From Beloved To Battered: Her Reckoning

My husband, Chase, was having an affair. But when I confronted him, he didn't just admit it-he told me he was tired of my ambition and that his new lover, a diner waitress, was everything I wasn't: simple and undemanding. Then he pushed me down the stairs. The fall cost me our unborn child. As I lay broken in the hospital, his mistress, Joy, visited. Under the guise of care, she forced a foul soup down my throat, whispering it was the "blood and flesh" of my dead baby. When I fought back, Chase walked in, saw Joy on the floor, and ordered his bodyguards to beat me for hurting her. One hundred slaps. Each one chipping away at the nine years of love I had for him. He had promised to be my anchor, but he had become the storm that wrecked me. Why did the man who once cherished my brilliance now despise it? Why did he protect the monster who tormented me while destroying me and our child? Lying on the cold hospital floor, bruised and bleeding, I finally understood. The love was dead. And with it, the woman who had ever loved him. I picked up my phone and made a call. It was time to burn it all down.

Chapters

Chapter 4

Elisabeth Ward POV:

Chase stood in the doorway, his eyes dark with fury, his gaze fixed on Joy's reddening cheek. He hadn't seen the true monster, only the victim she pretended to be. His face contorted with rage as he strode into the room, shoving me aside with a force that sent me sprawling against the wall. A sharp gasp of pain escaped my lips.

Joy, ever the actress, dissolved into tears, clinging to Chase's arm. "She hit me, Chase! She said terrible things!" she wailed, her voice thick with feigned fear. "She's so cruel! She tried to hurt our baby, she's trying to hurt me now!"

Chase' s eyes blazed, his concern for Joy overriding any shred of decency. He glared at me, his face a mask of cold fury. "What the hell is wrong with you, Elisabeth? Have you lost your mind?"

He turned to his bodyguards, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "Teach her a lesson. Make sure she understands the consequences of hurting Joy."

Joy, with a sickening display of false compassion, whimpered, "No, Chase, please. She's injured. Don't." But her eyes, as they flickered to me, held a malicious gleam.

He stroked her hair, his gaze never leaving mine. "She needs to learn, Joy. She needs to understand that you are under my protection."

The bodyguards advanced, their hulking forms casting long shadows over me. I stared at Chase, my mind reeling. This wasn't the man who had promised to protect me, who had sworn to be my shield. This was a stranger, a monster wrapped in a familiar skin.

"You promised!" I screamed, my voice raw and ragged. "You promised you'd protect me! You promised you'd always be my anchor!"

He flinched, a flicker of something unreadable in his eyes, but it was quickly replaced by a stone-cold resolve. He pulled Joy closer, his voice strained. "I did love you, Elisabeth. Once. But that's over. Joy is my love now. And anyone who hurts her, hurts me. You will pay for this."

He turned, leading Joy out of the room, his back a solid wall of indifference. The door clicked shut, severing the last fragile thread of hope.

A hand seized my hair, yanking my head back. The ordeal that followed was a blur of methodical humiliation. I didn't resist. I didn't cry. There was nothing left inside me to break. I was a broken doll, a shattered vessel.

My love for him, a brittle thing, cracked with the first impact. With each stinging echo, another piece crumbled. My deep affection, my foolish fantasies, my very faith in our shared history—all turned to dust.

I collapsed to the floor, a guttural cough tearing through me, and a trickle of blood stained the white tiles. A choked, bitter laugh escaped my lips, a sound devoid of mirth.

"May every person who betrays a true heart suffer a thousand times worse," I whispered, the words a chilling curse that hung in the sterile air.

Continue to next part

She's the coach's daughter. He's the captain. Together, they're breaking every rule." Ava Reynolds has one rule-never let her life be defined by basketball. As the coach's daughter, she's spent years dodging whispers and expectations, determined to make her own mark through journalism. But when her editor forces her to cover the university's star team, Ava finds herself colliding with Ethan Cole-cocky, brilliant on the court, and infuriatingly impossible to ignore. Ethan lives for basketball. It's his ticket out, his shot at protecting the only family he has left-his younger brother. The last thing he needs is a sharp-tongued reporter questioning his every move, especially when she sees more than he wants anyone to. What starts as a battle of words spirals into undeniable chemistry, leaving Ava torn between loyalty to her father and the pull of a boy who breaks every rule she set for herself. But when a secret threatens to ruin them both...will crossing the line cost them everything?

Action Modern Young Adult

7.8

From Prison Cell To Billionaire's Target

7.8

The freezing rain lashed against my face as I clung to the iron gates of the Hendrix estate, begging for a chance to prove I didn't kill my best friend. I had come here for mercy, but the man I had secretly loved for years had a different plan. He didn't want to hear my truth; he wanted to see me broken. As the sun rose, the estate manager delivered the final blow. He shoved Emery’s phone into my face, showing a forged text message that framed me for her death, then turned his back as the gates slammed shut. My own family didn't offer a lifeline, either. When the police came for me, my parents didn't fight for my innocence; they chose to disown me to save their bank accounts from Alfredo’s wrath. I was thrown into Rikers Island, stripped of my dignity, and subjected to years of calculated, brutal torture paid for by the man who once held my heart. How could the person I loved turn my life into a private slaughterhouse based on a lie? After three years of hell, I walked out of those prison gates with nothing but a scarred body and a hollow soul. The woman who loved Alfredo Hendrix died in that cell. Now, I’m back in the city where it all began, and I’m done hiding.

Action Billionaire Modern

7.5

His Dangerous Love On Ice

7.5

"Let's play a game." "What game?" "One that involves you not screaming." ★★★★★ I'd been the perfect girlfriend to my star hockey player for two years. Stood in the rain at his practices. Drove hours just to watch him warm benches. Wore his jersey like it meant something. And he repaid me by fucking his way through half of Chicago-including the sister of the one man he's been obsessed with for years. Zane Mercer. The NHL's most dangerous player. My stepfather's worst enemy. And the man who looked at me like I was something worth destroying the world for. One impossible offer. One desperate bet. One night that changed everything. Zane doesn't do fake. He doesn't do half measures. When he tells me I'm his for two months, he means it. In every way that matters. But Zane has secrets buried so deep they connect to my family's past in ways I never imagined. Dark secrets. Deadly ones. What starts as a transaction turns into obsession. What starts as revenge turns into something I can't walk away from. And what starts as a lie might be the only truth that matters. They say some men are too dangerous to love. They're right. But I was never good at following warnings. ★★★★★ This book contains explicit sexual content, dominant/possessive behavior, morally gray characters, family conflict, and themes that may be triggering. Intended for mature readers 18+. This isn't your normal hockey romance. It's dark, raw, and unrelenting-where obsession, desire, and power collide, and nothing is off-limits.

Action LitRPG Romance

8.2

His Friend, My Living Hell

8.2

My father's routine heart surgery went horribly wrong, leaving him in a coma. The surgeon was Fabiola, my husband Julian's celebrated childhood friend. When I begged Julian to use his immense resources to save him, he gave me a chilling ultimatum: my father's life for Fabiola's career. To protect her, he stood by as she deliberately scalded my hand with boiling soup. He locked me in a rat-infested wine cellar to "teach me a lesson." He even force-fed me peanuts, knowing I had a deadly allergy, and had me committed to a psychiatric hospital when I still wouldn't break. I didn't understand how the man who once promised to build a fortress around me had become the one launching the attack, all for a woman he claimed was just a friend. So, as Fabiola shoved me from the deck of our yacht into the dark water below, I didn't fight. I let myself fall, because faking my death was the only way to destroy them both.

Action Modern Romance

8.1

Redeeming The Hearts Of My Beasts

8.1

I died on an apocalyptic battlefield, only to wake up pinned down by a lead-lined blanket of my own fat. A violent download of memories hit me. I had transmigrated into the body of an exiled, sadistic noblewoman who was three million coins in debt. The original owner was an absolute monster. She had purchased beastman guards just to torture them for fun. In the corner of the filthy room, a golden retriever boy cowered, his back shredded by her barbed whip. In the basement, a snake guard was frozen and scarred from constant electro-shocks. When the white tiger guard returned from hard labor, he looked at me with pure, murderous hatred, ready to tear me apart to protect the others. Even the local elites kicked down my door to mock my pathetic life and try to steal my men. I was a decorated commander who bled for humanity. Why was I trapped in this ruined vessel, bearing the sins of a degenerate abuser? It was all a setup by her sweet-faced cousin, Debera, who stole her royal life and sent her to this outer-rim hellhole to rot. I gritted my teeth and plunged a military-grade gene repair serum into my arm, letting the agony burn away the black filth and weakness. "The crazy woman you knew before is dead." I tossed a medical kit to the trembling guards, loaded my old electromagnetic pistol, and headed for the deadly Demon Hunting Zone to start my revenge.

Action Fantasy Sci-Fi

7.1

THE REJECTED LUNA'S FOUR KINGS

7.1

"I was the girl they threw to the wolves. I returned as the Queen who leads them." One minute, Emma Belle was a nameless Omega servant. The next, she was a broken soul, publicly rejected and hunted by her fated mate, Caleb. But her death sentence became her awakening. Fleeing into the Forbidden Forest, Emma is rescued by the four most dangerous Alphas in the world-Damon, Nathaniel, Vincent, and the rebellious, golden-eyed Félix. They don't see a defect; they see a legend. Emma is the last of the White Queen lineage, a power suppressed by years of betrayal. Now, as the Council of Alphas declares war and the children of her former pack are taken as bait, Emma must master her dormant kinetic powers. She is tied to four kings, but her heart is drawn to the one who saw her first. Between the fire of Damon's obsession and the sweet, wild heat of Félix's love, Emma will have to choose: will she be the sacrifice the world demands, or the Queen who burns the hierarchy to ashes? One Rejection. Four Kings. A War for the Crown has begun.

Action Romance Werewolf

From Beloved To Battered: Her Reckoning

Chapter 4

You may also like