Novel & Cerita Why Do I Have Blue Rings Around My Eyes

She was transferred against her will. He never wanted an assistant.Now they’re stuck together… and sparks are flying.Eva Rodríguez has built her career with grit, grace, and zero tolerance for entitled men in designer suits. So when she’s forced to spend a year as personal assistant to Julian Salvator New York’s most insufferable CEO—she’s ready for war, not workplace chemistry.Julian is everything she hates: arrogant, broody, impossibly handsome. But beneath his sharp suits and sharper tongue is a man haunted by secrets—and maddeningly drawn to the one woman who doesn’t fall at his feet.

My husband is the Don of the entire New York East Coast Mafia. For ten years, I dimmed my own light to be his perfect silent partner, the dutiful wife who gave him the perfect heir. I thought we were the lovers who wou ld die for each other. Then came a mere associat. My husband and son had formed an alliance with the woman who seem want to take my place. But they just said, "Elena, you have the crown and the kingdom. She has nothing but us. Be generous." So, to make her smile, my husband trampled on my dignity again and again. To please her, my son affectionately calls her "Mom." In their eyes, I was the iron wall, the woman who would swallow any insult for the sake of the family honor. Until the fire. My husband locked me inside the burning room, to let me "reflect" on my jealousy. He didn't know that the fire didn't kill me. But it burned away the last ash of my love for him.

I had to get away from here! From HIM. Before I embarrassed myself further, or worse… accidentally exposed myself. But to my horror… in my flailing, the first three buttons of my shirt popped, spilling my breasts from the revealing bra beneath. “What the hell?” His shocked eyes flew to mine. Mortification hit me like a wave. My eyes widened, burning with shame. And then his eyes turned angry—the surprise vanishing immediately. “Was that an act?” He snapped, dangerously. “Are you here to seduce me?” ~~~~~ Luca was just a client—albeit one who paid the highest to touch her. A man who claimed every Friday night at the casino, and far more of her heart than Maya ever intended to give. Then one night, he vanished. A year passed, and Maya was certain she’d never see him again. But fate is a cruel bitch. Fresh out of the casino and desperate for a new start, she takes a job as a nanny… only to discover that her new employer is the very man who's haunted her dreams. And he doesn’t recognize her! To Luca, she’s simply the caretaker for his son… but little does he know that the woman now tucking his child into bed is the same one he once undressed in the dark. And Maya intends to keep it that way. Because if he ever found out just who she really was... she could kiss her only hope of survival goodbye! ~~~~~ She swore she’d keep her past buried. He swore he’d never fall again. But secrets like theirs never stay hidden. And when the truth finally comes to light, desire might be the least dangerous thing between them.

The first thing I did when I came back to life was to pawn off my engagement to the Don of the Schroder family, Edmund, on my stepsister. In my last life, he used the "family rules" to make me give up the one thing I loved—racing. He threw out all my colorful dresses and turned me into his canary in a gilded cage. I died, suffocated and hopeless. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day the marriage contract was to be signed. I quietly switched my name with my stepsister Laura's and let Edmund sign the papers. He didn't forget to warn me, "Stay out of trouble. Our wedding is in three days. Be a good girl and wait for me to come get you." But he had no idea I'd already bought a fake ID and passport. In three days, I'd be gone. I'd be free.

As I casually opened the online forum, a trending post at the top caught my eye. [Share the wildest thing you’ve ever done.] I clicked on the second comment, which seemed to contain just one line. [Without a doubt, it was the night before my buddy’s wedding when I had his wife come over for a “quality check.”] However, the poster kept adding to the thread. [That night, the woman tricked that idiot into thinking it was a bachelorette party, but she actually spent the whole night at my place. [She said she didn’t want to sleep with just one man forever and needed one last wild night before tying the knot. [By the end of the night, her throat was nearly raw from all the screaming. [We kept going until sunrise, right there in the wedding car her husband was supposed to pick her up later that day.] [Not only that, but even after they got married, this fool kept bringing his wife over to my place for dinner. [He’d help me in the kitchen while I pinned his wife against the fridge and kissed her. [He’d be glued to the game in the living room while his wife knelt in the bathroom and took care of me. [One time, when he passed out drunk on my couch, his wife and I had our own fun on the carpet beside him. [Every time he rolled over, we’d both jump. It was the thrill of knowing we could get caught at any moment.] The image loaded, revealing the familiar interior of the wedding car. The lucky charm I had given my wife dangled from the rearview mirror. My fingers momentarily stiffened, and I nearly dropped my phone. A wave of nausea rolled in my stomach as a chill crept up my spine. Just then, a hand appeared in my field of vision, waving in front of me. “Calvin, what are you zoning out for? You’re at my place, and you’re still on your phone. Come on. Dig in while it’s hot.” Wyatt Preston, my friend, grinned at me. Yet, his eyes kept straying toward my wife, Queenie Jennings, who was sitting beside me.

When Xavier proposed to me, it was a beautiful thing despite the compulsion. I knew he couldn't refuse because, after all, we were meant to be together. He was my mate and so was I for him. "I have to accept you as my partner, but don't ever expect anything more from me because you know exactly why." Those were his words when he accepted me back then when he knew that I was his mate. In fact, I still remember his cold voice, piercing into my heart that was too warm for him. Or, was I too kind to him? It was just that it was painful to be in a marriage where my mate didn’t love me. I guess I had gotten used to it because it happened anyway. Xavier ... That husband of mine only loved my twin sister,Mariya. And of course, marrying me was because I was just a shadow of my completely identical twin sister. Maybe he thought, it didn’t matter if people were different as long as they had the same face.

I'm the only daughter of the Blackstone pack's pure-blooded Alpha. On the day of my coming-of-age ceremony, my life gets plunged into danger. Xavier Callahan is the one who blocks the deadly blow for me. Since then, I've fallen head over heels for him uncontrollably. What's more fortunate for me is that I've picked up on the unique scent of my fated mate from Xavier. That's how we successfully become mates. Everyone claims that I'm the happiest Luna. But everything changes when I get severely injured just to protect Xavier. It results in the disappearance of my wolf. For the sake of my safety, Xavier has issued half of the Moonlight pack's security detail to protect me. When I suffer from mental breakdowns, he skips his work just to keep me company. When I'm starting to recover, he even transfers me the authority equivalent to the power an Alpha holds. Xavier tells me that giving me the authority is the best way to prove how much he loves. But now, he's currently mating with another she-wolf in my bedroom. "She's just a loser who can't even usurp my throne as the Alpha. She's nothing like you."

From the day I married Jason, I knew I was only a stand-in. He was heir to the vampire throne. I was nothing — the most forgettable daughter of a declining human noble family. The only reason he'd ever looked twice at me was this face. A face that happened to mirror Vicky's — his first love, already married to someone else. For three years after the wedding, I copied her carefully. I smiled whenever I saw him. He would touch my cheek, his eyes cold. “Vicky never smiled like that. Not to please someone.” To stay by his side, I got pregnant again and again — and lost each pregnancy, one after another, in the chill of his indifference. Three years of marriage. I had nothing left but scars. And still I would not let go. Until Vicky's divorce brought her back, and she came to the door herself. At a banquet, assassins struck. Jason's first instinct was to drop me and go to her. Nearly dying finally cleared my head. I signed the divorce papers myself and handed them to him. Later, after I finally walked away, Jason came looking for me — again and again. His eyes were blood-red, his voice unsteady. “Elena. I finally know. You're the one I love.” I just looked at him and smiled, calm. “Too late.”

After the engagement dinner, my grandmother was hauled down to the family's dungeons. The order was given by Serena, who handled the finances for my husband-to-be, Vincent, the heir to the Moretti family. Vincent himself led her down, refusing to hear a word of explanation. "The late Don's wife's diamond cross is missing. Your grandmother was the only guest not part of the family. If she didn't take it, who did?" Serena stood at the top of the stairs, her arrogant gaze sweeping over my face. It was laughable. Based on nothing but Serena's word, they could lock an old woman away. "She stays down there for every day the cross is missing. But that's one thing, our wedding is another. We're still on for next month." I glanced down at the diamond ring on my finger, engraved with the family crest. Exhaustion washed over me. This whole marriage felt meaningless.

In my previous life, I stood by Robert's side as he grew from the Alpha of a weak, remote pack into the undisputed king of the werewolf world. We raised a child together, and I thought I'd finally found a home that could shelter me from all storms. But when I was bedridden with illness, he couldn't wait to take the child and go find his one true love: my little sister, Bellis. And then came the moment that shattered everything — the child I had treasured with my whole heart calling Bellis "Mom" without a second's hesitation. That was when I finally understood. All those years, I had been living inside a lie — a total, elaborate lie. When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn, right back to my marking ceremony with Robert. This time, standing at that crossroads, under the gaze of all those guests with their warm, oblivious smiles, I would make a very different choice. What I didn't know yet was that the truth sometimes hides in the small, ordinary moments of life — not in what other people tell you.