Flash Marriage To The Ruthless Surgeon
My abusive ex was threatening a lawsuit that would destroy my father's career and wipe out my PhD. I was completely out of options.
That night, Graham, the boy from next door I hadn't seen in a decade, showed up at my apartment in the middle of a hurricane. Now a wealthy orthopedic surgeon, he offered a transactional marriage: he needed a local wife to keep his family away while he cared for his sick mother, and in return, he would make my ex disappear.
I thought it was a simple deal. But the morning after we signed the marriage license, Graham didn't just scare my ex off—he ruthlessly dismantled him. Then, Graham turned to me. His eyes were dead as he pulled out his phone, showing me a high-resolution photo of the night I illegally sold lab samples to pay off my ex's initial blackmail. He had hired a private investigator to stalk me. If that photo leaked to the FDA, I wouldn't just lose my degree; I'd go to prison.
"I needed a guarantee," he said flatly.
I was shaking with rage and terror. This wasn't a rescue. It was a hostage situation. Why did he hunt me down? Why use my darkest secret to trap me in this twisted marriage?
I couldn't live like this. I demanded an immediate divorce. But at the courthouse, the clerk dropped a bomb on us: state law required a mandatory thirty-day waiting period. Thirty days trapped with a ruthless, manipulative stranger. I had to find a way to break his leverage before the month was up.
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Chapter 4
The inside of Graham's car smelled of clean leather and something faintly antiseptic.
Jaimie sat in the passenger seat of his black Volvo XC60, her hands folded tightly in her lap. The car was nice-too nice for her own budget, but it felt solid and safe. It felt like a cocoon, separating her from the real world.
The silence was suffocating. The only sound was the hum of the tires on the wet asphalt and the rhythmic swish of the windshield wipers. The rain had started again, a light drizzle that blurred the city outside.
She watched the buildings pass, her mind racing. Every second that ticked by was a second closer to making the biggest mistake of her life. She thought about the washing machine, the way he had looked at her when he mentioned Gerry, the coldness in his eyes.
She couldn't do this. She couldn't marry a man who knew her secrets and used them against her. She couldn't live with a man who saw her as a transaction.
"Graham, stop the car."
He didn't slow down. He just glanced at her in the rearview mirror. "What's wrong?"
"I can't do this," she said, her voice trembling. "I'm sorry, but I'm backing out. I can't marry you."
She expected him to argue, to threaten her, to remind her of the deal. She braced herself for a fight.
"Okay," he said.
Jaimie blinked. "Okay?"
"If you want to back out, I won't force you." He kept his eyes on the road. "I'm sorry for how I acted this morning. I was out of line. I was sick, and I took it out on you."
She stared at him, her mouth slightly open. Was he... apologizing?
"I can change," he continued, his voice softer than she had ever heard it. "The washing machine thing, that's just a habit. I can be neater. And the investigation... I just needed to make sure you were safe. I wasn't trying to control you."
He sounded sincere. He sounded almost vulnerable. The hard edge was gone from his voice, replaced by a weariness that tugged at her heart.
She thought about his mother. About the heart surgery. About the fact that he had been running a fever and still showed up to take care of her. Maybe she had been too harsh. Maybe he was just a desperate son trying to do the right thing in the only way he knew how.
"Look, Jaimie," he said, his voice dropping to a low murmur. "I need this marriage. I really do. But I want it to be because you choose it, not because I'm forcing you."
Her resolve wavered. The anger drained out of her, leaving behind a hollow exhaustion. He was right. She needed this too. Gerry was still out there. Her father was still in danger.
"Maybe we could just..." she started, her voice softening.
"But," Graham interrupted, his tone shifting so abruptly it made her flinch. The softness vanished, replaced by a cold, hard edge that cut through the air like a blade. "I would prefer if our partnership was based on a mutual understanding, rather than just my willingness to accommodate your quirks."
He reached into the center console and pulled out his phone. He tapped the screen a few times, his thumb moving with deliberate precision.
"I didn't want to use this," he said, holding the phone out to her. "But you leave me no choice."
Jaimie looked down at the screen. Her blood turned to ice in her veins.
It was a photograph. A high-resolution, crystal-clear image taken with a telephoto lens. It showed a dimly lit warehouse. She was standing in the center of the frame, her face clearly visible. Across from her was a man she didn't recognize, handing her a thick envelope. On the table between them were small, sealed vials and a stack of printed data sheets.
The air in the car vanished. She couldn't breathe. Her lungs refused to work.
It was the night she had sold the lab samples. The night she had traded a piece of her soul to pay off Gerry's first demand. It was the one secret she thought was buried, the one mistake she thought she had gotten away with.
"Where did you get that?" she choked out, her voice barely a whisper.
"Gerry had been blackmailing you for a while," Graham said, his voice flat as he pulled the phone back and tucked it into his shirt pocket. "I was worried about what he might force you to do, so I hired a private investigator to keep an eye on things. This is from his report."
The car slowed to a stop at a red light. Graham turned to look at her. His eyes were flat, devoid of any emotion.
"What matters is that if this photo were to find its way to your university's ethics board, or to the FDA, your PhD wouldn't just be in jeopardy. You would be facing criminal charges."
The car slowed to a stop at a red light. Graham turned to look at her. His eyes were flat, devoid of any emotion.
"So," he said, his voice calm and level, "do we have a mutual understanding now, Jaimie? Or do you still want to get out of the car?"
The light turned green. The car lurched forward.
Jaimie didn't answer. She couldn't. She just sat there, staring blankly at the road ahead, the image of that photograph seared into her brain. The trap had just snapped shut, and she was the one who had walked right into it.
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9.1
I stood alone at the marble altar, the silence of the temple pressing against my eardrums.
It was my Mating Ceremony, but the groom was missing.
My phone buzzed with a notification: a livestream of my mate, Alpha Cain, skipping our union to welcome my sister, Eris, home.
In the video, he held her like she was fragile glass, captioning it: "True power recognizes true power."
When I returned to the Pack House, humiliated, I wasn't met with an apology.
I was met with a slap from my mother.
Eris, feigning a powerful "Alpha Aura," claimed my mere scent was poisoning her.
To "save" her, my family locked me in my room.
But the true betrayal came when I overheard their hushed whispers through the door.
"Use Vera," my mother said, her voice chillingly practical.
"She recovers fast. We can drain her blood weekly for Eris. She can stay as a servant to raise Cain and Eris's pups."
My blood ran cold.
They didn't just neglect me; they planned to harvest me like livestock.
They thought I was the weak Omega they exiled to the North years ago to peel potatoes.
They had no idea that in the North, I wasn't a servant.
I was Commander V, a warrior forged in ice and blood.
I reached under my bed and pulled out my black tactical duffel.
"Screw the meatloaf," I whispered.
I wasn't just leaving. I was going to war.
7.9
June was an ordinary architect struggling to pay rent, completely estranged from her high-society mother.
But one night, she was kidnapped and beaten in an abandoned warehouse by Gage Becker, the city's most ruthless billionaire, who demanded payback for her mother's sins.
Gage pointed a high-definition camera at June's battered face and video-called her mother, threatening to release the footage and ruin her upcoming billion-dollar wedding.
"I will never throw away a billion-dollar marriage for a useless daughter."
Her mother's cold voice echoed through the warehouse before the line went dead.
From that moment, Gage systematically destroyed June's life. She was publicly humiliated and forced to hack off her own hair with a cigar cutter. She was blacklisted from every firm in the city, evicted by her landlord, and violently mugged in a freezing New York blizzard.
Curled up in an icy tunnel waiting to die, June felt a suffocating despair. She hadn't spoken to her mother in months. Why did she have to endure this hell for a woman who didn't even care if she lived or died? Why was a monster like Gage so obsessed with driving her to the grave?
When Gage's armored Maybach pulled up, he stepped into the snow to mock her, waiting for her to finally surrender and beg for his mercy.
But the absolute humiliation snapped the last thread of June's sanity.
Instead of crying, she lunged forward with feral energy and sank her teeth directly into the devil's flesh.
7.9
Hannah came home under a false identity, ready to keep her head down and avoid trouble. Then a near-drowning opened her eyes, and the family she had wanted gave her nothing but disappointment.
She severed every tie, shed the disguise, and rose in revenge as a miracle doctor, brilliant hacker, and feared underworld ruler. Shock followed her family at every turn.
Her parents regretted everything. Her eldest brother clung desperately to the bond of their shared blood, while her second brother gave up his entire fortune just to earn her forgiveness. Her third brother offered up his own body for a surgery-all to save her.
But Hannah stayed cold and built her empire alone. Only one deadly rival refused to be ignored.
"I was hired to kill you, mister."
"Then take my heart, too."
9.1
My husband, Dante Moretti, the feared Underboss, signed the divorce papers I slipped him without a glance. Too busy texting his true love, Sofia, he was blind to the annulment decree ending everything. The Reaper couldn't see the death of his own marriage.
For three years, I was Elena, his silent wife, the "Caged Canary," cleaning his messes while meticulously planning my escape from our loveless world.
He dismissed me for Sofia's every whim, publicly shaming me after a past love letter was read, then abandoning me again for her fake crisis.
That night, he violently shoved me against a wall, leaving me bleeding and concussed, rushing instead to protect Sofia. Discarded and injured, my invisible love became a weapon against me.
His crushing blindness, the cold realization I was a mere placeholder, fueled a profound injustice. How could he be so lethal, yet oblivious to his wife, favoring the one who betrayed him?
With chilling resolve, I uploaded Sofia's confession, initiated a massive financial transfer dismantling his empire, and staged my own death. Under a new identity, I fled to San Francisco, ready to build my power, far from his bloody, deceitful world.
8.7
I was the spare daughter of the Vitiello crime family, born solely to provide organs for my golden sister, Isabella.
Four years ago, under the codename "Seven," I nursed Dante Moretti, the Don of Chicago, back to health in a safe house. I was the one who held him in the dark.
But Isabella stole my name, my credit, and the man I loved.
Now, Dante looked at me with nothing but cold disgust, believing her lies.
When a neon sign crashed down on the street, Dante used his body to shield Isabella, leaving me to be crushed under twisted steel.
While Isabella sat in a VIP suite crying over a scratch, I lay broken, listening to my parents discuss if my kidneys were still viable for harvest.
The final straw came at their engagement gala. When Dante saw me wearing the lava stone bracelet I had worn in the safe house, he accused me of stealing it from Isabella.
He ordered my father to punish me.
I took fifty lashes to my back while Dante covered Isabella's eyes, protecting her from the ugly truth.
That night, the love in my heart finally died.
On the morning of their wedding, I handed Dante a gift box containing a cassette tape-the only proof that I was Seven.
Then, I signed the papers disowning my family, threw my phone out the car window, and boarded a one-way flight to Sydney.
By the time Dante listens to that tape and realizes he married a monster, I will be thousands of miles away, never to return.
8.5
Five years ago, Nina Hale lost everything... her family, her reputation, and the man she once loved. Betrayed by her own sister and abandoned by those she trusted most, she disappeared without a trace.
Now she's back.
With a new identity and a burning determination, Nina is ready to reclaim her life and chase the dream she once gave up: becoming a star actress. But her return awakens old enemies, and her scheming sister Lydia is determined to ruin her again.
Just when Nina thinks things can't get worse, she's caught in another trap... and unexpectedly crosses paths with a quiet, lonely little boy.
Ethan Grant hasn't spoken in years.
Feeling responsible for him, Nina agrees to stay and help the child come out of his shell. But she didn't expect Ethan's dangerously charming father, Lucas Grant, to enter the picture.
Cold, powerful, and impossible to read, Lucas slowly finds himself drawn to the woman who brightens his son's world.
What begins as a simple act of kindness soon turns into something far more complicated, because Nina came back for revenge.
She never planned to fall in love.
**********
"I saw you with him," Lucas said quietly, but the tension in his jaw gave him away.
Nina exhaled, crossing her arms. "You don't get to care."
"Don't I?" He stepped in, close enough that she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes.
"This is just a contract."
"Then why does it bother me?" His hand hovered near her waist, not touching-yet.
"It shouldn't." Her breath faltered.
His gaze darkened, "And yet it does."