Standing Ovations

On my husband's birthday, I poured my heart into preparing a feast and selecting the perfect gift. Yet, he didn't come home. Instead, I received a picture message—a snapshot of him at the hospital, standing outside the OB-GYN ward, his hand resting tenderly on his childhood crush's belly. Beneath the photo, a message read: [The best birthday gift and a symbol of our decade-long bond.] Furious, I called her. "Don't you know he's married?" Before I could say more, my husband snatched the phone and lashed out at me. "Yvonne just wanted to share the joy of becoming a mother. Why are you overreacting? "Yvonne and I have been best friends for over a decade. Your petty jealousy is disgusting!" I once believed his busyness was for our future, but now I knew—he had been busy supporting the girl of his dreams through her pregnancy. Clutching my own stomach, I bit my lip to stop the tears from falling. Ten years of love had drained away. It was time to let go.

My Alpha, Damon, and I grew up together. Our fated mate bond ignited the second we stepped onto the grounds of the Wolf Elite Academy. He looked at me, his eyes soft, and told me he had a surprise for me at the Academy’s New Moon Festival. He said I had to come on stage. My heart raced as I walked toward him. He wrapped his arms around me from behind, holding me tight. He told me to close my eyes and wait. The next second, the lights flared to life. I saw another Alpha’s daughter standing before me, a pair of silver scissors in her hand. Snip. My long hair had always been my pride. Now, it lay in ruined clumps on the ground. The hall erupted in the excited howls of the pack. His laugh was the loudest. The most cutting. The next day, he found out I was dropping out of the Academy. A wave of his uncontrolled Alpha power slammed into me. "You're leaving? Over a game?" I turned away calmly. "Yes."

Brianna Lester, with her unusually platinum blonde hair and grayish-blue eyes, is impossible to miss wherever she goes. Her bubbly personality, hyperactivity, innate talent for tripping even while standing still, and her knack for always causing trouble ensure that she immediately catches the attention of the coolest tattoo artist around. Unfortunately, it's not her rather unique appearance that gets noticed, but her clumsiness. The moment she closes the door of the tattoo shop, one of the pictures hanging on the wall-the owner's favorite, and quite valuable-unexpectedly falls down. To make up for the damage, she ends up working at the shop until she can pay off the cost of the picture. It would all be pretty easy if a sexy tattoo artist didn't enjoy teasing her about her bad luck. By now, Brianna has resigned herself to the idea that her life is stuck in the "never a joy" zone, and her birthday is proof of that. Who can be considered lucky if they were born on a day that only comes once every four years? No one. Some people are kissed by fortune at birth, while others are kissed by bad luck. Brianna definitely falls into the latter category.

Before I realized it, I’d become the invisible wife standing beside my mafia Don husband, Adrian Kane. A stay-at-home mom buried in chores while my husband paraded around with his secretary, Viola, ten years younger than me. “She’s smart,” Adrian said once. “She knows how to help me.” Tonight marked our tenth anniversary. I saw an elegant designer dress and a necklace presenting in the living room. For a second, I was happy. Looks like Adrian finally decided to take me to this year’s annual mafia gathering and introduce me as his Donna. Turns out the dress and the jewelry was for Viola. Later that night, I caught Adrian sneaking in with Viola—both drunk, hands all over each other like I didn’t exist. I just made one phone call. “I will join the Doctors Without Borders program. Send me away.” Before I married Adrian, I had a future in medicine. But I gave it all up for him. Now? It was time to choose myself and leave behind everything that was never really mine.

Aria Blackstone spent three years praying for a miracle. The day she finally saw two red lines, she thought her life was complete. Instead, it ended. Dragged out of her husband’s mansion. Accused of trying to kill another woman’s child. Humiliated. Thrown away like nothing. And on a cold, lonely roadside… Aria lost the baby she had begged the universe for. Her husband never looked back. But someone else did. Aiden Blackstone... Gabriel’s estranged and untouchable billionaire stepbrother. A man who should have hated her. A man she barely noticed standing in the shadows of her broken marriage. A man who carried her bleeding body into his hospital… and into a world she never knew she deserved. With nowhere left to go, Aria must rebuild her shattered life inside Aiden’s mansion, unaware she is stepping straight into the heart of a man who has silently watched her fall apart for years. Gabriel wants her back. Aiden wants her safe. And Aria must choose between the billionaire who destroyed her… and the billionaire who saved her.

“Strip.” He ordered simply, his eyes boring tentatively, “I'll not give you the liberty of picking up your clothes if you will not do as you're told.” “You married me to get revenge on me!” I spat, angrily. “You are not supposed to have any carnal knowledge of me, I won't let it happen.” He smiled. The same smile that cuts across his lips yet doesn't reach his face. “You want me to have sex with you?” “Isn't that what you mean by stripping?” I asked, confusion boldly written on my face. A loud, dry mocking laugh from him almost made me wish for death. “No wife.” He whispered, standing up from the bed towards me. “I don't want to see any of my properties on you in my house, I want you tattered and extremely void, I want to see what you will do when you're all bare before me.” I stumbled backwards at the hatred in his voice. “I want to see you at your lowest, Now strip!”

"I...Is he my son?" He asked in shock when he saw my son Aldo standing beside me, and I tried to hide Aldo behind my body protectively, scared that now he might take my son from me when he finds out that he is his son, and all this time I have been keeping it a secret. "No! He is not." I lied, trying to sound confident, but I knew I was failing miserably as my forehead was sweaty and my tone was trembling. "Shut up, Sab. Don't lie to me, because you clearly mentioned that the only man who has been inside of you is me. And, even if you lie, no one is going to believe that this boy isn't my son because he looks just like me. Now, the question is, Why did you keep him away from me all this time? Why?!" he barked out the last sentence in anger, making me flinch and Aldo cry out of fear from this man. The Ruthless Italian Tycoon that I had one night stand with and ended up pregnant with his secret heir.

Two rules define Atty. Garette Le Brione: Never lose a case, and never bed a woman twice. As a billionaire lawyer, he has a reputation for ruthlessness in the courtroom and coldness in the bedroom. He doesn’t do repeats, and he certainly doesn't do love. .. But when he spots a "virgin fairy" standing by his father’s waterfalls, his ironclad rules shatter. His obsession is immediate, but the woman is Dianthe, his father’s young, voluptuous fiancée. Convinced she’s a gold-digger who has brainwashed his father, Garette trades his high-powered legal career for life on a Texas ranch, determined to sabotage the wedding. But his father’s dying wish delivers the ultimate verdict: To inherit the fortune, Garette must marry Dianthe. Garette plans for war. He wants to ruin her. He wants to expose her. But as the lines between hate and desire blur, Garette discovers that the woman he thought was a predator might actually be his salvation. Can a man who treats women like disposable clothes learn to cherish a gem? Or will his father's final secret destroy their chance at a real "happily ever after"?

What happens if the person you are chasing is also chasing someone else? Unique Aurella Ravenna Aglauros is a supermodel and a CEO that comes from the wealthiest family of Chicago. Finding true love for someone as busy, as famous, and as rich as Aurella is a very difficult task to accomplish. It might even be too impossible, so when her family arranged her to marry a CEO just like herself, hesitations were nowhere to be found. She agreed, and she eventually learned to be fond of him until she somehow fell in love. But when her long-awaited wedding day finally came, he changed his mind and left her standing at the altar with her expensive white gown stained with shame. Humiliated, she instead focused on becoming the best of her field just to forget that she let herself be fooled. Little did she know, there was someone else secretly yearning for her behind the competition between them in the business world. But how can a love story blossom in a toxic and chaotic environment? And how can he be capable of reaching her when she's chasing someone who's also busy running after someone else? Oh, how unlucky.

Even after a full decade of marriage, my husband Rudolf and I were as deeply in love as the day we wed—an enviable couple in the eyes of all. On the day of our anniversary, I saw him lifting a little boy into his arms right outside the entrance of our neighborhood. "Daddy! Can you take me to the amusement park this time?" The boy's words were enough to stop me dead in my tracks. I instinctively hid around a corner. "Of course! I'll even take you on a trip." Rudolf smiled warmly and kissed the boy on the forehead. In that instant, something seemed to have been set off in my head, as if years of trust had been shattered at that one moment. Daddy? Upon closer examination, I realized that the boy's features were remarkably similar to Rudolf's. No one could deny they were blood-related. "Your dad's busy with work, sweetheart. Don't cling to him too much," said a beautiful woman standing next to the boy. The cruel moment before me made it clear. The man who swore he would love me forever had been cheating all along.