Window-shopping

"Ahhhh," I moaned into the pillow, not wanting the neighbors to hear as they would immediately tell Mom about it. "Ahhhh," this time it came out louder as I felt a shockwave of ectasy and satisification go through my body. This was the best feeling ever. Suddenly, a gentle night breeze blew through my open window, My curtains fluttered open, and I looked up to find myself face to face with those breathtaking green eyes, they were like two emeralds glittering from his dark room, it was like they could see right through my soul, Aamon Blackwood!!! My heart skipped a beat as our eyes met across the distance. I felt a wave of panic wash over me. Had he seen everything? I tried to sit up, to cover myself, but it was too late. My bully, step brother had just seen me pleasuring myself! Gosh! * * * Haven is a simple wolf human hybrid girl living her simple life, she likes to publish erotic novel online under a hidden name. She secretly has been crushing on the ice hockey captain Ryder since they were in highschool but she has never gathered the guys to tell him. One day, her annoying stepbrother, Aamon discovers her secret and blackmails her into becoming his "servant". Will they keep their relationship strictly just slave and master? Or will they break all boundaries and fall into temptation?

As the long-lost daughter of a wealthy family, I returned to my biological parents, only to watch their company collapse. Overwhelmed by massive debts, my dad jumped to his death. My brother was left crippled by vengeful creditors. My mother, unraveled, would one moment tear at my hair, cursing my existence, and the next, cling to me, sobbing and vowing to cherish me. To save them, I shredded my college acceptance letter and took every job I could find. When my brother's condition worsened, I auctioned off my virginity to fund his surgery. But when I arrived at the hospital with the money, I overheard their conversation. "Kathy works day and night to earn money. I don't think she is after our fortune," said my mom. "She dropped out of college and ruined her future for us. Maybe we should stop this." My brother, supposedly half-paralyzed, stood by the window in a crisp suit. He shrugged. "She chose to skip college and work like that. What's it got to do with us?" My "dead" father broke his silence. "We need to be careful. People like her are like leeches. Once they latch on, you can't shake them off. Let's keep watching." I listened quietly, tossing the pendant they had given me into the trash. I had repaid the debt of my birth, and now, we were done.

All because I opened a window to air out the room, my husband’s childhood sweetheart, Celine Ashcroft, caught a cold. In a fit of rage, my husband, Ronan Blackwood, had his men bind me and drag me down to the ice cellar despite my being five months pregnant. "Don’t think that just because you’re carrying my child, you can bully Celine. If even a single hair on her head is harmed, I’ll make you repay it a hundredfold!" Shivering violently from the cold, I knelt through tears, begging for forgiveness. I promised that from now on I would serve his precious sweetheart well to atone, that I would never again let her suffer even the slightest harm. He only gave a cold order to seal the cellar, saying I needed to be taught a lesson so it would be burned into my memory. A week later, when Celine finally recovered from her cold, he finally remembered me in the cellar. "Vesper, have you truly realized your mistake? As long as you agree to kneel and apologize to Celine immediately, I’ll spare you." What he didn’t know was that by then, I had already frozen stiff in that ice cellar. And the child he had treasured so dearly no longer showed even the faintest sign of life.

On the last day of the deadline for the loan repayment, I went to Liam Sommer's stepsister, Christine Sommer, to ask for the 300,000 dollars I had lent her. The next day, Liam threw a ledger I had never seen before in front of me. Liam said, "On your birthday last year, I transferred 8,100 dollars to you. On our tenth anniversary, I transferred 108,000 dollars to you. Also, at the beginning of every month, I transfer 20,000 dollars to you for your living expenses. You must pay me back by the end of today." I froze, but Liam smiled without a hint of warmth. "What’s wrong? You can't afford to repay me? Evelyn Lancaster, you shouldn't have given Christy trouble. This is my lesson to you. If you don't pay me back today, let's not meet for the next three years, and don't come looking for me." Over the next three years, I never saw Liam again, nor did I go looking for him. While he and Christine traveled around the world and wore couple rings, I married my childhood friend in front of our family and friends. While he and Christine walked along the beach and kissed, I moved into a new house with my husband, our cat, and our dog. Everything was moving along smoothly, but why was Liam standing under the window of my house in the middle of the night, crying and saying that he was unhappy?

When Seth Gibson told me his legs were crippled and that only snowmelt from a mountain's peak could cure him, I did not hesitate. I scaled the mountainside, climbing over 15,000 feet just to get some snow for him. When I staggered back, bruised and scratched, cradling the snow outside the hospital room, I overheard cruel voices down the corridor. "Seth, today's the deadline. Nevaeh still isn't back. Could she have died up there?" "I heard that the mountain's pretty high. She might have gotten altitude sickness. What a shame! She's already risked herself for Seth ninety-nine times. This was supposed to be the last time before the game ended." "Serves her right! She used to bully Janice, Seth's childhood friend, didn't she?" I saw Seth through the crack in the door. He was standing at the window, his legs perfectly intact, and his expression ice-cold. "Enough," he said flatly. "If she dies, the game ends." I froze in disbelief until it finally sank in. Seth had been pretending all along. A laugh nearly escaped me. What a relief! I could finally get rid of this weight on my shoulders. I pulled out my phone and called his uncle. "I'll marry you," I said.

For five years, I was Carlos’s dirty little secret. In the light of day, I was his executive assistant, handling his legitimate businesses while he treated me with cold, professional detachment. In the shadows, I was the woman he claimed to love more than life itself, the one who warmed his bed while he whispered promises against my skin. That was until I found out I was pregnant. I was ready to tell him, to finally ask for a life in the light. But then, I discovered Carlos had purchased a secluded estate in the suburbs—a fortress meant for a wife. I followed him there, heart in my throat, only to watch through the window as his hand slid beneath a woman’s silk lingerie, his eyes burning with a raw desire I thought belonged only to me. "Sophie," he groaned, his voice rough with emotion. "I stayed unmarried all these years for one reason. I was waiting for you to come back to the States. Marry me." The sounds of their pleasure echoed from the room. The shock was a physical blow; my body revolted, and the stress induced a miscarriage right there in the cold. When I woke up in the hospital, empty and broken, I made a call I had been avoiding for years. I accepted the arranged marriage my family had set up for me—a political alliance with a rival syndicate. The next morning,I would vanish from Carlos’s life forever.

Mia Johnson's life has been filled with heartache and mistreatment, after her father leaves. Her life takes an unexpected turn when her mother poisons her and her father possesses the antidote to a poison that plagues her, but he remains distant, seemingly never to return. As Mia turns eighteen, her mother devises a shocking plan to secure a business , offering Mia's hand in marriage to a man named Carlos. Trapped and desperate, Mia's life seems destined for misery until a mysterious man enters her life. On a fateful night, a stranger quietly slips into Mia's room, offering food and concern for her well-being. Their chance encounter marks the beginning of a unique connection, one that will leave Mia questioning the true intentions of this enigmatic man named Dave. Days later, Mia meets the same handsome stranger in a shopping mall. She looked up at him. "You were the man in my room that night..." "Do you let men in your room at night? If you don't want visitors, don't skip your meals," Dave responds stubbornly. Mia discovers that Dave is adopted by her own biological father, a man of immense power and influence in the country. But their relationship takes an unexpected turn when Dave confesses his true feelings. "Big brother wants to you, Mia," Dave admits, leaving Mia shocked and confused. Struggling to come to terms with her emotions, Mia rejects the idea of romance with her "brother." However, Dave is determined to shed the brotherly label, longing to become her partner in love. “No… you are my brother and ten tears older than me…” she says while trembling. Dave takes a step towards her. “Who cares about being your brother? I want you… I want to make you mine, forever…”

For the past three months, I've slept only three hours every day just so my team and I can create an app. Thanks to our hard work, the app goes absolutely viral to the point we've garnered over 100 million registered users on the first week of its launch. At the afterparty, my wife, Stacie Woodward, announces that her godbrother, Tory Frost, who's the PR manager, will be the one receiving the million-dollar bonus. She then tosses me a few 50% discount coupons that can be used in shopping malls as my bonus. "You're just a code monkey—why do you need that much money anyway? You can have these discount coupons. Use them on anything you want. At least buy some nice clothes for yourself. Don't go around wearing these rags. You'll just end up humiliating me more." I plead to her in a low tone, "Have you gone crazy, Stacie? My dad needs the money for the best medication in order to save his life! Can you please stop joking around?" But Stacie clings to Toby's arm, looking high and mighty. "Your dad's dying, isn't he? He might as well stop wasting the public resources! I can always choose him a better grave and hold a nice funeral for him when his time comes!" As I look at Stacie's smug face, I just smile at her instead of getting mad at her. She must have forgotten that the app's core algorithm and the user growth model are built using my private, undisclosed technology stack. That means the copyright is mine and has nothing to do with the company. I just smile while nodding at Stacie. That night, I activate the technology stack's self-destruct and migration protocols.

It was Hana Verlice’s engagement party — but the only thing she could think about was that night six months ago. The night Dante Carter pinned her against the backseat window of his car,cheeks pressed to the glass, her dress lifted to her waists, with his mouth buried between her legs. Now, she was hours away from marrying his older brother. Elijah Osborne Carter — the perfect man, heir to Osborne Pharmaceuticals, and her father’s last hope of saving their crumbling empire. But as she slipped into her designer dress, her mind couldn't stop thinking about the one man she could never have. Dante. The mistake she was supposed to forget. The temptation she swore never to touch again. The younger brother who disappeared after that night and was never supposed to come back. But as she stepped out of her dressing room to join her soon-to-be husband at the party, there he was. Leaning at the foot of the stairs like raw sin. Messy hair. Dark eyes. That cocky mouth that once had her moaning his name in ecstacy. Her pulse quickened as her knees threatened to give out. She tried to breathe. To stay still. But one look at him… and she knew she was in trouble. “What the hell are you doing here?” she whispered, her voice barely holding. He smirked, slow and knowing as his gaze dropped shamelessly to her lips. “Did you miss me, cookie?”

In the coastal quiet of Baler, a studio is born—not of architecture, but of intention.* Founded by Yam, a poet whose words cradle pain gently, and Franc, an artist who paints tenderness into walls, the studio becomes a refuge for those learning to stay—with grief, love, longing, and themselves. As visitors arrive, they leave behind more than footprints: a sigh recorded in bamboo, a poem tucked into the “Found Letters” shelf, a mural painted in crooked lines. Through zines, tea, silence, and sketchbooks, the studio teaches softness as revolution. Ren creates the *Window of Soft Returns*, an installation of anonymous voice recordings—each whisper forming a community of echoes. Drew builds the *Staircase With No Wrong Turns*, inviting people to walk through emotions without shame. Franc offers brushstrokes as brave work, and Yam curates writing circles that map healing in half sentences. Together, they host festivals that feel like hugs, and they begin traveling their archive, letting softness cross oceans. Even those who once left—like Miguel—return, discovering that some doors never truly close. Others, like Tala, capture the studio’s sound and turn it into a podcast of breath and becoming. Over seventy chapters, the studio transforms into something larger than itself: a mural of memory, a sanctuary for second chances, a place where return is sacred and voice is proof of survival. In the final bloom, the studio stands not as a monument—but as a reminder: > *“Staying isn’t easy. > But chosen together, > it becomes home.”*