All Chapters of THE HURTFUL BRIDE ( HE WANTS HER BACK ): Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

THE DARKEST CELL Prison doesn’t break you all at once. It shatters you slowly—piece by piece—until you’re not sure who you were before the walls closed in. Yes, that it what prison does to a man's soul. I stopped counting the days after the first hundred. Time doesn’t matter in here. It bleeds together, a never-ending cycle of locked doors, tasteless food, and the hollow echo of voices that aren’t mine. But the cold? The cold is real. It wraps around my ribs, settles into my bones, and refuses to let go. And at night, when everything is quiet, the memories come. Killian’s voice. His hands on my skin. His lips whispering promises he never meant to keep. The way he looked at me in court, like I was nothing. The moment the judge sealed my fate, and I turned to find no one who would fight for me. I clench my jaw and force the thoughts away. I will not break. Not yet. Because I have bigger problems. A sharp kick against my ribs reminds me that I’m not alone. Seve

[ The Empire coming down to it kneel ] Killian Blackwood's POV: I never thought I’d find myself in a place like this, caught between the weight of legacy and the suffocating grip of failure. Blackwood Empire was built on a foundation of blood, sweat, and ruthless ambition. A titan of industry. But now, that titan is on its knees, begging for mercy, and I’m the one who’s expected to pick up the pieces. The weight of my father’s disapproval presses down on me more with each passing second. It’s a constant reminder that I’ve failed. Not just as a son, but as the man supposed to carry this empire into the future. The empire that’s crumbling around me. As I sit in the grand, cold dining room, the silence is suffocating. Selena's eyes cut through me like a surgeon’s scalpel, dissecting my every move, every word. My father, Mathew, hides behind his newspaper, as usual, but I know better than to think he’s not paying attention. He’s always watching, even if it’s just through his silenc

Chapter SixKillian’s POVThe airport terminal buzzed with movement, the overhead announcements blending into a dull hum. But for me, time had just stopped. My world narrowed to a single, impossible sight.Aurora HayesAlive. Beautiful. Untouchable. And walking away with a little girl clutching her hand.I couldn’t move. My polished Italian leather shoes felt cemented to the ground, my breath stuck somewhere between disbelief and fury.She was supposed to be gone—erased from my life like a bad debt. She was supposed to rot for what she did to my family, for the betrayal that nearly cost me everything.Yet here she was, as if the past never happened.And that girl…My pulse pounded, a slow, deafening drum in my ears.The child had my eyes.Sharp, glacial blue—the unmistakable mark of the Blackwood bloodline. The same eyes I saw in the mirror every morning. The same eyes my father had. The same eyes that could shatter boardrooms with a single stare.It was impossible. Wasn’t it?I clenc

(Aurora’s POV)The silence that followed Paulina's departure wasn’t empty—it was charged. A storm waiting to break. Enzo and I locked eyes, an unspoken language woven through years of survival and shared battle scars.Someone was outside.Someone thought they could waltz into our carefully constructed fortress without consequences.Enzo's entire posture shifted, tension coiling through his muscles like a predator ready to pounce. "Let’s go," he muttered, his voice low, controlled—but beneath it, I sensed the raw edge of danger.I caught his arm before he could charge ahead, my grip firm. "Wait."He stiffened. That single word had defused countless fights before, had pulled us both back from recklessness more times than I could count. His jaw clenched, but he didn't shake me off."We need to know who it is first," I reasoned. Information was always the deadliest weapon. Charging in blind was for fools—and we were far from fools.Together, we moved toward the security room, where the ai

(Killian's POV)Sleep was an indulgence I could no longer afford. God knows I’d tried. But no matter how expensive the sheets, how perfectly calibrated the temperature, or how silent the penthouse was, rest remained elusive. The mattress felt like stone beneath me, the air thick with something unseen but suffocating.Tonight was worse. Much worse.The blue light of the alarm clock glared at me—2:15 A.M. Another hour stolen by the ghosts that refused to let me go.I stared at the ceiling, watching the shadows slither across the imported crown molding. Once, this room had been my sanctuary. Now, it was just another prison, filled with echoes of what I’d lost. Or rather, what had been stolen from me.Aurora.Her name alone was enough to make my fingers curl into fists.She’d walked past me today as if I were nothing more than a stranger. No hesitation. No flicker of recognition. The same woman who once looked at me like I held the stars in my hands now moved with the ease of someone who