Reborn From Fire: The Billionaire's Obsession
The night before her wedding to Wall Street billionaire Everette Baird, Deliah Quinn stood happily in her haute couture gown.
Then, her younger sister Arvilla walked in, handed her a drugged glass of champagne, and slammed an ultrasound on the vanity.
"I'm pregnant with Everette's child," Arvilla sneered.
Before Deliah's paralyzed body could react, Arvilla dragged in a canister of industrial gasoline, soaked the bridal suite, tossed a lighter, and locked the heavy oak doors from the outside.
To escape the roaring inferno, Deliah smashed the glass balcony and threw herself into the freezing, violent waters of the Atlantic Ocean.
For five agonizing years, everyone believed the Quinn heiress was dead.
Deliah returned to New York entirely reborn—a top architectural designer and a single mother, having scrubbed her past clean and forgotten the people who destroyed her.
She only wanted a peaceful life with her five-year-old genius son, Leo.
But she had no idea her son was secretly hacking airport security cameras to find himself a wealthy stepdad.
Leo deliberately bumped into a terrifying, cold-blooded tycoon, spilling scalding coffee on his custom suit to get his attention.
When Deliah frantically rushed over to protect her son and apologize, the air in the terminal vanished.
Everette Baird stared at the exact face he had obsessively mourned for five years, his eyes turning pitch black as he crushed his phone in his bare hand.
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Chapter 3
Leo pressed his back against a massive marble pillar outside the VIP security corridor. He peeked his head around the edge.
At the far end of the corridor, Everette Baird was walking toward him.
Everette wore a custom Tom Ford suit, pitch black. He moved with a predatory grace, his aura so cold it felt like a physical wall pushing people out of his way.
Joshua walked half a step behind him, speaking rapidly. "The hostile takeover of the Silicon Valley tech firm is in motion, sir."
Everette's brow furrowed. "Clean them out. Every executive on their board is gone by tomorrow."
Leo watched them approach. He calculated the distance and Everette's walking speed in his head.
He turned and walked over to the counter of a nearby Starbucks. He stood on his tiptoes and grabbed a Venti hot Americano that someone had just ordered.
The barista was looking down at the cash register, completely missing the theft.
Leo walked back to his pillar, holding the scalding cup in both hands. He took a deep breath.
When Everette's leather shoes stepped onto the third marble tile from the pillar, Leo launched himself forward.
He intentionally let his foot slide on the polished marble. He lost his balance and fell straight toward Everette's long legs.
With a dull thud, Leo's head collided with the hard muscle of Everette's thigh.
The Venti Americano flew out of Leo's hands. The dark liquid arched through the air and splashed directly onto Everette's custom suit jacket and crisp white shirt.
The dark brown stain ruined the fifty-thousand-dollar suit instantly. Steam rose from the fabric.
Joshua gasped, stepping forward. "Where did this stray kid come from?"
Four men in black suits materialized instantly. The bodyguards surrounded Leo, dropping the temperature in the corridor to absolute zero.
Everette stopped moving. He looked down at his ruined clothes. A flash of pure, violent rage ignited in his eyes.
He slowly lowered his head, his gaze slicing down like a blade toward the boy sitting on the floor.
Leo sat on the marble, rubbing his forehead. He didn't cry. Instead, he tilted his head up and met Everette's terrifying stare without flinching.
When Everette saw the boy's amber eyes, his heart physically stuttered in his chest.
The breath was knocked out of his lungs. Those eyes. They were exactly like Deliah's.
The rage in Everette's throat vanished, replaced by a sudden, suffocating tightness. He raised a hand, signaling the bodyguards to back off.
Leo dusted off his pants and stood up. He looked up at the giant of a man.
"Sir," Leo said, his voice clear and serious. "Your suit is ruined. But my mom can pay for it."
Joshua stared at the boy in absolute shock, his professional composure cracking for a fraction of a second, though he wisely kept his mouth shut.
Everette shot Joshua a look so cold it made the assistant snap his mouth shut.
Everette slowly crouched down until he was eye-level with the boy. "What is your name? Where are your parents?"
Leo crossed his arms over his chest. A sly smile touched his lips. "I'm Leo. My mom is super pretty. And she's single."
A harsh, breathless sound escaped Everette's chest. He was actually amused. The corner of his mouth twitched upward.
"I see you have a lot of money," Leo continued, his tone completely business-like. "If you agree to be my stepdad, you don't even have to give me change for the coffee."
Joshua stared at the boy in absolute horror. No one spoke to the tyrant of Wall Street like this.
Everette stared at Leo's face. It was the eyes-amber, intelligent, and carrying a stubborn light that was an exact echo of Deliah's. The sight struck a deep, buried chord inside him.
Everette stood up. He pulled a silk handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the coffee from his hand.
"Fine," Everette said, his voice a low rumble. "Take me to this single mother of yours."
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7.2
Five years ago, I, Claire Parker, ran away for love with Daniel Carter, the broke boy everyone looked down on. But on the very day we were supposed to leave together, he abandoned me.
Overnight, I became the laughingstock of the entire city and was forced into a marriage alliance with a terminally ill man, Ryan Cooper.
Five years later, my husband died, the marriage arrangement fell apart, and the Cooper family threw me out without a shred of mercy.
Meanwhile, Daniel, the man everyone once sneered at, returned home in glory and became the hottest rising name in the business world.
And somehow, he ended up becoming my boss.
I wanted nothing to do with him, yet he kept closing in on me, cornering me with sarcasm sharp enough to draw blood.
Then one day, Daniel caught me on a date with another man.
His eyes reddened instantly as he pinned me against the wall. "Claire... are you abandoning me again?"
7.1
I was the top commander of a black-ops military program. After slaughtering my way through a hellish mission, I reached the extraction helicopter, trusting my second-in-command to watch my back.
But the moment our hands locked, he didn't pull me up. Instead, he plunged a syringe of lethal neurotoxin directly into my neck.
He aimed his gun at my chest, coldly stating that I was too dangerous to live. My lungs stopped, and I died in a pool of my own blood. But the endless blackness suddenly shattered. My consciousness violently forced its way into a new, broken shell. I woke up in a freezing alley, soaked in muddy rain.
This body belonged to seventeen-year-old Eliza Wyatt. A massive wave of foreign memories crashed into my brain. Her own younger sister had just stood at the top of the stairs with a mocking smile, watching street thugs beat Eliza to death.
"Take good care of the Wyatt family's eldest daughter. Tonight is the night she finally disappears."
The endless humiliation, the cold stares of her family, and the brutal betrayal by her own blood flashed before my eyes. Why was this fragile girl treated like garbage and pushed to her death by the very people who should have protected her?
I looked down at my pale, trembling hands. The top commander was dead, but in this bleeding shell, Eliza Wyatt was very much alive. I picked up a switchblade from the bloody puddle and stood up in the storm. It was time to hunt.
8.2
Ashley was tied to a rusted iron pillar in an abandoned warehouse, the noxious fumes of gasoline soaking her clothes.
Her fiancé Devon and her stepsister Brittany stood before her, revealing a horrifying truth. Devon never saved her from that fatal car crash three years ago; he merely stole the credit.
Worse, Brittany smirked and confessed that Ashley's own father had orchestrated her mother's murder. Before Ashley could process the betrayal, Devon callously tossed a lighter. A wall of blistering heat instantly consumed her. Even when Bennett Hawkins, the cold and untouchable billionaire, rushed into the inferno to shield her with his body, they were both swallowed by the explosion.
As the fire melted her skin, Ashley died with agonizing hatred. Why did her own flesh and blood want her dead? What dark secret were they hiding about her mother's tragic death?
Opening her eyes again, freezing saltwater violently flooded her lungs.
She was back at her twentieth birthday yacht party, right after Brittany had secretly pushed her into the freezing Hudson River.
Staring at the hypocritical faces of her family pretending it was an accident, Ashley didn't cry or beg. She calmly snatched a phone and dialed 911.
"Yes. I need to report an attempted murder."
7.4
She saved a dying boy and forgot his face. He survived and memorized hers.
For a decade, Rob Stark was a shadow. He was the anonymous donor at her mother's funeral. He was the silent investor who saved her career. He was the reason every man she ever dated disappeared without a trace.
Chloe Bishop thought it was fate. But fate doesn't break into your house and leave a marriage license on your pillow.
"You tried to escape me three times, Chloe. There won't be a fourth."
The man she saved didn't grow up to be a hero. He grew up to be her captor.
7.3
Clara was the despised fake heiress of the wealthy Price family.
For years, she endured their coldness, desperately trying to please her adoptive mother and her fiancé, Preston.
But a sudden, terrifying vision of an alternate timeline shattered her reality.
In that life, the real heiress, Bria, framed Clara for stealing a priceless antique pearl earring.
Her adoptive family chose blood over loyalty, watching coldly as Preston publicly dumped her.
Clara was thrown out without a penny, hunted down by hitmen Bria hired, and died a miserable, lonely death.
Now, as the agonizing memories faded, Clara found herself back in the exact moment the nightmare began.
Bria was whimpering in Preston's arms, while the family matriarch slammed her cane against the floor.
"You will call Preston," Eleanor ordered, her voice cold and absolute. "You will cancel the engagement yourself."
They expected her to panic and beg.
They expected her to cry over the family that never loved her and the man whose bankrupt tech company she had secretly saved with her own code.
Why should she suffer for their greed?
Why should she let a venomous sister and a useless fiancé destroy her life when she possessed the lethal combat skills of a brutal alternate reality?
This time, Clara didn't shed a single tear.
She yanked off the five-carat diamond ring, threw it onto the table, and publicly broadcasted the secret audio of Bria's vicious setup.
Then, she packed a single bag and walked out the door, ready to crush anyone who stood in her way.
7.4
Ardella caught her fiancé Braden cheating with an actress in a downtown VIP room.
It was supposed to be a simple business marriage to save her family's bankrupt company.
But instead of supporting her, her uncle and aunt demanded she get on her knees and apologize to the cheating fiancé.
They didn't care about her dignity; they only cared about the merger capital.
Her cousin publicly mocked her, and her uncle threatened to permanently hide the police file revealing who murdered her father if she ruined the deal.
To make matters worse, Ethelbert Stone, the terrifying billionaire who raised her—and the man she was desperately trying to escape—publicly claimed he didn't know her.
Yet, moments later, he trapped her in his car, his eyes filled with a sick, possessive rage, reminding her that every inch of her belonged to him.
She was completely cornered by a cheating fiancé, a parasitic family, and an obsessed former guardian.
They had drained her father's trust fund dry and now wanted to sell her off to cover their debts.
They really thought she was just a helpless pawn they could manipulate and discard at will.
But they were dead wrong.
Ardella calmly wiped her hands after throwing scalding tea at her aunt's feet, staring down at her greedy family.
"The headline tomorrow will read: Price Group Bankrupt, Fails to Sell Niece to Cover Debts."
She backed up the video of her fiancé's betrayal to ten different servers and sent a text to her private investigator.
Tonight, at the elite society dinner, she was going to blow the scandal wide open and drag them all down with her.