Before She Disappeared

Seren has never belonged to herself. Sold by her own father and brother to pay off a debt they could never afford, she is forced into a life she never chose, the wife of Rafael De Luna, the ruthless heir of the De Luna Syndicate. A man feared by everyone. A man who looks at her like she already belongs to him. Seren hates everything about him. His power. His cold voice. The way he reminds her every single day that she cannot escape him. Because in Rafael’s world, there are only two ways out of the marriage: Kill him or pay the debt with ten times the interest. Desperate to run from the life that suffocates her, Seren agrees to marry someone else, Nicolas, the only man who once promised to save her. But Rafael is not the kind of man anyone can escape from. Not when he has already decided that she is his. The more Seren tries to hate him, the more confused she becomes. Why is the man who terrifies her also the one who keeps saving her? Why does she feel safer in his arms than anywhere else in the world? And why does Rafael look at her like losing her would destroy him? In a world ruled by power, secrets, and dangerous love, Seren must decide whether to keep running… or face the truth she fears the most. Because the man she was forced to marry might also be the only one willing to burn the entire world just to keep her alive.

"Dad, I think something is wrong.""What do you mean?""I'm smelling four.""Four?""Yes, there are four different scents. I don't know how to explain it but they all have the same earthly scent, but something else to it. What does that mean?""You have four mates.""Four mates? That can't be real, I have never heard of that before." Avery was in a state of panic now, which caused her to involuntarily transform back to her human form.

To help my surgeon husband with his erectile dysfunction, I made an appointment with an expert six months in advance. But as the day approached, Isiah Coleman canceled it without explanation. Just as I was about to call him to demand answers, I spotted a post from his female friend on her social media. My usually stoic husband was beaming as he wrapped his arms around her. The caption read: [Only I can cure your illness.] What struck me, though, was the telltale bulge in his pants in the photo—a reaction I'd never seen from him with me. With a cold laugh, I liked the post and left a comment: [What a miracle worker!] The post exploded, with everyone speculating whether I'd confront the mistress. But what awaited him after the holiday was our freshly printed divorce certificate.

One month before my wedding to my boyfriend, he announced he wanted to have a child with his "first love." I refused, but he brought it up every single day. Two weeks before the ceremony, I received a prenatal checkup report. That’s when I discovered his so-called "first love" was already nearly a month pregnant. It turned out he’d never intended to seek my consent at all. In that moment, years of affection evaporated like smoke. So, I canceled the wedding, destroyed every trace of our memories, and on what should have been our wedding day, I walked into a closed-off research lab. From then on, he meant nothing to me.

The most powerful Godfather in the mafia underworld—Dante Costello—had an expensive diamond signet ring custom-made to fit my finger perfectly and sent straight to our home. He said that whoever could wear the ring would become the lady of his family. The Monroe family had long since fallen from grace. All that remained were four women. On ordinary days, we fought endlessly, tearing each other apart. Every single one of us wanted to marry Dante because marrying him meant preserving a life of dignity and comfort. In the first life, the fake heiress, Blair, secretly had the ring resized smaller and married into the family. Dante took one look at her, then had her thrown into the river to drown. “Not her.” In the second life, my cousin, Chloe, underwent plastic surgery to alter her fingers and force the ring on. Dante gifted her a staged car accident. “Still not her.” In the third life, my stepmother, Catherine, clenched her teeth and forced the ring onto her finger. Her blood hadn’t even dried when she married Dante. He coldly slashed her face, then locked her in the basement, where she slowly wasted away until death. By the fourth life, all three of them were terrified. None of them dared to marry him anymore, so they hurriedly pushed me forward instead. I put on the ring. This time, the size was perfect. Just when I thought my good days had finally begun, Dante stabbed me to death on our wedding night, his eyes burning red with madness. After my rebirth, the consigliere of the Dante family delivered the ring once again. This time, all four of us avoided it like the plague.

Lena Clermont fell hard for her dad's friend, Andrew Rohan—twelve years older. The first time she saw him, he was all sharp suits and broad shoulders, effortlessly standing out. He smiled, patted her head, and handed her a princess dress. Fast forward to twenty. He got drugged at a banquet. She wore that same dress, offering herself as the cure.

My wolf had been wounded by silver. It took me two years to find a rare herbal cure. But before I could use it, my mate, Gary, gave it away—without hesitation—to my adopted sister, the Black clan’s darling, Jane. The healer told me I had only one week left to live. So, I made a decision: I would freeze my body. Preserve it. I donated myself to Jane’s Werewolf Research Facility—the one she took such pride in. The day I signed the donation agreement, my pup threw himself into my arms and said, “Mommy and Aunt Jane are finally getting along again!” My parents praised me, saying I had finally learned what sisterhood meant. Gary looked relieved. “You’ve finally let go of your resentment,” he said. “I’m proud of you.” I smiled faintly. Yes. I’ve finally learned to obey. I would return the title of Black clan heiress to Jane, and did my best to grant everyone their wishes. But it was only when they realized I could no longer fight back— when my body had been sealed away in cryostasis, cold and silent— that the regret began. Suddenly, they wanted to bleed for me. They wanted to compensate. They wanted to follow me into the grave. But where were they when I needed them, when I was still alive?

Three days after I died, my fiancé got a call to ID the body. He just scoffed. "She's dead, so what? Call me when she's in the ground." The cops, out of options, hit up my backup contact—my childhood friend. He actually laughed. "She's really gone? Not my problem. Burn her or whatever." Then my body hit the internet— And suddenly, both of them looked like ghosts.

They say that the deepest cuts come from the ones you hold closest to your heart. But I never expected my husband to be the one holding the knife while another woman twisted it in deeper.... My name is Ariana Carter. I am deeply in love with my husband Misha, and we have the perfect marriage. Scratch that, HAD the perfect marriage, or so I thought until he changed. His lies and betrayal broke me. Until I woke up. Now it's time for me to retake everything I lost--my life, my career, my family, and my dignity. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's start at the beginning, shall we?

Grace is forced into marriage with Damon Croft, the Rival Alpha who swore to destroy her father’s bloodline by entering what looked like a revenge marriage arrangement only to for it to become a curse-bound marriage. Where neither could leave. In a world ruled by Lycans, fated mates are rare…and even cruelly binding and what escalates things is that Damon doesn’t hide his hate for her. He doesn’t love her and he only wished to make her pay for her fathers sins, one day at a time but the moon goddess mark upon them complicates things and Damon swears he’ll never accept it. Grace, born mute and treated as a ghost in her own home refuses to beg for his mercy. Every time he tries to break her, she finds another way to defy him and every act of defiance blurs the line between hatred and obsession. Until everything is at stake and what they think they know is not what they know. Their whole lives have been someone’s needlework of manipulation and greed. She can’t stand him but he can't get enough of her.