Trapped By The Phantom: His Little Lamb
I woke up to the screech of a megaphone and realized I had transmigrated into a YA novel called *Roses Under Thorns*.
I wasn't the beloved heroine. I was Chloe Carrillo, a disposable scholarship student whose only purpose was to die in a tragic car crash to advance the plot.
Desperate to survive, I tried to become invisible. But fate played a sick joke, making me the roommate of the female lead and drawing the suffocating, obsessive attention of her powerful brother, Dean Gibbs.
While desperately avoiding Dean's controlling grasp, my nightmare worsened. An untraceable cyberstalker began hunting me.
He called me "Little Lamb." He left a burner phone in my secret library hideout, sent photos of me taken from ceiling vents, and texted me the moment I stepped out of the dorm shower.
"The water looks warm. Enjoy your shower."
The police couldn't help, and asking Dean meant trading one terrifying cage for another. I didn't understand why this was happening. I was supposed to be a nobody, yet I was trapped in an invisible web, monitored every second of my life.
Refusing to be a victim, I tracked down the university's legendary phantom hacker, Ashton Bridges.
I handed him my devices, begging him to trace the stalker, thinking I had finally found a safe ally.
I didn't know that as soon as the lab door closed behind me, he pulled up a live camera feed of my bedroom, his lips curving into a predatory smile.
"Little Lamb, you walked right into my arms."
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Chapter 11
Back in the dorm room, the door clicked shut behind them, and the sound was like a starting pistol.
Chloe felt a surge of adrenaline, a feeling she hadn't recognized in days: hope. It was a fragile, unfamiliar thing, but it was there, warming the pit of her stomach. She held the small, black flash drive in her palm. It felt heavy, solid. A weapon.
"I feel like I can finally breathe," Chloe said, the words coming out on a shaky exhale. She walked over to her desk, her movements deliberate.
Hannah watched her, a genuine smile spreading across her face. "He seemed really smart. Like, scary smart."
"He is," Chloe agreed. She looked at the flash drive, then at Hannah. "This is going to work. I can feel it."
She sat down and opened her laptop. The screen flickered to life, and for the first time in a week, she didn't flinch at the sight of the small, dark circle of the webcam. It was just a piece of hardware. Soon, it would be a blind eye.
With a sense of ceremony, she slid the USB drive into the port. The click was satisfyingly firm.
A simple installation window popped up on the screen. The program was called "Aegis Protocol." A shield.
Chloe's finger hovered over the trackpad. This was it. This was the moment she took back control. She clicked "Install."
A blue progress bar appeared and began to crawl steadily across the screen. Chloe watched it, her breath held tight in her chest. It was more than just software; it was a digital wall being built around her, brick by invisible brick.
Hannah came and stood behind her, resting a hand on her shoulder. "Is it working?"
"I think so," Chloe whispered.
The progress bar reached the end. A small, cheerful chime sounded from the laptop's speakers. Installation Complete.
The relief that washed over Chloe was so intense it made her dizzy. The tension in her shoulders, a constant companion for days, finally released. The air in the room felt lighter, cleaner. She had done it. She had found a way.
She was safe.
Just as a real, genuine smile touched her lips, her phone, lying face-up on the desk, lit up.
Ding.
The sound, so similar to the one from the laptop, made her heart stutter. She glanced at it, a flicker of the old fear returning, but she pushed it down. It was probably the Aegis program, blocking some spam message. It was a sign that it was working.
She reached for the phone, her movements confident again. She unlocked the screen.
The message was from an Unknown Number.
Her blood went cold.
"Cute little program. Did the Phantom tell you it would protect you?"
Chloe's breath hitched. The screen seemed to blur. He knew. He knew she had installed a program. And he knew Ashton's nickname. A name only a handful of people on campus even whispered.
Before she could process it, a second message buzzed through.
"You shouldn't have dragged your friend into this, Little Lamb."
A wave of nausea rolled through her. Her friend. He meant Hannah.
Then came the third message. It wasn't text. It was a picture.
Chloe's vision tunneled. The photo was of Hannah's profile. She was standing by the mini-fridge, a bottle of water in her hand, a look of concern on her face as she watched Chloe at the desk. It had been taken seconds ago.
The angle was unmistakable. It was from the laptop. From the webcam.
Chloe's head snapped up. She stared at the tiny black dot above her screen. It wasn't a blind eye. It was a gaping maw. A black hole that had just swallowed her last shred of hope.
He was watching them. Right now. Through her computer.
She hadn't installed a shield. She had opened the gates and welcomed in the Trojan horse.
Hannah was in danger. Because of her. The thought was a physical blow, knocking the air from her lungs more violently than any threat against herself.
"Chloe? What is it?" Hannah asked, her voice laced with worry. She had seen the color drain from Chloe's face. "You look like you're going to be sick."
Chloe couldn't speak. Her throat was closed tight with terror. She shakily turned the phone and held it out for Hannah to see.
Hannah's eyes scanned the messages, then landed on the photo of herself. A small gasp escaped her lips, and she slapped a hand over her mouth, her own face turning pale.
Something inside Chloe snapped. The fear, the helplessness, it all curdled into a hot, violent rage. She reached out and slammed the laptop shut with a loud crack. It wasn't enough. She wanted to smash it, to grind it into dust.
She snatched her phone, her fingers fumbling on the screen, slick with a cold sweat. She found Ashton's number in her recent calls. She didn't hesitate.
The phone on the other end rang once.
"I need a video call," she hissed into the phone, a raw, ragged thing torn from her throat. "Now!"
There was a beat of silence from the other end. Then, his voice, as calm and steady as ever, replied.
"Okay. I'm connecting."
The calm in his voice was the most terrifying thing she had ever heard. Her only hope was now the source of her deepest fear.
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7.7
Nora's life turned into a nightmare after she was banished from her pack by her own husband. She was subjected to mockery, abuse and humiliation before being cast out with nothing.
Faced with the cruelty of a world that had never once been kind to her, the moon goddess decided to bless her with her fated mate.
The same man she watched slaughter others without a single trace of mercy. The man who was twice as cold and twice as ruthless as the husband who destroyed her.
Yet he would not let her go. She found herself stuck between the husband who used her and the ruthless mate who wanted her but refused to admit it. Two powerful men. One woman who was never supposed to survive any of it. And a moon goddess who was not done with her yet.
7.2
Elara Vex had everything-a flawless ice core, the title of prodigy, and a place at the pinnacle of the High Tower. But in one brutal night, it was all ripped away. Her mentor tore the core from her chest. Her fiancé drove a sword through her back. Her own sister smiled as she bled out on the cold marble floor.
When Elara wakes, she's years in the past, mere hours before her core is scheduled to be stolen. This time, she won't be anyone's sacrificial lamb. She shatters her own core with forbidden blood magic and forges something far more terrifying in its place-a bottomless, ravenous Chaos Core that devours magic itself.
Now, branded a worthless cripple and cast into the deadly Abyss, Elara is pulled from the darkness by the outcasts of Elysium Academy-a school for heretics, psychopaths, and everything the Tower despises. Under the tutelage of a reclusive principal who knew her murdered mother, Elara will master her forbidden power and uncover the Tower's darkest secrets.
When the Five Academies Ranking Tournament arrives, Seraphina Vex stands in the arena, draped in white saintess robes, ready to claim ultimate glory. She doesn't know that a ghost from her past has clawed her way back from hell. She doesn't know that Elara is coming-and this time, the prodigal sister isn't asking for mercy. She's bringing chaos.
8.4
My mate, Alpha Santino, brought another woman into our home. She was a pregnant Omega, the widow of his fallen Beta, and he swore to protect her above all others.
He gave her my seat of honor, left our bed cold each night to soothe her feigned nightmares, and ignored me completely. I was the Luna of the Blackstone Pack, but I was becoming a ghost in my own life.
The final betrayal happened in my own bedroom. She stood over my vanity and deliberately shattered my mother's sacred moonstone necklace, the last piece of my family I had left.
When Santino burst in, he didn't see my heartbreak. He saw only her fake tears.
"What did you do to her?!" he roared, his voice laced with the Alpha's Command, a sacred power he used to crush my will.
Then, for her, he did the unforgivable. He raised his hand and struck me, his mate.
In that instant, the love I had desperately clung to turned to ice. The man I had sworn my life to had not only betrayed me but had defiled the sacred bond the Goddess herself had blessed.
As the pain of his betrayal ripped through me, something ancient and powerful awakened in my blood. I rose to my feet and spoke the words that would destroy his world and begin mine.
"I, Alessia Bianchi, reject you, Santino Moretti, as my mate."
7.1
The captain is dead to the world. And I'm the only one holding the kill switch.
Ethan Carter, the "Glacier of Silvercrest," was the most feared Alpha to ever step onto the ice. Now, he's nothing but a shell-a broken, comatose legend trapped in his own body.
My life? It was supposed to be simple. Graduate, survive the pack's bottom-tier status, and pay off my father's ruinous blood-debts. Instead, the pack elders handed me a contract soaked in cold, hard malice: I am the designated "Stabilizer." My only job is to touch him, scent him, and keep his wolf from flatlining.
I thought I was just a glorified nurse. I didn't realize the Alpha was listening.
When Ethan finally wakes, he isn't the hero the Kingdom of Valeria remembers. He's a starving predator with amber eyes that burn holes through my defenses and a temperament that makes the frost in the mansion seem warm. He hates the bargain, he hates the pack, and-most dangerously-he hates the way his scent turns wild whenever I'm near.
He wants me out of his sight. I want to be out of his reach.
But in a pack built on secrets, someone is still trying to finish the job they started on his life. Now, the man who wants me gone is the only one who can protect me. And as the rink turns into a battlefield, I'm realizing the most dangerous thing about the Alpha isn't his temper... it's the fact that once he claims a mate, he doesn't know how to let go.
Frozen hearts are meant to shatter. But in the fire of this pack, we're both going to burn.
7.3
For a thousand years, the Vora beastmen have been cursed by a madness-a burning sickness in their blood that only one thing can soothe: the legendary 'Blood-Blessed,' a human female whose very scent is a living cure.
When a virus wiped out nearly all females, their desperate hunt for this mythical girl turned into a brutal conquest. They crushed our fallen human kingdoms, reducing us to breathing meat under their cruel "Livestock Codex."
To save my little sister from being branded for their elite breeding auction, I took her place in the male-only death draft.
Disguised as a boy, I was thrown into a pitch-black labyrinth, a living sacrifice meant to feed their ultimate nightmare: the feral, half-dragon Mad King.
He tore our steel cage apart like wet paper. I pressed my back against the freezing wall, watching in horror as he slaughtered the screaming men around me.
He ripped the filthy coat from my body, exposing my true gender. As his crimson eyes locked onto my throat and he opened his jaws for the kill, my rage burned away my fear.
I was a pureblood heiress of a dead empire, but I would not die cowering like an animal. I gripped a shard of glass, ready to aim for his eye.
But as he lunged, the glass sliced my palm. The moment my blood hit the air, the legend became my reality. The sweet, intoxicating scent that flooded the dark wasn't just my pheromones-it was the living cure.
The terrifying, apocalyptic tyrant froze mid-strike. He dropped his massive body to his knees, his fangs retracting as he gently, desperately licked my bleeding hand.
His chaotic red eyes darkened with an absolute, world-ending obsession as he pulled my fragile body against his burning chest.
"Mine."
I was meant to be his final meal. They called me the Blood-Blessed. He called me his Queen.
7.7
I trusted the wrong people in my past life.
My supposed lover and my sweet sister conspired against me, locking me inside a burning warehouse to die.
But the man I had spent my life hating, my ruthless captor Damien Sterling, rushed straight into that inferno and burned alive just to try and save me.
In my past life, I was utterly blind. I believed Julian's forged documents and Scarlett's fake affection. I even tried to assassinate Damien with a silver dagger they provided, breaking the heart of the only man who truly loved me. I died choking on thick ash, realizing too late who the real monsters were.
Why was I so incredibly foolish? Why did I let their vicious manipulation turn me into a weapon against the one person who would sacrifice absolutely everything for me?
Opening my eyes again, the phantom smell of smoke vanished.
I was sitting in the bloody water of Damien's bathtub, right after my staged suicide attempt.
When my sister sneaked into my penthouse suite and handed me the dagger to kill him again, I didn't hesitate.
I grabbed her hand tightly and plunged the sharp blade directly into my own shoulder.
"Please don't kill me, Scarlett!"
This time, I will ruthlessly ruin them both, and I will never let Damien go.