The Almighty Tycoon Returns For Her
For a whole year, April believed her billionaire husband, Bartholomew, abandoned her in Europe the day after their arranged wedding. She hated him so much she drunkenly prayed for his death at a club.
But he suddenly returned that very night, catching her red-handed. Instead of a divorce, he trapped her, threatening to bankrupt her bloodsucking family unless she moved into his penthouse to play the devoted wife.
Forced to comply, she attended a dinner with her toxic family. Her stepmother deliberately served her lobster—knowing April had a fatal allergy.
"Eat up, darling. I know hospital food is dreadful."
When April refused and exposed their massive gambling debts, her furious father raised his hand to strike her across the face.
But it was Bartholomew, the ruthless tyrant she despised, who caught her father's arm and snapped his wrist.
"If you ever try to touch my wife again, I will erase your family by sunrise."
April was completely stunned. Why was he defending her with such murderous rage? And why did he keep a cheap paper airplane she had made at age six preserved under a glass dome in his study?
The answer came that night. When Bartholomew stepped out of the shower, April saw the massive, jagged surgical scar sliced directly over his heart. He hadn't run away; he had been fighting for his life on an operating table. Staring at the man who had silently survived just to come back to her, April made her choice. She was going to uncover the truth behind his surgery and their past.
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Chapter 8
The late afternoon sun bled through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the penthouse walk-in closet.
April stood in front of the full-length mirror, her fingers trembling slightly as she tried to fasten a heavy, blindingly bright diamond earring. She was using the jewelry as armor, trying to mask the knot of anxiety twisting in her stomach. Tonight was the Poole family dinner.
Bartholomew walked into the closet. He was wearing a bespoke, midnight-black suit that fit his broad shoulders flawlessly.
He saw her struggling with the clasp of her diamond necklace. Without a word, he stepped behind her and took the cold metal from her hands.
He lowered his head. His warm breath fanned across the sensitive skin of her nape. His large, calloused fingers deftly secured the clasp, intentionally letting his knuckles drag against her bare skin.
April flinched as if she had been burned. She met his dark gaze in the mirror, her heart doing a violent flip. She quickly looked away. "Thank you," she muttered.
They rode the elevator down to the garage. The bulletproof Maybach was waiting.
The moment they slid into the backseat and the privacy partition rolled up, the tense, quiet atmosphere vanished. It was a war room now.
Bartholomew opened an iPad resting on his lap. He pulled up a detailed dossier.
"Gregory will use the excuse of celebrating my recovery to force the port tariff reduction proposal at the dinner table," Bartholomew said, his voice cold and analytical.
April let out a bitter laugh. "And my stepmother, Lorraine, will put on her 'loving mother' act to guilt-trip me into agreeing."
Bartholomew turned his head, his eyes locking onto hers with terrifying intensity. "How far do you want to go tonight?"
April didn't hesitate. "I want to rip their fake masks off. I don't want them getting a single cent from Reynolds Group."
Bartholomew's lips curved into a dangerous smile. He closed the iPad.
"Good. But just in case things get out of hand, we need a safe word." He looked down at her legs. "If they back you into a corner you can't handle, kick my left shin twice under the table. I will physically remove you from the house."
A strange, unfamiliar warmth bloomed in April's chest. No one had ever offered to protect her like this. But her pride made her lift her chin. "I can handle them."
The Maybach cruised down the tree-lined avenues of the Upper East Side, surrounded by century-old townhouses.
Suddenly, Bartholomew reached across the center console. His large hand clamped down over April's cold, nervous fingers.
April gasped, trying to yank her hand back, but he intertwined their fingers, locking her in a grip that was firm but not painful.
"We are playing a happily married couple," he said, staring straight ahead. "Start getting used to the physical contact."
April gave up struggling. She let her hand rest in his, feeling the rough calluses on his palm and the steady, grounding heat radiating from his skin.
The car pulled up to the extravagant French-style townhouse of the Poole family. The butler was already waiting by the door.
Bartholomew stepped out first. He turned and offered his hand to April, playing the role of the devoted husband to perfection.
From the corner of his eye, Bartholomew spotted the flash of a paparazzi camera hidden in the bushes. He didn't flinch. He wanted the world to see that April belonged to him.
April took a deep breath, straightened her spine, and looped her arm through his.
The heavy front doors swung open. Lorraine, dripping in gaudy jewelry, rushed forward with a sickeningly sweet smile.
Lorraine opened her arms to hug April, but Bartholomew smoothly shifted his body, blocking Lorraine completely. He offered a stiff, formal handshake instead.
Lorraine's smile cracked for a second before she awkwardly shook his hand and ushered them inside.
In the living room, April's stepsister, Sloane, was lounging on the sofa, posing with a limited-edition Birkin. When she saw Bartholomew, her eyes lit up like a predator seeing meat.
Sloane pushed her chest out, lowering her voice to a breathy purr. "Hi, brother-in-law." Her eyes raked over his body shamelessly.
Acid clawed up April's throat. She clenched her jaw, ready to snap.
But Bartholomew didn't even blink. He looked right through Sloane as if she were a piece of ugly furniture. He completely ignored her existence.
He leaned down, his lips brushing April's ear. "Looks like the prey is eager to jump into the slaughterhouse," he whispered, a dark amusement lacing his tone.
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9.7
For three years, I hid my identity as the sole heiress of a multi-billion dollar tech empire to live in a cramped apartment and support my boyfriend, Ben.
But the day before our engagement, I stood outside a meeting room and overheard him talking to his wealthy boss, Haylie.
"She's just a stepping stone," Ben laughed, his voice full of contempt. "A poor, ambitionless distraction while I work my way up to where I really belong."
He mocked the cheap silver ring he gave me, calling it a necessary prop to keep a naive fool happy.
He bragged about the multi-million dollar merger proposal he was presenting, planning to use it to secure his promotion and build a future with her.
He had no idea that I had secretly negotiated that entire deal using my real connections just to give him his big break.
I had sacrificed my family's comfort, my true identity, and my own career just to watch him rise.
I poured my heart and soul into our humble beginnings, only to realize he saw my love as a pathetic joke and me as disposable trash.
I calmly picked up a pen and voided the merger agreement, tearing my hard work into tiny pieces.
I went home, slid the cheap ring off my finger, and dropped it into his mug of cold coffee.
"Soon, you'll find out exactly who is nothing."
Walking out the door, I pulled out my phone and texted my billionaire father.
"I'm in. Announce the merger."
9.1
With only fifteen days of cash flow left to save her tech startup, Aida had no choice but to seek a five-million-dollar bridge loan from Brendan Walls, a ruthless billionaire predator.
He agreed to sign the check, but on one sickening condition. He demanded Aida act as bait to get close to his corporate rival, Grayson Lott, treating her like a high-end call girl for a business transaction.
Forced to comply to save her employees, Aida let Grayson take her to a windowless underground club, where he secretly spiked her whiskey.
As the drugs paralyzed her body, triggering horrific flashbacks of a brutal assault from six years ago, Aida locked herself in the bathroom. She had to shatter a mirror and slice her own thigh open with a jagged shard of glass just to stay conscious enough to call Brendan for help.
Brendan's armored SUV immediately smashed through the club's wall to save her, and Grayson was arrested. But lying in the hospital, the horrifying truth finally clicked in Aida's mind.
The rescue was too fast. Brendan’s men hadn't rushed from Midtown; they had been parked outside the entire time. He had watched Grayson drug her and waited for the felony to happen just so he could legally seize Grayson's company. He had gambled her life and trauma for a hostile takeover.
When Brendan casually tossed a signed contract and luxury car keys onto her hospital bed as hush money, the last thread of Aida's sanity snapped.
"The deal is dead. NovaTech is mine. If you ever come near me again, I will kill you."
Bleeding and shaking with icy rage, Aida threw the keys at his chest, formally declaring war on the monster who thought he could buy her soul.
7.0
Eleanore thought her fiancé, Johan, was her only salvation after her family went bankrupt.
But at a high-society gala, he handed her a drugged glass of water. As the unnatural heat burned through her veins, the horrific truth hit her. Johan had isolated her and controlled her finances, all while secretly getting engaged to a wealthy heiress. He drugged Eleanore to ruin her completely, planning to lock her away as his helpless, secret mistress.
Desperate and losing her mind to the drug, Eleanore fled down the hallway. With Johan and his bodyguards hunting her, she stumbled into the dark presidential suite.
But she wasn't alone. Sitting on the leather sofa was Alexander Briggs—the most feared corporate raider on Wall Street, and Johan's exiled brother.
Outside the door, Johan was screaming, ready to drag her back to hell.
"I can be your antidote. But it's going to cost you."
The ruthless billionaire looked at her trembling body with cold calculation. He offered her a staggering deal: a three-month fake marriage to destroy Johan's empire, and in return, absolute protection and her father's massive debts paid in full.
She couldn't understand why the most powerful predator in New York would use a ruined girl as his weapon, but she knew she would rather die than let Johan touch her again.
When Johan finally broke down the door to claim his prey, Alexander calmly pulled Eleanore into his arms.
"Watch your mouth. You are speaking to my future wife."
8.6
As the eldest daughter of the Sharp family, I was treated worse than a stray dog, while my younger sister Seraphina was their precious princess.
When the family needed someone to marry a dying billionaire heir, they naturally chose me to take her place.
To force my consent, my brothers held a peanut butter sandwich to my face—knowing it was a lethal allergy—while dangling my EpiPen just out of reach.
On speakerphone, my own mother sighed in annoyance.
"Let her die. It might be for the best."
I choked out an agreement just as my throat closed up. But the forced engagement broke my sacred mystical vow, causing me to violently cough up my own lifeblood.
Seeing the blood, Seraphina dramatically fainted. My brothers instantly carried her to the hospital, stepping over my dying body and leaving me to bleed out on the cold marble floor.
I had to use a forbidden blood rune, draining my last ounce of strength, just to survive the night.
Even the mystical Order I served offered no comfort, calling only to demand I secure ten billion dollars for them or forfeit my soul for eternity.
Abandoned by my blood family and my spiritual master, I was completely alone, left with nothing but a broken body and a ticking clock.
But they made one fatal mistake: they let me live.
I turned to the dying heir they forced me to marry, a man plagued by a dark curse only I could cure.
"I will be your wife, and I will save your life," I told him.
In exchange, I would use his unimaginable wealth and power to make everyone who threw me away pay the ultimate price.
7.9
In my past life, I was the naive surrogate who fell desperately in love with Karson King, an untouchable Wall Street billionaire.
I thought my blind devotion would earn me a place in his family. Instead, his cruel mother forced me to sign away my parental rights to my three-year-old daughter.
I was locked in a dark, freezing basement. I watched helplessly as his arrogant relatives tormented my child, pushing her down a flight of marble stairs and shattering her tiny arm.
When we finally died in a horrific car crash, my face covered in blood amidst the shattered glass, Karson didn't shed a single tear. To him, my death was just the convenient erasure of a cheap mistake.
I sacrificed my dignity for his approval, but they treated us worse than stray dogs. Why did my innocent daughter have to pay the ultimate price for their ruthless arrogance?
Opening my eyes again, the harsh glare of a massive crystal chandelier pierced my vision. I was back in the grand foyer of the King estate, exactly five years ago.
"Sign it. You are nothing but a gold digger."
My soon-to-be mother-in-law slammed the thick legal contract onto the marble table, demanding I give up my daughter.
This time, the paralyzing fear evaporated, replaced by absolute, icy clarity.
I didn't cower. I picked up the pen, looked right at the billionaire who despised me, and prepared to manipulate his entire empire.
9.2
Chelsi was down to her last fourteen dollars. After a humiliating job rejection for being "too low-class," the threat of eviction forced her to try live-streaming. Terrified of her exhausted, tear-stained face, she cranked the AR beauty filter to the max, morphing into a bizarre plastic alien.
She was immediately dragged into a forced streaming battle with Kamron, the platform's most arrogant top streamer. Seeing her distorted filter, Kamron sneered, unleashing fifty thousand fans to flood her chat with toxic insults.
Kamron set a ruthless penalty for her inevitable loss.
"You're going to take a bar of soap, scrub your face completely clean, and shove your bare face right into the camera."
Desperate to keep the fifty dollars she had just earned for rent, Chelsi begged for a different punishment, but Kamron coldly refused. With her heart pounding, she walked to the freezing bathroom, her hands shaking as she scrubbed her skin raw, bracing for the cyberbullying.
She squeezed her eyes shut, feeling utterly humiliated by the cruelty of the internet. Why did she have to be stripped of her dignity just to survive? She clicked off the filter, waiting for the tidal wave of disgust to destroy her.
But the insults never came. The high-definition camera revealed a breathtakingly delicate, flawless face that no algorithm could ever replicate. The chat went dead silent, Kamron was so stunned he dropped a ten-thousand-dollar virtual yacht, and a silent war between two mysterious billionaires was about to begin.