His Shadow, Her Betrayal, His Rise

His Shadow, Her Betrayal, His Rise

Gavin

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The blinding white of the hospital ceiling. My ears registered the monotonous beep of a machine, my body a dull ache radiating from my chest, but my mind was replaying a lifetime. A lifetime I didn't swerve, didn't fight, a life where I gave everything for her, for Sarah Miller. I saw myself hollowed out, unfulfilled, alone, a footnote in her brilliant biography, my own child a ghost. Then the blinding clarity: this wasn't just a brush with death, it was a preview of the life I was about to lose myself in. My gaze drifted-Sarah, impeccable as always, on her phone, brow furrowed. And next to her, Alex, murmuring, his hand on her arm, a gesture far too familiar. They were a perfect, closed circuit. I was the outsider. A cold certainty settled in my chest, more real than the pain from my injuries: I would not let that life happen. My hands trembled, not from weakness, but from a newfound resolve. I called my boss. "Mike! I heard about the accident. Are you okay? Do you need anything?" "I'm okay, Mark," I said, my voice raspy. "But I'm calling to resign." "Resign? Mike, what are you talking about? You're our top young talent. We were just about to put you on the downtown high-rise project." "I don't want the high-rise," I said, with surprising strength. "I want the sustainable community project. The one in Oak Creek. I know it's a pay cut. I know it's in the middle of nowhere. I'll take it. I need to do it." A weight I hadn't realized I was carrying lifted from my shoulders. It felt incredible. This was my second chance. My life wasn't going to be a footnote in Sarah Miller's biography. It was going to be my own story. Starting now.

Introduction

The blinding white of the hospital ceiling.

My ears registered the monotonous beep of a machine, my body a dull ache radiating from my chest, but my mind was replaying a lifetime.

A lifetime I didn't swerve, didn't fight, a life where I gave everything for her, for Sarah Miller.

I saw myself hollowed out, unfulfilled, alone, a footnote in her brilliant biography, my own child a ghost.

Then the blinding clarity: this wasn't just a brush with death, it was a preview of the life I was about to lose myself in.

My gaze drifted-Sarah, impeccable as always, on her phone, brow furrowed.

And next to her, Alex, murmuring, his hand on her arm, a gesture far too familiar.

They were a perfect, closed circuit.

I was the outsider.

A cold certainty settled in my chest, more real than the pain from my injuries: I would not let that life happen.

My hands trembled, not from weakness, but from a newfound resolve.

I called my boss.

"Mike! I heard about the accident. Are you okay? Do you need anything?"

"I'm okay, Mark," I said, my voice raspy. "But I'm calling to resign."

"Resign? Mike, what are you talking about? You're our top young talent. We were just about to put you on the downtown high-rise project."

"I don't want the high-rise," I said, with surprising strength. "I want the sustainable community project. The one in Oak Creek. I know it's a pay cut. I know it's in the middle of nowhere. I'll take it. I need to do it."

A weight I hadn't realized I was carrying lifted from my shoulders.

It felt incredible.

This was my second chance.

My life wasn't going to be a footnote in Sarah Miller's biography.

It was going to be my own story.

Starting now.

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Contract With The Devil: Love In Shackles

Contract With The Devil: Love In Shackles

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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.

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