My Dead Husband Returned With Another Woman
Three years after I buried an empty casket for my husband, I found him alive in a grocery store parking lot.
He was rubbing a stranger's pregnant belly, smiling a soft smile I had never seen in our years of marriage.
My husband, the ruthless Don of Chicago, had become "Arthur," a gentle man with no memory of the empire he ruled or the wife he left behind.
To protect his happiness, I swallowed my agony and lied.
"I am his cousin," I told his pregnant fiancée, Mia.
I brought them home to his estate, enduring the torture of watching him give her the tenderness that used to belong to me.
But my mercy was rewarded with cruelty.
Dante looked at me with cold, unfamiliar eyes and slapped divorce papers onto the table.
"Sign them," he demanded, his voice devoid of emotion. "I want to marry Mia before the baby comes. I want a fresh start."
He didn't know I was dying of a heart defect caused by the stress of grieving him.
He didn't know I stalled for two weeks not for money, but because I wanted to be buried with his name.
I died the morning the deadline arrived, taking the secret of my love to the grave.
Ironically, that very night, a bullet grazed his temple during an ambush, unlocking the memories he had lost.
He remembered the peach orchard. He remembered our blood oath. He remembered that I was his soulmate.
He ran to my brother’s gates, screaming my name, blood pouring down his face, desperate to beg for forgiveness.
But my brother just stood there, blocking the entrance to the cemetery with a cruel smile.
"She waited for you every single day," he spat.
"And you killed her."
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Chapter 10
Elena POV
I recognized the glint of silver before my eyes could even focus on the details.
It was the locket.
Vintage sterling, engraved with a delicate tangle of vines and roses.
I was the one who found it in an antique shop in Florence on our first anniversary.
I was the one who had carefully placed a picture of us inside.
And I was the one who had clasped it around his neck before he deployed, telling him it was his compass to find his way back to me.
Dante strode back to Mia.
He didn't look at me.
He didn't see the woman dying by inches against the tree mere feet away.
"I found it," he said, his voice rough with relief. "I told you I'd find it."
He fastened it around Mia's neck.
The silver chain rested against her throat.
It looked wrong.
It looked like a lie.
Mia clutched the locket as if it were a lifeline.
"Thank you, Artie. I was so scared. It's the only thing I have of yours from... before."
Dante smiled.
Then, with a tenderness that shattered me, he reached out and tapped the tip of her nose with his index finger.
Boop.
The world tilted on its axis.
My vision went black at the edges.
That was my gesture.
He used to do that when I was mad at him.
He used to do that when I was sad.
It was our secret language.
A silly, childish thing that the feared Don of Chicago only did for his wife.
And now, he was doing it for her.
He had given her my locket.
He had given her my gesture.
He had taken the most sacred parts of our history and transplanted them onto a stranger because he couldn't remember where they came from.
He just knew they meant love.
And he loved her.
Bile rose in my throat, hot and acidic.
I couldn't breathe.
The pain in my chest wasn't just the disease anymore.
It was my soul tearing itself apart.
I turned around.
I didn't care if I made noise.
I stumbled away, my heels sinking into the soft earth, fighting for balance.
I ran toward the house.
I ran toward my room.
I needed to hide.
I needed to scream.
But as I reached the sanctuary of my bedroom and collapsed onto the floor, no sound came out.
Only silence.
The silence of a ghost realizing she had already been exorcised.
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9.3
Innocent Silesia
9.3
No!" My voice rang loudly. "Like I said, this is the first time I've even been in this city."
"Ah, I see..." His voice shifted. "I was going to give you a different punishment. But since you claim you haven't slept with me..." He leaned forward, his smile cruel. "Why not refresh your memory?"
When Matteo's empire is shaken by betrayal, a stolen jewel, a night of seduction turned deception, his wrath is swift. He vows to hunt down the thief who dared to cross him. But fate delivers him the wrong girl.
Silesia Elton is twenty-three, an orphan from the quiet seaside town of Averna. She comes to Bellmere chasing nothing more than a job, a chance, a future. Instead, she is mistaken for the thief who stole from the king. Kidnapped, accused, and punished, her innocence is shattered in a single night of cruelty.
By the time Matteo realizes the truth, it's too late. Silesia is gone, leaving behind nothing but tears and the echo of words he has never heard before: "I don't want your money."
But Matteo cannot forget her. Dreams of her innocence haunt him, stirring something he has never known, remorse. Guilt sharpens into obsession, and soon the man who swore never to chase anyone finds himself searching for the girl who slipped through his fingers.
Meanwhile, Silesia struggles to survive in a city that devours the weak. Betrayed by the law, cast out by kindness, she is forced into the shadows, where every hand that offers help demands a piece of her soul. Yet even as she runs from the man who ruined her life, fate drives her back into his world.
Caught between the two is Matias Loki, Matteo's twin, a man who hides warmth behind ambition and whose gentle eyes see in Silesia the light his brother cannot hold. But desire between brothers is dangerous, and Silesia becomes the spark that threatens to burn the empire down.
7.4
In a world ruled by guns, secrets, and blood-soaked loyalties, love is the most dangerous currency of all.
Alessandro De Luca is the unseen king of a global cartel-ruthless, brilliant, and feared across continents. His word is law, his mercy nonexistent. Until one night, one woman, and one mistake unravel everything he has built.
Elena Hart is innocent but unbreakable, drawn into the underworld through a debt she never created. She should have been collateral-nothing more. Instead, she becomes his weakness.
As enemies close in and betrayal festers within the cartel, Alessandro must choose between the empire crowned in blood... or the woman who threatens to destroy it.
Love was never part of the plan.
Survival was.
And in this world, both demand a price.
9.6
For five years, I lived a beautiful lie. I was Aliana Hughes, the cherished wife of the city's most feared Mafia Capo and the beloved daughter of the Don. I believed my arranged marriage had blossomed into love.
On my birthday, my husband promised me the amusement park. Instead, I found him there with his other family, celebrating the fifth birthday of the son I never knew he had.
I overheard their plan. My husband called me a "naive fool," a placeholder to legitimize his secret son. The ultimate betrayal wasn't his affair, but the sight of my own father's car parked across the street. My family wasn't just aware; they were the architects of my ruin.
Back home, I found the proof: a secret photo album of my husband's other family posing with my parents, and records showing my father had bankrolled the entire deception. They had even drugged me on weekends so he could play happy family.
The grief didn't break me. It turned into something cold and sharp. I was a ghost in a life that was never mine, and a ghost has nothing to lose.
I copied every damning file onto a USB drive. As they celebrated their perfect day, I sent a courier with my parting gift: a recording of their treachery. While their world burned, I walked toward the airport, ready to erase myself and start over.
7.5
I spent five years laundering my family's wealth and buying military-grade weapons to crown my husband, Alistair, the Don of the Chicago Mafia.
But the night before his coronation, he drove an Italian stiletto into my stomach.
He sneered that a Don needed a true Mafia Queen, and that was always meant to be his "fragile" friend, Kylie.
As I bled out on the Persian rug, he revealed the sickening truth.
The night I was found in a rival Irish boss's bed two years ago wasn't a setup by our enemies. Alistair had ordered his own mother and sister to drug and frame me.
He just needed me terrified enough to sign over my merchant trust fund to prove my loyalty.
My entire marriage, my sacrifices, and my stolen wealth were just stepping stones for him and his mistress.
I had bled for him and won him the city, only to be slaughtered like a sacrificial lamb so he could hand my empire to another woman.
Before the flames I started consumed us both, I swore I'd drag his entire family to hell.
Opening my eyes again, the suffocating smoke was gone, replaced by the scent of lavender and the bitter taste of chloral hydrate.
I was back on the exact night of the frame-up two years ago.
Outside the door, my sister-in-law was whispering, waiting for the Irish boss to arrive so they could ruin me.
This time, I was going to make sure she was the one in that bed.
9.8
Three women, three brothers, a single, crumpled dollar bill.
Alina's world shatters the moment she's auctioned off-and claimed by the powerful Hawthorne brothers.
Thrown into Adrian Hawthorne's cold, dangerous world, she becomes his to control... his to protect... and, terrifyingly, his to desire. He's ruthless, possessive, and hiding secrets that could destroy them both. But the deeper she falls into his world, the harder it becomes to tell if she's his prisoner-or something far more dangerous.
Because the Hawthorne brothers don't just take.
They keep.
Viviane has spent her life surviving, so when Julian Hawthorne "buys" her freedom, she knows better than to trust it. Men like him don't save people-they collect them. But Julian isn't as simple as he pretends to be, and the deeper she's pulled into his world, the more dangerous it becomes to walk away.
Especially when she realizes she might be the only thing he's ever been willing to fight for.
Lena doesn't belong to anyone-and she intends to keep it that way. Brilliant, guarded, and hiding more than anyone suspects, she enters Lucien Hawthorne's world on her own terms. But Lucien doesn't play fair, and he doesn't let go.
When her past comes crashing back, Lena is forced to face the one thing she's been running from: trusting someone who could destroy her... or save her.
Three women. Three choices.Stay. Fight.
Or burn it all down.
Because being sold was only the beginning.
9.4
The Bride I Never Wanted
One betrayal. One reckless decision. One deadly mistake.
The night before my wedding, I found my fiancé in bed with my maid of honor. Heartbroken and humiliated, I did what any rational woman would do-I ran.
What I didn't expect was to find a stranger on a bridge, seconds from jumping. A woman being forced to marry a monster. A mafia boss named Dante Castellano who killed without mercy and ruled without conscience.
In my shattered state, I made her an offer: I'd take her place. One ceremony. One night. Then we'd both disappear and start over.
I thought I was saving her life.
I didn't know about the blood oath. The binding that couldn't be broken. The centuries-old tradition that would chain me to Dante until death-mine or his.
Now I'm trapped in a world of violence and secrets, married to a man who's as dangerous as he is magnetic. A man whose cold grey eyes see too much. Who touches me like he owns me. Who's starting to suspect his bride isn't who she claims to be.
Dante Castellano doesn't forgive deception.
And I just became his wife under the biggest lie of all.
They say you should be careful what you wish for when your life falls apart. They're right. Because I wished for escape, and instead, I got a beautiful nightmare in an Italian suit.
Now I have two choices: make him believe I'm his perfect wife, or die trying.
He wanted a convenient bride. He got me instead. God help us both.