Coralie Sullivan

I kept a list. Ninety-eight times my husband chose another woman over me.

Missed birthdays, ruined anniversaries, broken promises—all for his "patient" Sophia, who seemed to have a medical emergency every time we had plans.

"It's just my job, Emma," he would say. "You understand."

Ryan thought he could have his cake and eat it too. He was wrong.

After an incident, I was determined to leave him, and before I left, I gave him an unforgettable "gift."

I busted my ass working for five years, completely wrecked my health just to scrape together money for his eye surgery. Then I discovered—he was never blind to begin with.

When I asked him why.

"Because you owe me," Matthew stared at me with those cold eyes.

But I can't remember a damn thing...

Now I'm about to die from late-stage stomach cancer. I wonder if Matthew will be pleased?

I thought I was the happiest woman in the world... until I clicked on that video.

The moment the screen lit up, my entire world came crashing down.

The woman on the bed was Calista - that girl who grew up with us since we were kids. And that hand caressing her skin was wearing the wedding ring I had personally put on Matteo's finger.

"I've missed you so much..."
"You drive me crazy, baby..."

Those sweet words I knew so well completely destroyed me.

Everyone said we were the perfect couple, but who knew this marriage was built on nothing but lies?

Since he's so good at acting, I guess it's time I gave him a show of my own. I'm going to make sure everyone sees what this "perfect husband" really is...

Texting my roommate about tonight's plans. 【Want to binge-watch something tonight?】My finger slipped, autocorrect changed it to 【Want to spend the night together?】Even worse, I sent it to the wrong person—to my stepbrother Alex!

My face instantly burned red. In my panic to delete the message, I secretly grabbed his phone.

Only to accidentally discover that he had me saved as—【Phenylethylamine】The love molecule?

I stared at the screen in shock, my mind completely blank.

This genius stepbrother with glasses had been cold and distant for three years. I thought he didn't care about me at all...

Footsteps approached. Alex was coming back.

He glanced at his phone's position, then at me. "Ava, did you touch my phone?"

How do I explain what I just saw?

I'm dead, trapped as a ghost who can only follow my husband around.

Watching him examine my dismembered corpse at the garbage dump, his coldness shattered my heart—this man couldn't even recognize his own wife's wedding ring. When I heard him tell someone that my death was "convenient, saved him the hassle of divorce," rage nearly tore my soul apart.

But when I followed him back to his car and saw him break down crying when he thought no one was watching...

Louis and I missed each other for five years before we finally reconciled.

But after only three years together, he passed away from cancer.

When I opened my eyes again, I had traveled back to the year when he hated me most.

Louis was saying harsh words to me, decisively breaking up:

"Emily. I never want to see you again."

I grabbed his collar and kissed him, cutting off whatever he was about to say.

Louis: ???

I said: "Even if we break up, we can still be friends with benefits, can't we?"

I'm alive.

When I jolted awake to see March 15th on my phone, I could barely believe it—I should have been dead since August 18th! Marcus, my Alpha husband, had murdered pregnant me with his own hands for his "childhood sweetheart" Freya's fake death.

Reborn to the night it all began, I heard the familiar pleading downstairs: "Please, Alpha Marcus! My daughter is dying!"

This time, when Marcus fed me that lie about "special wolf poison" to trick me into breaking our mate bond, I smiled and agreed.

I used to think I was living the perfect life. I had my career as a strategic planner that was respected across the region. I had Kai, my fiancé who I'd loved since we were kids. I even daydreamed about the pups we'd have someday, little ones running around the pack house with his eyes and my stubbornness.

But that was all bullshit.

One conversation I wasn't supposed to hear changed everything. Suddenly my whole happy life turned into a lie. My perfect future was going to shatter right there at my own mating ceremony, in front of everyone.

Well, fuck that. If Kai thinks he can humiliate me, he's got another thing coming.

My childhood friend Jake prepared an elaborate confession ceremony for Madison during our graduation trip.

Everyone thought I would show up crying and making a scene to stop him, because in their eyes, I was madly in love with Jake.

But I only went to return the necklace he had given me, and then I left.

Jake thought I was playing hard to get, but I really wasn't. Because that night I was already in his roommate Daniel's bed.

When I was twenty, Samuel called off our engagement and chose Stella instead.

After the engagement party ended, he told me: "Stella saved my life once. Now her father wants to marry her off to that disgusting old man Harrison Burke. I can't just stand by and watch."

He said to give him three years to repay his debt of gratitude, and after three years he would come back to me.

Like a fool, I waited for him for three years.

During those three years, I went from being his fiancée to becoming his secret lover, telling myself it was only temporary.

Until that day, when he knew I had a heart condition but still made me go extreme skydiving for the sake of a business deal.

After that, I completely came to my senses and abandoned him. And he seemed to suddenly regret it.

Eric Kane married me when I was at my most desperate.

Everyone said this Alpha only married me to get revenge for my sister's betrayal.

For three years, I rejected all his marking requests, telling myself this was just a transaction.

Until that phone call came, he died on his way home.

He left me a phone with a video inside.

I gently tapped it open to hear his tender yet desperate voice. He said:
"Tessa, could you love me just a little bit? Even just a little would be enough."
"If there's a next life, maybe you could tell me the answer? Maybe in that life, we could become true mates?"

I killed myself at his grave, but when I opened my eyes again, I found myself lying in my old bed.

And the time on my phone showed eight years before Eric and I got married.

Three years ago, I was an 18-year-old tattoo prodigy named Juliet, getting ready for the once-every-three-years Tattoo Masters Competition, it was literally my dream stage. But two weeks before the competition, I got attacked by a rogue wolf who brutally crushed my right hand. What made it even worse? My fiancé Damien showed up at the hospital to tell me he'd sensed his fated mate, and it was his childhood friend Selene. Just like that, our engagement was over. Talk about a double blow that left me completely devastated.

That's when Kael appeared. He was Damien's childhood buddy, this incredibly powerful Alpha who claimed he'd fallen for me at first sight. He wanted to claim me, make me his future Luna. When I was at my most vulnerable, Kael's gentleness and promises became my only lifeline. He marked me, married me as his Luna, and swore he'd take care of me forever.

Our married life was absolutely blissful. Kael was so thoughtful, he'd accompany me to physical therapy, defend me in pack meetings, read to me late into the night. A year later, my right hand miraculously healed. While I was handling my Luna duties, I secretly started practicing tattooing again. Two years of grinding paid off - my skills reached a whole new level.

Three years later, another competition rolled around, and I signed up again. This time I was ready to really show what I could do. But just as I was rushing to find Kael with all this excitement, I overheard a conversation that hit me like lightning. After that... well, let's just say I started planning my exit from Kael's life.

My husband Steven was in late-stage cancer, but he suddenly insisted on divorcing me.

He said it was for my own good, but I absolutely refused.

We loved each other so much - how could I possibly abandon him at a time like this?

Until I was going through some paperwork and accidentally found an $1.8 billion trust fund - but I wasn't the beneficiary.

Why would my soon-to-be ex-husband transfer our family's massive fortune to someone else?

After I discovered the truth, he quickly ended up in the hospital in critical condition. And on the very night his resuscitation failed, I had him cremated.

So after this weird plague, basically all the alphas disappeared. Only a few packs had alpha bloodlines left, so they formed an alliance. Whoever could produce an alpha pup in the younger generation becomes the next pack leader.

I'm Natalia from Moon Stone pack. My dad's the alpha, I've got alpha blood, but I can't shift. So everyone treats me like garbage. My mom died young, dad remarried this beta luna who had Stella, my half-sister who's just a beta but gets treated better than me.

In my past life, at the mating ceremony, Damon picked me. I thought I'd won. Turns out the bastard was actually an omega using black magic to fake being beta. When we mated, we had an omega pup instead of an alpha heir.

What does this piece of shit do? Blames ME. Says I faked my alpha bloodline. Then he kills me and my baby and dumps our bodies with the rogues.

But I'm back. It's the mating ceremony again, except this time Damon's going after Stella instead of me. Which makes me think, did that asshole get reborn too?

When the hospital called, I thought I was going to lose him.

The moment I burst into his room, Nathan was alive, but the way he looked at me, like I was a complete stranger.

"I'm sorry, you are...?"

My husband had forgotten everything. Three years of marriage, from the moment we met to falling in love, all erased.

But what's even more absurd? He stared at his bother Nolan and said, "Did I just... fall in love at first sight with a stranger?"

Listening to him frantically ask Nolan in the hospital room "Is this normal?", a crazy idea suddenly hit me—

Three years ago, Nathan "acquired" me in just three months. From his secretary to his wife, so fast it felt like closing a business deal. I loved him, but something was always missing... like a real courtship, real romance.

Now, he has amnesia.

What if I told him we were just in a contract marriage? That our contract was ending soon and we were about to separate?

I was at my favorite artist's concert, phone up, recording the Kiss Cam segment. My boyfriend Mason said he was three hours away having dinner at his parents' house and couldn't make it, even sent me a selfie as proof.

Then the Kiss Cam found him.

On the giant screen, Mason wore the exact same gray vintage rock tee and black ripped jeans from his "family dinner photo," his arm around a blonde girl with her head on his shoulder.

The arena erupted: "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!"

He looked like he'd seen a ghost, frantically trying to block the camera.

My phone's location alert read: "Mason is nearby (0.1 miles)."

Three years of us, exposed as a massive lie in front of thousands of cheering strangers.

I heard my fiancé Henry's laughter echoing down that hotel hallway.

"I only went after Maya to piss off Dennis."

Eight years. I chased Dennis for eight years.

When I finally gave up on him, when Henry spent years pursuing me, when he proposed with fireworks lighting up the entire beach—I thought I'd finally found someone who loved me.

Three weeks until the wedding.

I flew to his city with his favorite chocolate cake, ready to surprise him on his birthday.

Then I heard the truth.

"Those eight years she spent obsessing over Dennis made me sick."

"I'll just skip the wedding. Let her stand there in that white dress in front of everyone."

Fine. I'll let him think he's won.

Then on our wedding day, I'll be the one who disappears.

I woke up in his tent thinking I'd finally gotten everything I'd ever dreamed of.

Six years. Six entire years of making myself into whoever Noah wanted me to be, giving up my UCLA full-ride scholarship, planning to follow him to Boston, convincing myself this was what "love" looked like.

Until I accidentally saw the messages on the iPad.

"Had to get it done before school starts."
"Jade's my training wheels before I go after Madison."

"She's giving up UCLA for me? Perfect safety net. She's not going anywhere."

In that moment, I realized I was never his girlfriend. Just his most convenient backup plan.

At 3 AM, I lay in his arms with tears soaking the pillow. By sunrise, I packed my bags and left camp.

A week later, I deleted every plan for Boston and resubmitted my UCLA application.

During the wedding ceremony, just as the priest asked if I would take my fiancé Derek to be my husband, the church doors suddenly burst open.

A muddy little girl rushed in, shouting at Derek: "Daddy!"

Derek looked completely bewildered, and I just stood there frozen, because this girl really did look a lot like Derek.

The girl said her name was Mia, that she was Derek and Isabelle's daughter from the future, and she'd come here to get her parents back together.

Derek was stunned, all the guests were stunned, because my name isn't Isabelle.

I thought escaping to Vegas would help me forget my cheating ex. Instead, I had the hottest one-night stand of my life with a mysterious stranger in a hotel bar, then panicked and ran before sunrise.

Two days later, I'm sitting across from my "arranged" blind date, and my stomach drops. It's him. Same intense eyes. Same devastating smile.

Now my dad expects us to get serious. His dad's breathing down his neck too. So we make a crazy deal: fake an engagement to get our families off our backs, then figure out if this thing between us is real.

I was married to Finn Murphy for five years, listening to him drunkenly cry my half-sister Isabella's name every single night. She had been sent to the Moretti family in my place and died in a shootout. Finn blamed me for her death every day, believing I had stolen Isabella's life and destroyed their love.

Then Finn died in a gunfight protecting me. With his last breath, he begged me to stop clinging to him. Heartbroken, I promised.

So when I woke up on my twentieth birthday with a second chance, I made a different choice: I accepted the engagement to Luca Moretti myself—the Italian mafia heir who was supposed to be my family's greatest enemy.

This time, Finn regretted everything. But I won't accept his regret anymore.

My daughter was taken by rogues, and my husband didn't care.

But when his childhood friend went missing in another attack, he spared no expense searching for her.

I searched for our daughter alone. When I died in the wilderness, I'd been looking for fifty years.

As I bled out that day, I had only one thought—I'm sorry, Lily. I'm so sorry I couldn't find you.

Then I opened my eyes and found myself fifty years in the past, the night before the nightmare began.

I heard the recording. My six-year-old son Jerry had been helping my husband cover up his affair, for an entire year.

Later, at his birthday party, I overheard his friends: "That's Jerry's nanny. His real mom works overseas."

My son told everyone I was just the nanny.

That day, standing in the hotel hallway, Jerry looked at me and said: "Can you promise to never come find me again? So Michelle can officially be my mom?"

My blood ran cold.

I died with Vivian's smile burned into my memory.

She shot my sister Emma, and my husband Damien just stood there and watched. As my heart stopped, the last thing I saw was Vivian's triumphant smirk.

Then I opened my eyes.

I was back on the day the nightmare began, the morning Damien announced he wanted to keep both me and Vivian.

In my past life, I cried, I fought, I resisted. And finally, I watched Emma bleed out while Vivian smiled.

This time, I smiled back and said, "Okay."

That night on my graduation trip, I made the craziest decision of my life—I spent one night with a stranger named Jake. Dark eyes, perfect jawline. He said he'd call me, left his number, and rushed off for an emergency.

I tried to reach him. That number only gave me a cold robotic voice: "The number you have dialed is currently unavailable..."

Three months later, I stared at three positive pregnancy tests and broke down crying.

I had my daughter Ava alone. Three years passed, and I thought I'd moved on from that man. Until my best friend Maya excitedly announced: "My brother is finally coming home! You have to come to his welcome party!"

When I walked into that party and saw the man standing in the doorway, the entire world stopped.

It was him. Jake. The man who vanished four years ago. Maya's brother.

I spent a month planning our fifth anniversary trip—Yellowstone, camping under the stars, the kind of romance we hadn't had since before the company consumed our lives. I'd even bought baby shoes to give him by the campfire, ready to finally say: I want to start our family.

Then his mother called. Then his sister and her twin boys.

By the morning we were supposed to leave, the RV was packed—with everyone except me. My seat was buried under twenty shopping bags.

"Maybe you should just stay home?" Marcus said with that apologetic smile. "Someone needs to watch the house. And Mom's roses need watering."

So I stayed. Smiled and waved as they drove away.

Then I grabbed the keys to his Range Rover that I 'wasn't allowed to drive' and booked myself the most expensive oceanview suite at Big Sur.

Three years. I thought that would be enough.

Enough to forget the man who never said he loved me. Enough to rebuild my life in this quiet coastal town. Enough to protect my secret, my daughter Rosie.

But when Adrian Smith appeared at the town's flower market, looking at me with those same gray-blue eyes Rosie inherited, I knew it was over.