Flash Marriage To The Alpha Colonel
I was an intern nurse working exhausting shifts, yet my mother constantly forced me into blind dates with wealthy, arrogant men to secure our family's social standing.
During a terrifying hospital lockdown, an assassin disguised as a doctor held a scalpel to my throat. I was almost killed, but a high-ranking military colonel threw his own body down a flight of concrete stairs to shield me.
I survived with cuts and bruises, but when I went home, my mother didn't care about my near-death experience. She was only furious that I had rushed out on my blind date with Preston, a rich financial analyst.
She forced me to meet him to apologize. When Preston grabbed my arm, bruised me, and mocked my attack as a pathetic lie, my mother still took his side.
"Men get angry," she told me coldly. "It's your job not to provoke them. You will beg for his forgiveness, or you are no longer welcome in this house."
I had narrowly escaped an assassin, yet my own family was willing to feed me to a monster just for a fat paycheck and neighborhood gossip.
My heart went completely dead.
So, when the intimidating Colonel appeared, offering me maximum military protection through a sudden marriage, I didn't hesitate.
I walked back into my parents' house and calmly slapped a crisp marriage certificate onto the coffee table.
"I won't be apologizing to Preston. I got married today."
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Chapter 6
The next afternoon, Caroline sat in the back of a cab, staring blankly out the window. The pale sunlight filtered through the glass towers of the financial district, doing nothing to warm her. Every bump in the road sent a jolt of pain through her bruised ribs, but the physical pain was nothing compared to the hollow, numb feeling in her chest.
She reached up and touched the gauze on her neck. The cut throbbed beneath the bandage. She had cleaned up as best she could the night before, washing the blood off her skin and trying to smooth down her tangled hair. But she still looked like a wreck. Her eyes were hollow, her face pale, and no amount of cold water could erase the shadows under her eyes.
She had barely slept in two days. The adrenaline crash had left her shaky and drained, making her limbs feel heavy and her brain foggy.
The cab pulled up in front of a sleek, modern building in the financial district. Caroline paid the driver and stepped out onto the sidewalk. The cafe was on the ground floor, a trendy spot with exposed brick and expensive coffee.
She pushed open the glass door, the bell chiming overhead. The smell of roasted beans and pastry filled the air. It was a stark contrast to the sterile, blood-scented air of the hospital.
She spotted Preston immediately. He was sitting at a table near the window, surrounded by three other men in identical suits. They were all laughing, their ties loosened, drinks in hand.
Caroline walked over, her feet dragging. She felt like she was moving through water.
"Ah, the wanderer returns," Preston announced as she approached. He didn't stand up. He didn't pull out a chair. He just gestured to the empty seat across from him with his coffee cup. "Gentlemen, this is the nurse I was telling you about. The one with the commitment issues."
His friends snickered, eyeing Caroline with a mix of curiosity and disdain.
Caroline sat down. The chair was hard, the seat uncomfortable. She looked at Preston, waiting for him to say something.
"Well?" he said, raising an eyebrow. "Don't you have something to say to me?"
"I'm sorry," Caroline said, the words tasting like ash in her mouth. "For leaving the other night."
"Yes, you are," Preston said, leaning back in his chair. "You know, Caroline, I had to pay the bill. The whole bill. Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was for me?"
"I left money," Caroline said, her voice flat.
"Fifty dollars," Preston scoffed. "That barely covered your drinks. I had to cover the rest. And the tip." He shook his head. "It's fine. I should have known better than to date a girl who works for tips."
One of his friends snorted. "Maybe she can take your blood pressure, Preston. You look a little stressed."
"Very funny," Preston said, but he was smiling. He turned back to Caroline. "So, what's the excuse today? Or are you just going to fall asleep at the table again?"
Caroline blinked. "What?"
"You heard me," Preston said, his smile fading. "You've been yawning since you sat down. It's rude. I'm trying to have a conversation with you, and you're acting like you'd rather be somewhere else."
Caroline rubbed her eyes. She was so tired. The noise in the cafe was too loud, the lights too bright. She just wanted to close her eyes for a second.
"Maybe we should do this another time," she said, her voice barely a whisper.
"No," Preston said, slamming his hand on the table. The coffee cups rattled. "We do this now. You wanted a second chance, you got it. The least you can do is pretend to be interested."
Caroline stared at him. He was serious. He actually thought his little coffee date was more important than whatever she was going through.
"I was attacked yesterday," she said, the words slipping out before she could stop them.
Preston paused. "What?"
"At the hospital," Caroline continued, her voice hollow. "A man tried to kill my patient. He held a scalpel to my throat. I was pushed down a flight of stairs."
The table went silent. Preston's friends exchanged uncomfortable glances. Preston stared at her, his mouth slightly open.
Then he laughed.
It was a short, sharp sound, completely devoid of humor. "Wow," he said, shaking his head. "That's a new one. I've heard some crazy excuses to get out of a date, but 'I was pushed down the stairs'? That's creative, Caroline. Really."
"It's not an excuse," Caroline said, her hands clenching into fists under the table. "It's the truth."
"Sure it is," Preston said, rolling his eyes. "And I'm the President. Look, if you didn't want to see me, you could have just said so. You didn't have to invent some ridiculous story."
"It's not ridiculous," Caroline insisted. She reached up and pulled the gauze off her neck, revealing the angry red cut and the bruise that had formed around it. "Look."
Preston's eyes flicked to her neck. For a second, he looked taken aback. Then his expression hardened. "That could be from anything. You probably just scratched yourself shaving." He leaned forward, his voice dropping to a hiss. "I'm not an idiot, Caroline. Don't treat me like one."
Caroline stared at him. She had never hated anyone more in her entire life. She had just shown him a wound from a near-death experience, and he was calling her a liar.
She was done.
She stood up, the chair scraping loudly against the floor. "You're right, Preston. You're not an idiot. You're just a narcissistic, self-centered jerk who can't see past his own ego."
Preston's face turned red. "How dare you-"
"No, how dare you," Caroline shot back. "I came here because my mother made me. I apologized because I was trying to keep the peace. But I am done. I am done pretending that you are anything other than a spoiled child in an expensive suit."
She turned to walk away, but Preston grabbed her arm, his fingers digging into her skin.
"You're not going anywhere," he snarled. "Not until I say we're done."
"Let go of me," Caroline said, trying to pull her arm free. His grip was tight, bruising.
"Hey!"
The voice was like a gunshot. It cut through the noise of the cafe, silencing everyone.
Caroline turned. Jarrod Romero was standing in the doorway. He was wearing civilian clothes-dark jeans and a black sweater-but he looked more intimidating than he had in uniform. His face was pale, his jaw set in a hard line, and a sheen of sweat glistened on his forehead despite the cafe's air conditioning. His right arm was in a heavy black sling, held tight against his chest. He walked toward them, his stride purposeful. The crowd parted for him, people shrinking back from the raw power radiating off him.
Preston dropped Caroline's arm, stepping back. "Who the hell are you?"
Romero ignored him. He stopped in front of Caroline, his gray eyes sweeping over her face, then down to her arm where Preston had grabbed her. A red mark was already forming on her skin.
He looked back at Preston. The look in his eyes was lethal.
"Take your hands off her," Romero said, his voice quiet and deadly. "Or I will remove them for you."
Preston paled, but he tried to bluster. "This is a private conversation, man. Back off."
Romero took a step forward, getting into Preston's space. He was a full head taller, and he used every inch of that height to loom over the other man. "I don't repeat myself."
Preston swallowed hard. He looked at Romero's sling, then at the cold fury in his eyes, and seemed to decide that his pride wasn't worth a broken bone. He took a step back, raising his hands in surrender.
"Whatever, man. She's not worth it anyway." He turned to his friends. "Let's get out of here."
They scrambled to gather their things, eager to escape the tension. Preston shot Caroline one last, venomous look before storming out of the cafe.
Caroline stood there, her heart pounding. She looked up at Romero, completely at a loss for words.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
He didn't answer immediately. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and slapped it on the table.
"For the coffee," he said. Then he turned and walked toward the door, pausing to look back at her. "Come on."
Caroline hesitated for only a second. Then she followed him out into the night.
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7.6
Jocelyn Yang lived in the grand Turner Mansion, not as a guest, but as a prisoner. Ever since her father's death, the ruthless billionaire Elam Turner forced her to atone for sins her father never committed.
On her nineteenth birthday, a male classmate secretly sent her a diamond necklace. Elam, who had flown back from London overnight, flew into a psychotic, jealous rage at the sight of another man's gift.
He mercilessly crushed the delicate necklace into the marble floor with his custom leather shoe.
"Did you forget what you are?" Elam hissed, dragging her into a pitch-black storage room. "You take gifts from other men behind my back?"
He pinned her to the dusty floorboards and violently assaulted her. The next morning, a wire transfer of $500,000 hit her bank account. He had humiliated her, broken her spirit, and was now casually trying to buy her silence. Later, when a broken bike left her walking miles through a freezing rainstorm, he just shoved scalding tea into her bleeding hands.
"Look at you," he sneered. "You look like a stray dog ruining my floors."
Jocelyn curled up in the cold, her lips bleeding and her heart shattered. She couldn't understand his terrifying obsession. If he hated her so much, why did he refuse to let her go? Why did he look at her with such manic hunger while systematically destroying her life?
Staring at the massive sum of hush money on her phone, a desperate spark of vengeance flared in her chest. Jocelyn wired every single cent back to Elam's account. She picked up her charcoal pencil, vowing to win the upcoming art competition and buy her escape from this monster forever.
7.2
Clara's husband of three years walked into their penthouse with two lawyers.
He threw a divorce agreement on the table, demanding she sign away all her assets. If she refused, he would bankrupt her family and send her mother to federal prison.
He did it all for his new girlfriend, Corinne. After stripping Clara of everything, Kane stood by while Corinne publicly humiliated her, stepping on her fingers and mocking her misery. When Kane suspected Clara might be pregnant, he dragged her to a private clinic. He forced her onto an examination table and ordered a deeply invasive medical check-up, treating her like absolute garbage just to ensure she wasn't carrying his heir.
Lying on the cold medical bed in a thin paper gown, Clara's heart completely shattered. She didn't understand how the man who once promised her forever could turn into such a ruthless monster. She was indeed pregnant, but she knew if he found out, he would steal her baby and destroy her completely.
With the help of a tech-genius friend, Clara faked a negative test result and escaped his clutches. The next day, she walked into their company, threw a bold "I QUIT" note right in the mistress's face, and walked away. Touching her belly, Clara swore she would return to make them pay for every single thing they had done.
9.2
After catching my fiancé cheating with my adoptive sister, I broke off our engagement on the spot.
In retaliation, my abusive adoptive parents sold me to Kaelen Knight, the Lycan King, to clear our pack's debts.
He was rumored to be a ruthless, reclusive monster who had been horribly crippled in a fire centuries ago.
To ensure my absolute ruin, my sister planted fake love letters to my ex in my luggage and anonymously destroyed my university scholarship, cutting off my only escape route to the human world.
"A wolfless whore. You planned to drug me," Kaelen sneered, looking at the fake evidence with absolute disgust.
Believing I was a spy, my new husband had his guards throw me into the freezing woods with the Dire Wolves, leaving me to survive the night alone.
I was just a broken, wolfless Omega, entirely at the mercy of a cruel, powerless Lycan and a family that wanted me dead.
But I was wrong about him being powerless.
One night, I accidentally saw him rise from his wheelchair, his tall frame radiating an overwhelming, lethal aura.
He wasn't crippled at all.
The secret I thought was my shield was actually a loaded gun pointed at my head. Trapped with a terrifying predator, I had to stop playing the victim and fight for my life.
7.2
Allie Patterson poured fifteen years into her husband Grayson’s tech startup, living in a cramped San Jose apartment. Every penny, every late night coding session, was for their shared future, built on his constant claims the company struggled, always on the verge of its big break.
Then, a grant deed arrived: a stunning $4.2 million Atherton villa, paid in full, listing Grayson and an unknown Kacey Schmidt as joint tenants.
Her coffee mug shattered as Allie’s world imploded. Driving to the mansion, she found Kacey in silk pajamas, flaunting a massive pink diamond and, beneath it, Grayson’s grandmother’s heirloom ring – the one he’d tearfully claimed to have lost years ago.
Kacey purred, "He's in the shower. We were so tired last night."
The words were a serrated knife, twisting, confirming years of lies.
Humiliation and rage burned out, leaving a terrifying, absolute silence. All her sacrifice and trust were a cruel, elaborate joke, orchestrated by the man she loved.
Allie calmly took photos, then gave herself one minute in her beat-up car to mourn. When it passed, her tears stopped, replaced by cold, calculated murder in her eyes. She typed a text to Grayson:
"Come home early tonight. I have a surprise for you."
8.8
"Fuck...please..."
He risks a nibble, sending shockwaves to my core. My back arches off the wall with a sharp moan.
His hand slides between my legs, cupping my soaking panties.
"Look how wet you are," he whispers, "...shaking, and I haven't even fucked you yet."
He strokes my clit gently first, then harder. My toes curl, hair spilling into my sweaty face.
He's breaking me, ruining me with just his tongue and fingers. I can't speak. I can't think. I just tremble in his arms.
*********
The night I caught my fiancé cheating, something in me broke.
I cried.
I screamed.
I drove - into the rain, into nowhere, into him.
Cassian Cross.
A stranger with gray eyes, a sinful mouth, and hands that made me forget my name.
One night was all it took. One reckless mistake to burn away my heartbreak.
Until he showed up at my mom's wedding...
As my new stepbrother.
Now, Cassian won't stop.
He corners me in hallways, whispers filth at the altar, and looks at me like he still owns my body.
But there's one thing he didn't tell me-
He already belongs to someone else.
A fiancée bound to him by a contract... and a secret that could destroy us both.
He's dangerous.
He's forbidden.
He's promised to another.
And God help me, I still can't stop wanting him.
8.4
Arlene was the illegitimate daughter of the wealthy Boone family, treated worse than a stray dog. To keep her meager scholarship, she had to swallow her pride and apologize to the frat boy who tormented her.
But he didn't just want an apology. He forced her to drink twenty shots of liquor laced with pure capsaicin extract.
"Drink us under the table, or take off your clothes and crawl out."
Arlene drank until her stomach tore, vomiting blood and collapsing on the filthy club floor.
When she dragged her half-dead body back to the Boone estate, her biological father and half-sister didn't care. Instead, her sister ground Arlene's SAT admission ticket into the dirt with her stiletto.
"Throw her out. Dad doesn't want to look at her before Hardie's engagement."
The guards threw her onto the gravel, leaving her bleeding and barefoot in the freezing night.
Arlene sat shivering at a dark bus stop, her dignity completely stripped away. She never wanted a dime from the Boones, so why did they insist on crushing her only way out? And why did Dr. Hardie Boone, the untouchable head of the family, look at her with such a twisted, terrifying obsession?
When Hardie's black Aston Martin pulled out of the shadows, he scooped her up, took her away, and locked her inside his penthouse.
"You carry the Boone name. Whether you live or die is my decision."
Trapped by the dangerous man who demanded total control over her life, Arlene finally realized that simply running away was no longer an option.