find out." I leered at his chiseled frame, practically drooling. Before divorcing, I needed to test his things and my limits. I tripped purposefully and fell onto his toned pecs, ready to test the waters. "Whoops!" I gasped, setting the stage.