When I Stepped Out Into The Bright Sunlight

【Terminal illness+ Betrayal+Bitter Love+werewolf+Regret+ countdown】This is a series of stories, and each can be read independently. I gave him my heart, literally. Three years ago, when Blake was dying from heart failure, I was the only compatible donor. I didn't hesitate, I let them cut out my beating heart and put it in his chest, accepting an artificial replacement that was never meant to last forever. Now my mechanical heart is failing and Blake? He's too busy planning his wedding to another woman to notice I'm dying. Lydia offers him everything I can't, political connections, a path to becoming Alpha, and a future without a sickly mate dragging him down. He calls it a marriage of convenience and promises he'll come back once he has what he wants. But I've spent three years watching him choose her over me. I'm done waiting. In thirty days, I'll undergo the Soul-Severing Ritual. My memories, wolf, and my very existence, all of it will be erased. I will disappear from the world completely. And Blake will finally understand what it feels like to lose someone who loved him with her whole heart.

During the holiday, my six-year-old son received his cleft-lip surgery. He wore a mask and sat quietly in our family bookstore, engrossed in a picture book. A young man came in, pinching his nose dramatically as he swaggered up to the manager. "Why did you let someone with an infectious disease in here?" he demanded loudly. "Get them out!" The manager winced. "Sir, I'm sorry, but I don't have the authority to remove other customers." Undeterred, the man marched up to me. "Be wise and get out of here. My girlfriend is Imogen Slater, CEO of the Slater Group. You don't want to mess with me." I froze in stunned silence. Imogen despised all men except me, and this guy claimed she was his girlfriend.

I died on the day I was supposed to receive the Pack’s Distinguished Service Award. Three hours after I died, my parents, my brother, and my mate were just wrapping up the graduation party they’d thrown for my sister. While my sister, Ella, was posting a cozy family photo on Instagram, I was locked in our basement, using my tongue to swipe on my phone and call for help. The only person who answered was my mate, Ryan. All he said was, "Sophie, cut the drama. Ella's graduation party is important. Enough with the tantrums!" This was the ninety-ninth time they had let me down. And the last. I lay in a pool of my own blood, my lungs still. They thought I was just throwing a fit, hiding somewhere. That if they taught me a lesson, I’d come crawling back. But they didn't know. I was home the whole time. I was already dead.

This Thanksgiving, Elmer Fuller finally agrees to go on a trip with me. But when I wake up in the hotel, I don't see him anywhere. I spend the entire day desperately searching for him, only to stumble across a social media post from his first love. It's a selfie of her and Elmer having a cozy family dinner with her parents. The caption reads, "Someone's finally meeting the parents on Thanksgiving night. Mom and Dad can stop pressuring me to get married now!" Around her neck is the scarf my mother knitted for me before she passed. I left a comment. "Stop using my things to flirt with my husband. Take the scarf off—you can have him." Not long after, she posts an update. The scarf is shredded into pieces and tossed into a dog bed, with the caption, "What trash—too filthy even for a dog!" Elmer likes the post.

I've been in a coma for six months after a car accident. When I finally wake up, the first thing I hear is something sloppy in my hospital ward. My girlfriend, Quinn Simpson, is in here. She's kissing Chad Scott, her true love. Chad looks uneasy as he glances at me every few seconds. "Quinn, don't do this. I heard coma patients can still hear things. If Mateo hears us—" Quinn scoffs, completely unbothered. "So what? He's a vegetable. Probably won't wake up for the rest of his life. It's better this way, isn't it? Didn't you say you liked living on the edge?" They talk trash about me right in front of my face. I can even feel the contempt in Quinn's eyes. When the two of them finally leave, they don't notice the effort it takes for me to crack my eyes open. But the nurse who walks in next does. She sees it immediately and slams the emergency button. Once I start regaining strength, the first thing I do is send a message to my parents. "Mom, Dad, I'll do the arranged marriage."

She fell in love with a lie. Elena Cross has nothing. No money, no safety net, no parents left to call. She has a voice that stops rooms and a stubborn refusal to let the world win. When she meets Danny Miller, a quiet sound engineer with sad eyes and steady hands, she does the one thing she swore she wouldn't do: she trusts him. He falls for her too. For her fire. Her music. The way she fights for her little brother and refuses help from anyone. Danny Miller wanted someone to love him without knowing his last name. Because his last name is Ashford. As in Ashford Global Industries. As in billions. When the truth explodes in public, his family goes to war. Not against him. Against her. His mother smiles for the cameras while orchestrating Elena's destruction. His brother, who wants Daniel erased from the inheritance, uses Elena as the weapon. A famous ex-girlfriend pretends to help while twisting the knife. Elena loses her career, her home, her reputation, and the man she loved in the same week. She discovers she's pregnant in the wreckage. She runs. She rebuilds from silence. She turns her pain into songs that millions hear. Daniel walks away from everything to find her. No money. No name. No family. He becomes the nothing she always was, searching for the woman who loved him when he pretended to be nobody. But his brother has one final lie: he tells the world the baby is his. Now Elena and Daniel have to fight an empire, a public scandal, and every person who ever tried to keep them apart. Some love stories are fairy tales. This one is a war.

Hindi namalayan ni Sophia na isang taon na pala siyang kasal sa isang lalaking minsan lang niyang nakita at hindi niya kabisado ang buong pagkatao. Ninais niyang matapos ang malamig na pagtrato ng binata sa kanya kaya ginawa niya ang lahat ng paraan upang mahuli ang atensyon ng lalaki ngunit sa hindi inaasahang pagkakataon ay tuluyan na palang nahulog ang loob ni Sophia sa binata pero nangangamba siya kung paano niya aaminin sa mister ang totoo? Matatanggap kaya niya ang lahat ng ipagtatapat ng misis niya?

Hindi matatawaran ang saya na aking nararamdaman ng sabihin niyang gusto niya akong maging girlfriend. Gustong-gusto ko siyang yakapin, pero umiiwas siya. Lahat ginawa ko para maging masaya siya sa akin pero kulang pa rin, dahil niloloko niya lang ako. Para sa kanya ang isang pangit na katulad ko ay walang karapatan sa kanyang pagmamahal -CHARLOTTE Hindi ako makapaniwala ng makita siyang muli. Ibang-iba na siya sa dati gusto ko siyang yakapin at sabihin na miss ko siya pero hindi ko magawa dahil hindi na ako ang lalaking mahal niya- ISAIAH

When I head over to my daughter, Hannah Westfield's place for dinner during Christmas Eve, I specifically wear a wool coat for the occasion. Unexpectedly, when Hannah sees me, she pushes me out of the front door instantly. "Mom, why must you buy the same coat as my mother-in-law did? Don't you know that she hates it when others imitate her? Hurry up and take off the coat before she sees you!" Meanwhile, my son-in-law, Thomas Clifford, digs out an old coat and puts it on me. "Mom, there are many relatives visiting our house today. Please spare my mom her pride and don't steal her thunder, okay?" Seeing how sincere Thomas looks, I decide to yield. But as soon as I take my seat, Giselle Johnson chortles in amusement as she stares at the old coat I'm wearing. "Oh Fiona, if you like my clothes, you could've just said so, and I'd give it to you. It's bad if you just steal my old coat from me and wear it, you know? Besides, don't you know that those who imitate always do a bad job at it?" Furious, I'm about to up and leave when Giselle grabs the coat and blocks my way. "I placed two money envelopes in the coat pockets a few days ago. There are 20 thousand dollars in there. Why are they gone after you've worn it? "I don't mind you wearing my coat behind my back, but you must return the money to me right now!"

Everyone in southern Italy knew that Lorenzo Moretti loved me like a madman. And yet he had been keeping a much younger woman in Naples. They said she looked just like I had years ago. He told people she was only a reminder of the woman he had once loved most. He also gave strict orders that no one was to let me hear about her. Until the day I found out I was pregnant. I went to his office to tell him the news myself, only to stop outside the door when I heard a young woman’s voice from inside. “Lorenzo… am I only here because I remind you of her?” The door was slightly ajar. Through the gap, I saw a young woman who looked too much like me, wrapped in his jacket and holding his glass. I stood there, barely breathing. Then I heard him answer. “Don’t compare yourself to her.” “She could never be what you are.” I turned and walked away without making a sound. That night, I called my mother. “Mother, I’ve made up my mind.” She was silent for a moment. “I want a fire,” I said. “Something no one survives. By the time it’s over, Sophia Moretti needs to be dead to the world.”