Sexual Awakening

After my family went bankrupt, I begged my fiancé Ryan to pump cash into our business. He didn't just refuse. He turned around and got engaged to someone else. When I was at the end of my rope, Ethan Brooks stepped up, tossing all his savings into my family's mess. Sadly, we missed our shot, and our company crashed. My parents couldn't handle it. They jumped off a building. Even so, I was thankful to Ethan and married him to pay him back. Three years later, at Lily Carter's birthday party, I overheard her talking to him. "You tanked the Harper family so I could win that bid. Won't Kelly blame you?" "For you, I'd give up everything. I'll just make it up to her." My blood ran cold as I realized our marriage was all a lie. The one he loved was Lily all along. I turned and left. If he was that hooked, I'd set him free.

The entire pack knows that my Alpha mate, Cassian Blackhowl, treasures me more than his own life. Against everyone's objections, he chooses me, an Omega, to be his mate. Before we form a mate bond, I suffer from a blood disease and hover at death's door. Cassian searches the world, draining his fortune, just to find someone with a blood type that matches mine so that I can have a transfusion to save my life. He stays by my bedside for months, never leaving, until I finally recover. But after we form a mate bond, I'm unable to conceive a pup. Cassian simply smiles and says, "Then I'll just have to try harder until you get pregnant." We get lost in our acts of passion more frequently until I finally carry a pup. However, I lose the pup, and the cycle repeats. Each time, the agony tears through me like my body is being ripped apart, leaving me weaker and weaker. Seeing me in such torment, Cassian gathers me into his arms. "Let's not try for a pup anymore. We can always adopt one." … Five years pass, and just as he once promised, he makes me the most envied she-wolf in the pack. But on the very day of our five-year bond anniversary, I receive a message. It's an invitation to a pup's birthday party. The message is withdrawn almost instantly, but not before I see the names of the parents—Cassian Blackhowl and Elara Wolfhart. I stand there, frozen stiff. Cassian is my mate. My Alpha. My life. And Elara is the she-wolf who once saved me with her blood.

I was the second princess of the Phoenix Court. And I fell in love with a lowly black serpent. In my past life, just to be with him, I purposely picked that black serpent during the Sacred Bonding ceremony when we each chose our companion beasts. After that, we spent every night together. I didn't care what the whole clan thought. I was determined to marry him. But on our wedding day, that same serpent I'd given my heart to drove an arrow straight through me, killing me while I was three months pregnant. As I lay dying, I heard him hiss bitterly in my ear, "If it weren't for you, I'd have been with Seraphine by now. You should've died a long time ago." That's when I finally got it. All he cared about was power. And he'd been in love with my older sister all along—the sister who was next in line for the Phoenix throne. When I opened my eyes again, we were back at that same moment—the Sacred Bonding ceremony. Before everyone, he dropped to his knees and confessed he loved my sister. He begged not to be bound to me. The whole clan looked at me with pity. But I only smiled and pointed to a small white serpent resting quietly off to the side. That black serpent thought clinging to my sister would make him powerful. What he didn't realize was that only the one I chose would become the true heir to the Phoenix Court.

After being reborn, I decided to write my sister's name on the marriage application. This time, I would help Sebastian Holt achieve his wishes. In this lifetime, I took the lead—I let my sister wear the wedding dress first and put the engagement ring on her finger. I personally orchestrated every encounter between Sebastian and my sister. When he took her to the capital city, I headed to Southport University without a second thought. In my previous life, even when I was over 50 years old, he and our son still knelt before me, begging for a divorce. This time, I would fulfill his final romantic destiny with my sister. Living this second life, all I wanted was to spread my wings and soar high, free from love's entanglements.

In the five years of their marriage, Kimberly bore a son for Daniel, believing their life together would last. Then Siena returned to the country. Kimberly finally realized she was nothing but an outsider the whole time. Daniel repeatedly chose Siena over her, and even her son grew attached to Siena. Fortunately, their marriage was just a contract, and in seven days, she would be free to leave.

On a flight, my boyfriend Cassio tried to steal a seat for his pregnant childhood sweetheart. Last time, I stopped him. I forced him to return the seat to its rightful owner. Out of spite, his sweetheart Ella refused to take the seat. She stood through the entire flight. By the time we landed, she miscarried. She bled out and died. Cassio never blamed me. He arranged her funeral quietly… Then married me. He gave me the best prenatal care, the finest doctors, and a seemingly perfect life. Until the day I went into labor. He put me on a long-haul flight with multiple layovers. And when I collapsed in a filthy airport restroom, bleeding and barely conscious— He looked down at me with pure hatred. “Serena, this is what you owe her.” “If you hadn’t interfered back then, Ella would still be alive.” “Today, you and your bastard child will pay for her and her baby.” When I opened my eyes again, I was back on that flight. Watching him berate the plainly dressed woman, I quietly put on my noise-canceling headphones. He didn’t know that woman was the beloved wife of the most dangerous mafia Don in the city. And the kick he was about to deliver— Would be their death sentence. This time, I just watched.

Yuri's father calls and tells me to send his son, the Alpha heir and my childhood friend, home to meet his further mate. But Yuri Blevin is lying next to me, fast asleep and shirtless. Thinking it's just a joke, I nudge him and say with a light laugh, "Yuri, they said they've arranged a mate for you. What do you think?" He raises an eyebrow and lazily wraps an arm around my waist. "Then make sure you pick a nice suit for me. I trust your taste will impress her." When I freeze and say nothing, Yuri opens his eyes and lets out a carefree chuckle. "Hey, Ophelia, what kind of reaction is that? We're just casual lovers, right? Don't tell me you actually thought I'd make you my future Luna?"

On the night Valen Varesi's dying first love went into labor, his parents stationed armed men outside my suite to make sure I stayed far away from the private maternity floor and the birth of the Varesi family's heir. I never gave them the scene they were expecting. Not when Sabina Orsini was taken into surgery, not when the baby's first cry carried through the corridor, and not when the whole family finally relaxed. His mother sat beside Sabina's bed, clutching her hand with relief. "As long as we're here," she said, "that barren wife of his won't get anywhere near you or the baby." Valen stood at Sabina's side, wiping the sweat from her forehead with a tenderness I had once believed was mine. "Don't worry," he said. "My father has men covering every exit. If Nerina tries anything, she'll be gone before the night is over." Only then did he finally let himself breathe. As far as Valen was concerned, he had done nothing unforgivable. He had granted a dying woman one final wish and secured the bloodline his family had demanded for years. I was the one refusing to be reasonable. He had even decided that if I came later, apologized to Sabina, and stopped fighting him, he might be generous enough to let me raise the boy in name and keep my place as Mrs. Varesi. What never crossed his mind was that I had already made my decision. By the time Valen finally opens the "gift" I left for his heir ceremony, I will already be gone. And the only thing waiting for him inside is a divorce notice, a twin pregnancy report— and the truth that the children carrying his real bloodline will never call him father.

When the gas cooker exploded and Sharon Milton was close to death, only her five-year-old son, James Collins, was at her side. Her spirit stood next to James and looked at him as he sobbed and called Sean Collins. He begged Sean to come home and save his mommy. However, Sean only scolded him and told him not to lie like Sharon before hanging up. James wiped the tears from his eyes and called 911. When the ambulance finally arrived, Sean appeared and stept in. "Daddy, Mommy is bleeding out and needs the ambulance. Please don't take it from her!" "You little liar. Looks like your mom hasn't taught you very well. Step aside! Riley is due. She needs this ambulance more than Sharon!" James's eyes had turned red due to all the crying, but Sean pushed him away and left without even taking a look back. He got into the ambulance with Riley in his arms. "Daddy... Daddy! Please save Mommy!" James sobbed as he chased after the ambulance, but he didn't see the speeding truck that was heading towards him. Sharon shouted her son's name and wanted to push him away, but there was nothing she could do. She could only watch as James was run over by the truck. Beneath the wheels, there was a pool of blood spreading across the ground. Sharon was about to lose her mind. Over the past years, Sean had abandoned Sharon and James countless times for Riley Winston and her daughter. Whenever Sharon and Sean had an argument about this matter, Sean would always just say that he was repaying Riley's father for saving his life. Sharon just felt that Sean didn't know what he was doing. What she didn't expect was that he didn't care about her and James's lives at all. Sharon felt that she was the one who killed James. Her heart ached as she took her last breath. If there was another life, she just wished that she had nothing to do with Sean.

After my brother, Don Matteo Sabella, finds out I have a crush on our family Consigliere, Lorenzo Gallo, for years, he spikes Lorenzo's wine and has him delivered to my bed. That night, he pushes deep into me, and we lose ourselves in each other. When the sky begins to lighten, Lorenzo stays, kisses my temple, and asks me to marry him. Now that we are married, he is all those things—gentle, perfect, and fiercely possessive—handing me almost everything I desire. I truly believe I've landed the kind of love every woman in our world dreams about. That illusion lasts until the day Matteo gets taken out in an assassination. After that, Lorenzo steps up as the Sabellas' new Don. It isn't long before he says he has family business to handle and disappears overseas for three years. Even on the day I deliver our daughter, Luna Gallo, he can't come home because of some emergency. Then I hear a recording that's blowing up on the family's internal network. His Consigliere chuckles and asks, "Don, what do you think has changed the most since you took over the family?" Lorenzo answers in this offhand tone, "It's definitely the fact that I can finally give those I care about most a home. But it also means I'm even more worried that Eliana and Sofia will be targeted because of me…" My blood runs cold. Eliana Rossi is his adopted sister, and Sofia is her daughter. Turns out every business trip, every absence, every so-called emergency Lorenzo has is about them. He has another home out there. That night, with my hands shaking, I dial the encrypted line. "Matteo, we've found the traitor. Isn't it time you stopped pretending to be dead and came to take Luna and me away?"