The Con and the CEO

His Amnesiac Lie: My Stolen Life

I learned my three-year relationship was a lie from a conversation I was never supposed to hear. My boyfriend, Hardin, the man I'd saved from a car wreck that ended my career, hadn't lost his memory. It was all a long con to steal my life's work-a revolutionary game engine-for his mistress, my old college rival. The man who promised to protect me stood by as she publicly humiliated me, burned my arm with a cigarette, and had me tasered in an alley. He dragged me into an icy shower when I fought back. When I tried to leave, he had me held down while doctors drew my blood and stole my kidney for his mistress's aunt. He called the injury that destroyed my career "unfortunate." He thought he had broken me, turning me into a prisoner in his mansion, a source of spare parts. But he forgot who I was. With the help of my old mentor, I reclaimed my secret identity as the legendary developer "PixelVixen." And I sent the two words that would bring their empire crashing down: "I'm back."

Five Million Dollar Goodbye Kiss

I gave up my acceptance to MIT to support my boyfriend, Brayden Berg. After his family's tech empire collapsed and his parents died, I worked double shifts as a line cook, using my tuition money to help him get back on his feet. But the day he announced his new company's success, he stood on stage, kissed a high-society lawyer named Jesse Collins, and introduced her to the world as his partner. The humiliation was just beginning. At a party, Jesse deliberately spilled champagne all over me. Later, trapped in an elevator together, she hissed that I was a "charity case" just moments before the cables snapped. The crash shattered my leg. When a rescuer peered down from the emergency hatch, able to save only one of us at a time, I heard Brayden's frantic voice from above. "Save Jesse!" he screamed without a moment's hesitation. "Save her first!" In the hospital, he explained his choice by saying Jesse was "delicate," while I was "strong" and could handle it. Then, he had the audacity to beg me, his childhood friend, to donate my rare blood type to save her. He carried me to the donation room, and the moment the bag was full, he ran off with my blood to Jesse's side without a backward glance. Staring at the fresh needle mark on my bruised arm, I finally realized the boy I had saved was gone. It was time to save myself.

The Cage She Built For Us

I poured years of my life into "The Gilded Cage," a virtual world where I became Noah, determined to save Chloe, its tragic villainess. I guided her, taught her, helped her build a tech empire, thinking I' d rewritten her destiny. But when she finally stood on top of the world, she looked at me, her eyes cold. "You didn't save me, Noah. You just built me a different cage." Then, she brutally threw me from her penthouse balcony. Ejected from the simulation, I thought I was free. But a system malfunction tethered my consciousness to Chloe's. I was dragged through her past, a ghost watching her childhood trauma and Liam Hayes's betrayal unfold, forced to relive every painful step of her original story. Each memory, a cruel reminder of my failure, of the monster I inadvertently helped create. Why was I condemned to witness the very pain I' d tried so hard to prevent again? The system said it was a recursive feedback loop, a side effect of her emergent sentience. But it felt more like a calculated torment. When my consciousness was finally about to dematerialize, Chloe, tear-streaked and broken, reached for me, pleading, "Please. You have to save me." But the phantom pains of her betrayal surged, and I recoiled, spitting out the words that echoed her own cruelty: "My life doesn't need a monster in it." I thought it was over. Then, weeks later, the real Chloe, corporeal and lost, appeared on my doorstep. "I found a way out... You have to help me. You have to save me."

The Pet Dog and the Plot

The silence of my house hit me first. My sweet, goofy rescue dog, Buster, wasn't there to greet me. He was just gone. My estranged husband, Mark, and his new girlfriend, Lisa, spread a narrative that ruined me: Sarah Miller, the animal shelter manager, was so negligent she lost her own dog. My work suffered, volunteers pitied me, and online comments shamed me publicly, painting me as an irresponsible fraud. They paraded around town with a new, expensive designer puppy, while the loss of Buster became a hole in my life that never closed. I became a shell, until I overheard them at a charity gala, hidden in a secluded alcove, laughing. "She still probably thinks he just ran away," Lisa snickered. "It was for the best," Mark replied smoothly. "Getting rid of Buster was the only way to make room for Muffin." "And to knock Sarah down a peg," Lisa added. The world tilted; they didn't just let Buster get lost, they orchestrated it. They destroyed my reputation and my heart for a designer puppy and cruel sport. The shock was a physical blow, and the world went black. I died of a broken heart. Then, I gasped, my eyes flying open to the familiar morning sun. It was the day Buster disappeared. This was a second chance, a miracle. I wasn't going to waste it.

My Family, Their Sinister Game

For ten years, I built a wall of mediocrity around myself. After my sister Sarah vanished, an alleged suicide linked to the sinister "Blackwood Tech Curse," my parents pulled me from advanced STEM, scrubbed my online presence, and moved two states over. "Just be average, Ashley," my father pleaded, "Average is safe." I became an insurance analyst, safe and boring, believing I had outsmarted fate, that Sarah was a random tragedy. Until today, when an encrypted email landed in my inbox: "Congratulations, Ashley Miller. You've been accepted." The Blackwood curse, a digital ghost from a defunct institute, promised death wrapped in an acceptance letter, just like Sarah's. When I tried to expose it, the FBI agent who' d dismissed my fears showed me security footage-me, at the scene of a Blackwood victim's death, then a fabricated psych evaluation painting me as delusional. My own laptop was framed as the source of a federal hack, isolating me further. Even my parents, panicked by the lies, asked, "Ashley, honey… Did you… have you been seeing someone?" The one person I thought I could trust, Davies, believed the frame job. "The hack came from your laptop," he said, his voice flat. But then, my own hand clenched, tried to strike me, until Davies, who' d burst in, saw it wasn' t me. "You' re not suicidal," he whispered. "Something else was controlling you." He set up a livestream, making my forced stay at a "safe house" public, only for a chilling message to appear on my screen, "WE CAN GET TO YOU ANYWHERE." Then, a porcelain doll-Sarah' s childhood doll, supposedly lost for years-appeared at my window, its face frozen in a scream. The lights went out, and in the darkness, my mother, her eyes wide and blank, attacked me with a shard of glass, whispering, "The signal is the vessel." The next morning, the doctors diagnosed me with "severe schizoaffective disorder, with acute paranoid delusions." My parents finally broke, signing the commitment papers when a psychiatrist presented a photo altered to show me with a different sister, Eva, claiming Sarah was just my cousin, that their decade of lies was to "protect" me. I realized then, in the sterile silence of the psychiatric facility, that this wasn' t a ghost story, but a controlled experiment. And I heard a name whispered in the halls: Marcus Thorne, the vanished founder of Blackwood Tech, now a VIP patient on the top floor. They thought they had trapped me, broken me. But they had just given me a new purpose, a new identity, and a clear target.

The Doctor's Redemption

The grand hall was silent, a suffocating blanket. I stared at the engagement photo, a smiling lie from a life that was now a ghost story. Just back from a humanitarian mission, I expected wedding bells, but David Hayes, the man I was supposed to marry, had moved another woman into our home, my clothes gone, my future surgically removed. He introduced her, Seraphina Thorne, a social media star, her smile as artificial as the diamonds on her wrist, while he couldn' t even meet my eyes. When I demanded to speak to him alone, he coolly replied, "Whatever you have to say, you can say it in front of Seraphina." The public humiliation stung like a physical blow. His gaze was that of a stranger. My year away, he claimed, showed him what he truly wanted: a "partner" who strengthened his position, not a "distraction" like me, the doctor who saved lives. Then came the final cut: he wouldn't let me leave. I was to stay, wear his gifts, and smile at their engagement party, or he would destroy my brother Michael's journalistic career. Trapped, humiliated, and reduced to a pawn in his cruel game, I felt the walls of the gilded cage close in. Was this the price of love, or was I merely an asset to be discarded and then reclaimed? That night, as David, my former fiancé and now my captor, forced a sapphire necklace around my neck saying, "You' re still mine," I knew I had to find a way out. I needed to break free from the ashes of my past and reclaim the life I had lost.

Love Unbreakable

There was only one man in Raegan's heart, and it was Mitchel. In the second year of her marriage to him, she got pregnant. Raegan's joy knew no bounds. But before she could break the news to her husband, he served her divorce papers because he wanted to marry his first love. After an accident, Raegan lay in the pool of her own blood and called out to Mitchel for help. Unfortunately, he left with his first love in his arms. Raegan escaped death by the whiskers. Afterward, she decided to get her life back on track. Her name was everywhere years later. Mitchel became very uncomfortable. For some reason, he began to miss her. His heart ached when he saw her all smiles with another man. He crashed her wedding and fell to his knees while she was at the altar. With bloodshot eyes, he queried, "I thought you said your love for me is unbreakable? How come you are getting married to someone else? Come back to me!"

Contract With The Devil: Love In Shackles

I watched my husband sign the papers that would end our marriage while he was busy texting the woman he actually loved. He didn't even glance at the header. He just scribbled the sharp, jagged signature that had signed death warrants for half of New York, tossed the file onto the passenger seat, and tapped his screen again. "Done," he said, his voice devoid of emotion. That was Dante Moretti. The Underboss. A man who could smell a lie from a mile away but couldn't see that his wife had just handed him an annulment decree disguised beneath a stack of mundane logistics reports. For three years, I scrubbed his blood out of his shirts. I saved his family's alliance when his ex, Sofia, ran off with a civilian. In return, he treated me like furniture. He left me in the rain to save Sofia from a broken nail. He left me alone on my birthday to drink champagne on a yacht with her. He even handed me a glass of whiskey—her favorite drink—forgetting that I despised the taste. I was merely a placeholder. A ghost in my own home. So, I stopped waiting. I burned our wedding portrait in the fireplace, left my platinum ring in the ashes, and boarded a one-way flight to San Francisco. I thought I was finally free. I thought I had escaped the cage. But I underestimated Dante. When he finally opened that file weeks later and realized he had signed away his wife without looking, the Reaper didn't accept defeat. He burned down the world to find me, obsessed with reclaiming the woman he had already thrown away.

Rising From Ashes: The Heiress They Tried To Erase

Maia grew up a pampered heiress-until the real daughter returned and framed her, sending Maia to prison with help from her fiancé and family. Four years later, free and married to Chris, a notorious outcast, everyone assumed Maia was finished. They soon discovered she was secretly a famed jeweler, elite hacker, celebrity chef, and top game designer. As her former family begged for help, Chris smiled calmly. "Honey, let's go home." Only then did Maia realize her "useless" husband was a legendary tycoon who'd adored her from the start.

Marrying A Secret Zillionaire: Happy Ever After

Linsey was stood up by her groom to run off with another woman. Furious, she grabbed a random stranger and declared, "Let's get married!" She had acted on impulse, realizing too late that her new husband was the notorious rascal, Collin. The public laughed at her, and even her runaway ex offered to reconcile. But Linsey scoffed at him. "My husband and I are very much in love!" Everyone thought she was delusional. Then Collin was revealed to be the richest man in the world. In front of everyone, he got down on one knee and held up a stunning diamond ring. "I look forward to our forever, honey."

The Heiress' Secret: Ex-Husband, Meet The Real Me

For three years, Deanna endured scorn in a one-sided marriage. When Connor forced her to choose between her career and a divorce, she didn't hesitate-she walked away. Determined to reclaim her birthright, Deanna returned as the brilliant heiress to a medical conglomerate. Her ex and his family begged for another chance, but it was too late. With a tycoon father, a legendary healer mother, a CEO brother who adored her, and a showbiz powerhouse sibling, Deanna's life overflowed with power. Even her arrogant rival, heir to billions, only ever had a soft spot for her.

Once The Bride He Discarded, Now The Love He Can't Forget

Five years of devotion ended when Brynn was left at the altar, watching Richard rush to his true love. Knowing she could never thaw his cold heart, Brynn walked away, ready to start over. After a night of drinking, she woke beside the last man she should ever cross-Nolan, her brother's arch-enemy. As she tried to escape, he caught her, murmuring, "You kissed me all night. Leaving isn't an option." The world saw Nolan as cold and distant, but with Brynn, he indulged her every desire. He even bought her a whole village and held her close, his voice low, deep, and endlessly tempting, his robe falling open to reveal his toned abs. "Want to feel it?"