My Substitute Bride Wasn't Supposed to Bite

Age Gap Romance/Arranged Marriage/Strong Heroine/Found Family/Revenge/Slow Burn Romance Nineteen-year-old Clarice Sullivan was forced by her scumbag father to marry Theodore Grant, a man of thirty-one. On their wedding night, Theodore, transformed into a ravenous wolf, left her utterly exhausted. "I thought you said you couldn't?" she muttered, rubbing her aching lower back. "Aren't men in their thirties supposed to know some restraint?" Theodore, irritated, pinned her down again. "Round two!" he growled. After marriage, Theodore switched into full protective-and-doting-husband mode. "Darling, my worthless father is trying to hit me again!" "Just wait," Theodore snapped, his temper flaring. He promptly dismantled the entire Sullivan family. "Darling, she drugged me-tried to hand me over to another man!" Clarice pointed accusingly at her wicked half-sister. Theodore's fury erupted. He slapped the woman hard across the face and ensured her reputation was ruined beyond repair. With Theodore's unwavering devotion backing her, Clarice repaid every slight and cruelty a thousandfold. When others criticized her for being spoiled, Theodore scoffed, "I'm the one who spoiled her-got a problem with that?"

Chapters

Chapter 6

"Let's get to the starting line," Chloe said.

This was no game. Once the countdown began, there was no room for hesitation. A single mistake on Velmont's wide, empty highways wouldn't just mean losing-it could be fatal.

Clarice pressed the accelerator and shifted gears in one smooth, practiced motion. Her hands were steady, her focus absolute.

The roads surrounding Velmont were deserted at this hour. The route was a circuit of the entire city-a brutal mix of narrow backstreets, dense downtown traffic, tunnels, and treacherous mountain passes. Brutal, but the prize made it worth the gamble.

The moment the race began, Clarice left Leo eating her dust. She pushed the car hard through downtown Velmont, building an early lead.

As they entered a long tunnel-a known hazard-she eased off slightly. Only one car was ahead, a Porsche that looked faintly familiar. Before she could place it, the screech of tires echoed behind her-Leo was closing in. Refocusing, she surged forward and overtook the Porsche.

Inside the Porsche, Theodore kept his eyes on the road ahead. He'd been outside the city all morning and was returning with Ethan Lewis.

"What's the rush? Eager to get back to your young wife?"

Theodore didn't react, his expression unreadable.

Ethan, undeterred, smirked. "I have to say, ever since you met her, you've been... different. Going soft, Theo?"

Theodore said nothing, but a muscle tightened in his jaw. Ethan's words, however irritating, held an uncomfortable grain of truth.

Then his gaze flicked to the glovebox, where the jewelry he'd bought for her sat.

"So the infamous Mr. Ice has finally fallen," Ethan pressed on, a teasing smile spreading across his face. "Let me guess-that jewelry in the glovebox is for her?"

Theodore's knuckles whitened on the steering wheel. "You talk too much."

Just then, a car flew past them. The window was cracked open and the wind slammed against the passenger door, making Ethan jump.

"Jesus!"

"Seriously, who drives like that?"

A second car whizzed by.

"They're racing," Ethan said, eyes tracking them. He looked back at Theodore and grinned.

"Come on, man-show them how it's done."

Theodore used to be a legend on the track. No one dared challenge him.

But he ignored Ethan, keeping his pace steady.

"Theo! What, you scared now? You or your car not up to it?"

"Step on it!" Ethan shouted, clearly frustrated.

"If you won't do it, pull over-I'll drive!"

"Shut up," Theodore growled.

He slammed the accelerator. The engine roared to life, and in seconds, they were flying toward the tunnel exit.

Ethan quickly checked his seatbelt. As much as he wanted to see Theo race again, he wasn't exactly eager to die for it.

"Faster! Come on-leave them in the dust!"

"Clarice, look! That Porsche's catching up!" Chloe shouted, watching the mirror.

The Porsche had just passed Leo like he was standing still.

"That car wasn't at the starting line," she added, suspicious.

Clarice knew it wasn't. That Porsche wasn't part of the race-they'd run into it in the tunnel.

She glanced back. Now the Porsche was riding right beside them.

The passenger window was cracked open, revealing half a man's face. He was grinning-smug and full of himself-like he was saying, "You think you can beat me?"

Clarice hated that look. After a day of simmering frustration, this was the spark that lit the fuse.

She slammed the gas, the speedometer jumping to 180 mph.

A sharp turn was coming up-tight enough that only one car could make it through cleanly.

Either her, or the Porsche.

She smiled coldly, calmly, and turned to Chloe. "Buckle up. Hold on."

She didn't just yank the wheel. She positioned her car with surgical precision, claiming the only viable racing line into the sharp turn. There was no way she'd let him pass.

"Clarice!" Chloe yelped.

Then came a loud crash-but it wasn't their car.

It was the Porsche.

Clarice had pulled up so close, she forced him to swerve hard. He hadn't expected it-panicked, jerked the wheel, and-bam-right into the guardrail.

Clarice drifted through the curve like she was dancing, her car spinning once before coming to a stop-perfectly-right in front of the Porsche's hood.

She rolled down her window, stuck her hand out.

.and gave him the finger.

Then flipped it upside down, smirking with pure, icy mockery.

Ethan stared, dumbfounded.

"She's insane," he muttered.

She'd practically forced them to crash. If Theodore hadn't reacted in time, they'd be wrecked too. Or maybe. maybe she knew he'd avoid it.

What the hell was going on? She'd just flipped him off-Theodore Grant-right to his face.

Who the hell had the guts to do that?

Theodore's expression darkened.

He stared at the girl with the long purple hair and night-vision goggles, brows furrowed deeply. Clearly, he didn't find her little stunt amusing.

It had been a long time since a woman pissed him off like that.

But he didn't chase her.

Instead, he killed the engine, pulled out a cigarette, and lit it with calm precision.

"You're not going after them?" Ethan asked, stunned.

"Not interested," Theodore said flatly, exhaling a plume of smoke. His eyes, however, remained locked on the road ahead where the purple-haired vixen had disappeared, memorizing every curve of her retreat.

Continue to next part

Leo Vance builds things that last. Bridges. Buildings. A quiet, unspoken life with the woman he loves. What he has never been able to build is the courage to name what they are. On the morning of his wedding to botanical illustrator Elara Ashford, Leo stands in a chapel in a suit he cannot bring himself to fully button, and realizes something that stops him cold - he has already been married to her. Not in any courtroom or ceremony, but in every moment that actually counted. The night she held his hand at his mother's funeral and said nothing, because nothing was the right thing to say. The years they ate ramen so he could chase a dream she believed in before he did. The night she stood in the doorway during their worst fight and looked him in the eye and refused to let him run. He has said I do a thousand times in a thousand unspoken ways. So why does saying it out loud feel like the beginning of the end? What Leo doesn't know is that Elara has been sitting with her own impossible question for three weeks - ever since she found a note in his jacket pocket that made her wonder whether the man she is about to marry proposed because he chose her, or because someone told him he was about to lose her. What neither of them knows is that the woman he was secretly engaged to four years ago just walked into the venue. His best man is in love with his bride. His estranged father is standing outside in a rented suit, unable to go in. And the wedding videographer has been filming everything - with two cameras. By the time the officiant asks who gives this woman, nothing about this wedding will have gone according to the blueprint. But then again, the most important things Leo has ever built never did. Every Vow But One is a lux serialized romance about the terrifying distance between loving someone completely and choosing them on purpose and what it can cost when you finally close the gap.

Action Modern Romance

8.2

My Crown, His End: A Vengeful Heart

8.2

My fiancé staged his own kidnapping as a sick loyalty test, betting I'd risk our unborn child to save him. The shock of his betrayal cost me our baby. When I confronted him, he protected his mistress and burned our son's ashes right in front of me. He sneered that I was just his "loyal little soldier" and that only death would end us. He was right. He just never realized he was talking about his own death, at the hands of the queen who owns his entire army.

Action Modern Romance

9.0

Revenge for Mom: Destroying His Mafia World

9.0

My fiancé, the Underboss of the DeLuca Crime Family, promised he would burn the world down for me. But when my mother was dying in the hospital, he chose a ski trip with another woman. It was that woman's dog that attacked my mother, but when I called him, shaking, he was annoyed. He was in Aspen with Isabella, and I could hear her laughing in the background. He dismissed my mother's injuries as a "minor scrape" and told me not to "make a big deal out of this." While my mother's fever spiked, he ignored my desperate pleas. Instead, my phone lit up with an Instagram post of him and Isabella smiling by a fireplace, sipping hot chocolate. My mother slipped into septic shock. That picture was a public declaration, a judgment on my mother's worth, and my own. A cold fury burned away every last bit of love I had for him. She died at 3:17 a.m. I held her hand until it was cold, then walked out of the hospital and called the one number I was never supposed to use—the number for my father. "She's dead," I said. "I'm coming to Chicago. I'm leaving this life, and I'm going to burn his world to the ground."

Action Mafia Modern

8.4

Rise of the Rejected Luna

8.4

She was to be set out as a debt to be paid. He is known to be the ruthless Alpha of a pack, feared by many and dared by none. By ancient rites and moonlight ceremonies, turning eighteen means everything to werewolf shifters. It is aligned with their tradition, holding a great celebration. For Kiara, it should be a day to be merry, the day she finally confirms her bond with her boyfriend and future Alpha, Jason. Rather, it becomes the moment her world is blurred. "I, Jason, hereby reject you as my Luna." Ridiculed as a "freak" for her inability to shift, Kiara is publicly rejected by the boy she loves - replaced by her sister, Erina, and humiliated in front of the entire pack-Heartbroken, backstabbed, and renounced by everyone including her family. Kiara is sent out against her will to live with Alpha Ryder, who had provided a handsome loan to her parents to cure an ailment. Her stay at the Alpha was prolonged and intriguing. She discovers that she has never been a freak but rather descended from the Lunaries. The drama unfolds, tragedy awaits, torn between love and war. She learns great strength and endurance. She becomes a body of attraction to the Alpha. Would her stay in the new pack be worth her first rejection or would she be consumed by it?

Action Romance Werewolf

7.1

The Don's Pawn, A Queen's Revenge

7.1

My family sent me to marry into the enemy, a ruthless Don in Chicago. From the moment I arrived, I was treated like a common whore, a pawn to be humiliated and discarded. But they made one fatal mistake: they thought I was a lamb, when I was really a wolf in disguise. Sent to Chicago for an arranged marriage with Don Vincenzo Moretti, Isabella Falcone arrived at his hostile estate, instantly an unwelcome outsider. Hostility turned personal. Publicly shamed and trapped in Vincenzo's bed by his cousin, the Don accused me of whoring for family favor. I faced constant humiliation. Family insulted me, staff trapped me. Vincenzo was cold. A rival framed me with a planted diamond, and the Consigliere declared me a thief, ordering soldiers to drag me away. Branded a criminal by a rigged game, injustice fueled a cold, clear rage. I was a pawn, but I would show them a queen. My fear hardened into lethal resolve. Alida Savage thought she'd destroyed me, but only declared war on the wrong woman. I would tear down all who dared to underestimate me.

Action Mafia Modern

9.6

The Vanished Luna: Returning to Reject the Alpha

9.6

"Not guilty." With those two words, my husband, the Alpha, acquitted his mistress of poisoning my mother. I had the toxicology reports. I had the receipts. But Garrison didn't care. He looked me in the eye, his hand resting possessively on Keyla's back, and told me to stop making a scene. That was just the beginning of my hell. He moved Keyla into our master suite and forced me into the servant's quarters. "Since you can't give me strong pups," he sneered, "you can serve those who do." I became the maid in my own home, washing Keyla's silk lingerie while she wore my Luna robes. When I tried to fight back, he used the Alpha Command to silence me and locked me in a room filled with silver dust that burned my skin like acid. He even drugged me and offered me to a rival Alpha just to secure a timber deal. He thought he had broken me. He thought I was just a weak Omega who would eventually fade away. But he forgot that my mother taught me everything about poisons. On the night of the yacht party, I didn't just jump into the dark ocean to escape. I jumped to be reborn. I flushed my wedding ring, severed the bond, and let the icy water swallow Janette the victim. Garrison thought I was dead. He didn't know that the ocean wouldn't kill me. It would awaken my true bloodline. And when I came back, I wasn't his wife anymore. I was a White Wolf, and I was going to burn his pack to the ground.

Action Romance Werewolf

My Substitute Bride Wasn't Supposed to Bite

Chapter 6

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