The Will To Keep Winning

At 4:00 a.m., my husband, Rocco, gently shook me awake. His voice was a low murmur, . "Alessia, my love, could you do something for me?" But his next words shattered the illusion. "Scarlett is hungry. Go make her some seafood soup." Scarlett was our maid, and she was also Rocco's pregnant goomar. "I just had fresh seafood delivered. Get to the kitchen and make her a bowl of soup. Just for Falcone's heir." I refused, my voice cold. His anger flared in an instant. "Don't be so unreasonable, Alessia." "Is it really so hard for you to make some soup?" I shook my head, silent. He stroked my cheek, a patronizing smile playing on his lips. "Fine, Alessia. So you've learned to defy me now." "Think carefully, Alessia. Do you really want to keep your place as a Falcone?" "And your position as the family's lawyer? Think about whether you still want these… then give me your answer." Seeing the arrogance in Rocco's eyes, the last ember of love I had for this man died. I took out my phone and dialed a number I hadn't called in a long time. "I want out of the Falcone family."

I was sitting in City Hall, about to sign that damn mate bond certificate with Logan—Alpha of the Eastside Moonclaws—when his phone buzzed. One glance. Then he stood up like this was all just another errand. Didn’t even flinch when he said: “Something came up. Let’s push the bond signing to another day, yeah?” And just like that, he was gone. Left me sitting alone, surrounded by bonded pairs, all glowing with that sickly sweet “forever” vibe. Why? Because Emma, his darling little childhood packmate, twisted her ankle during pack-speed training—trying to keep up with the advanced wolves when she barely passed the basic shifts. Ten minutes later, I get a text: “Emma’s injury’s kinda serious. I gotta stay with her. Let’s move the wedding, okay?” Just another time—maybe the last—Logan picked her over me. But this time? No tears. No begging. No rage. The clerk gave me a quiet look, like she already knew how the story ended. “Ma’am... do you still want to proceed?” I pulled out my phone.Didn’t wait for him to change his mind. The clerk gave me that soft, pitying look. “Ma’am... do you still want to proceed?” I shook my head, and dialed home. The moment my Beta sister picked up. “Tell Alpha Dad I’m coming back to the Ridge. Today.” A pause. “You sure?” “Yeah,” I said, standing up, my voice steady. “I’m done here.” And just like that, I walked out. Not just from the building—but from him.

After three miscarriages for Xavier Lowe, I see it—my mother-in-law has three years left, my father-in-law nine years, and my sister-in-law two years. I say nothing. After the third miscarriage, my mother-in-law blames me, calling me a curse who "kills" children. My sister-in-law sneers, saying she almost died in a car crash the year I married Xavier—as if my bad luck dragged her down. My mother-in-law snaps, "She can't even keep a child. It must be because she's cursed!" Xavier just stands there, silent. He doesn't say a single word for me. I know that, deep down, he believes that I bring bad luck. Maybe it's also because he already has someone else—his secretary, Yvette Snyder. His mother has always liked her better, and he clung to her the night I lost my third child. I don't explain because I know the truth will only destroy them faster. On my 28th birthday, I catch a glimpse of my own countdown in the mirror. On that day, I take a leave of absence. I go to the funeral home and pick out an urn—pure white, just like the wedding dress I once wore. Wearing a beautiful floral dress, I text Xavier, asking him to meet me at the lake where we first met ten years ago. I wait from daylight until nightfall as my countdown ticks to zero. I die, and he never shows up.

The eighth time I proposed to Jason, he shut me down cold and indifferent, just like all the times before. He said he needed more time, and I was ready to keep waiting. However, out of nowhere, I saw a post on social media. He and my sister went and got their marriage certificate. When I confronted him, Jason was perfectly calm. "Tessa is pregnant and needs to avoid stress. Stop causing trouble for no reason!” Both were wearing wedding rings in the photo. Her baby bump was already starting to show. Something inside me just went quiet. I gave the post a like and left a comment. [Wishing you a lifetime of happiness and love!] A year later, Jason came to see me. He looked tired and defeated, asking to get back together. By then, I was already visibly pregnant. Before I could say a word, his best friend stepped forward with a smile and pushed him back. “Come on, man. The baby’s almost here. My wife already has a husband. She does not need a backup.”

When my mother first told me about the arranged marriage, Noah Parker lowered his head and kissed me, pulling me closer as we became tangled together. After a haze of passion, he carried me into the bathroom. Warm water streamed over my skin, but his words sent a chill straight through me, as if I'd fallen into an icy pit. "Go home. And don't come looking for me here again." I thought he'd seen the text and was jealous, so I quickly clung to him and swore, "I won't marry anyone else—" His smile stayed, but the heat in his eyes cooled into something distant. "But I'm getting married." He brushed back my messy hair, ignoring how my body trembled under his touch. "My fiancée is gentle and kind—nothing like you. She’d never throw herself at her foster brother like that. We've already set a date. If you keep clinging to me like this, she'll be upset with me."

When I took a bullet for Theo Moretti, the bullet grazed my temple, compressing the optic nerve and causing blindness in both my eyes. He kneeled by my hospital bed, pressed the family crest to his chest, and swore: “Sophie, I will be your eyes for life. If I break this oath, may I die a horrendous death.” I believed him. However, the day my sight returned, I saw Theo through the bedroom door, naked on our marital bed with the maid, Isabella. He gripped her waist and thrust violently, his voice hoarse in a way I had never heard, growling, “Bella… you really are the most seductive woman in all of Sicily…” “Theo, who else besides me could satisfy you like this in bed? Divorce that blind woman already!” Isabella nibbled his earlobe. “After all, I’m the one who truly understands you.” “Wait a little longer,” Theo panted. “I need time… Don Lucas just handed me control of the docks. If I divorce now, I’ll be left with nothing.” Rare snowflakes rained down outside. I walked barefoot out of the estate in a thin nightgown and sent an encrypted message to my father. “Father, send someone to pick me up in three days. I’m coming home.” Don Lucas, my father, never expected that the boss he had personally promoted would dare betray his daughter. He replied with a single sentence: “For daring to betray you, Theo’s dead.” What I did not know was that this message would ignite a storm that would sweep across all of Sicily. In three days, Theo Moretti, the man I had risked my life for and I had personally helped rise to power, would lose everything he held dear, including me.

As the fated mate of Loki Whalen, Alpha of the Darkshadow pack, I once believed I would be his only Luna for life. Today, that lie shatters. On the pack's registry, my name has been crossed out as Loki's mate. In its place is Maya Hemmings, his true love, whom he claimed had left the pack years ago. The truth is cruel. In that instant, the excruciating pain of a bond rejection tears through my soul. That's when I finally understand that my weakness from the past year isn't from the heartache of failing to conceive, but the aftermath of our severed mate bond. Loki needs my powerful bloodline to bear him an heir and solve the plague, the Blight, that's spreading through the pack. What he doesn't know is that the healer told me yesterday that I'm carrying the twin pups he's always dreamed of. Since his love is a lie, I have no reason to stay. Now, I will leave and take his true heirs with me.

The day after I marry the powerful Don Lucio Ferrari, news breaks that his childhood love, Bella Bianchi, has died by suicide at home. When he hears the news, he locks himself in his study for three days and three nights. When he finally reappears, he walks straight up to me and says, "You will never replace her." For ten long years, he acts as if I don't exist, refusing to speak to me. During the chaos of a mafia shootout, when a gun is aimed straight at my heart, he instinctively throws himself in front of me. "Viola, the biggest regret of my life is marrying you. If there is a next life, please let me go." In the end, he is hit by multiple bullets while saving me and dies of blood loss on the way to the hospital. At his funeral, everyone points fingers at me, saying I bewitched their Don and caused his death. The day after his funeral, I take my own life at his grave. When I open my eyes again, I am reborn three days before our wedding. This time, I decide not to cling to him, choosing instead to let him be with the person he truly loves. But now, he seems to regret it, and I can feel it.

This is my second month trying to win over Lucian Moonshadow, the Alpha. Lucian smiled softly as he said, "Do you really think I would want an inferior Omega?" Later on, he was furious to find me with another wolf. "Didn't you say you wanted to be my Luna? You're nothing but a hustler, aren't you?" I chuckled angrily. "I'll be the Luna of whoever spends the night with me." Lucian uncovered the Alpha from another pack in bed and sent him away. "Leave right now. Ilyra belongs to me."

For three hundreds under vampire rule, the Blood Prince has drawn a new bride from his realms every fifty years. In my previous life, Seraphina was chosen,Lucian’s childhood sweetheart. The night before our bonding ceremony, she burst into our chamber, tears streaming. “Lucian, I’ve been chosen as the Blood Prince’s seventh bride!” she sobbed. “They say he loses control on his wedding night, drains every drop of blood from his bride. None of the first six lived to see dawn. I don’t want to die—please, claim me as your mate!” But Lucian had already claimed me. And by wolf law, an Alpha may bind only one mate at a time. So I step forward, and refused her. The next day, at the altar, Seraphina slit her throat with a silver dagger. Lucian didn’t flinch. He ordered the blood scrubbed from the stones—and proceeded with our ceremony as nothing had happened. However,on our honeymoon, he pushed me into starving wolves. His eyes burned crimson as he snarled, “If you hadn’t tricked me into marking you earlier, Seraphina would be alive. You killed her.” Over a dozen of wolves with gleaming eyes swarmed me in, tore me limb from limb. Then I woke, back on the day the mate-hunger hex seized Lucian. This time, I dragged Seraph-the girl Lucian cherished as most precious jewel,from her house myself, and shoved her into Lucian’s chamber. “Be his cure, and I’ll take your place as the Blood Prince’s bride instead.