

Skyler Reid spends three years being the kind of husband most people only read about. He cooks, he tends the house, he keeps the light on when his wife Ruby works late, he asks for nothing in return. She is a celebrated lawyer with a demanding career and he builds his entire life around making sure she never has to worry about coming home. It works, until it doesn't. When Ruby's first love Brandon Lowe resurfaces with a divorce case that needs handling,everything shifts. She pours herself into his affairs without question, and when Brandon frames Skyler with a flimsy accusation, she doesn't pause to ask for his side. She just turns on him. Skyler looks at the woman he has quietly loved and served for three years and realizes she has never once looked back at him the same way. He stops fighting for something that was never quite his and lets go. Only then, when the warmth is gone and the light is finally off, does Ruby understand what she had in her hands and chose not to hold.

In my previous life, my parents doted on my frail, sickly younger sister.For her sake, they chose a hawk beastman willing to settle in a human city as her husband.Me? They cast me into the deep sea,marrying me off to a giant shark beastman.When the apocalypse came and torrential rains drowned every human city, my parents and sister were left clinging to a rotting plank, adrift on the endless ocean.I couldn't bear to watch them die. With my giant shark husband, I dragged them down into the deep sea to safety.But resentment festered. Seeing me live comfortably while my shark beastman hunted day after day, my parents grew furious that my sister's life paled in comparison to mine. In their jealousy, they laced the fish we ate with poison and killed me.Now, given another chance at life,they've decided my sister should marry the giant shark beastman instead.My biased parents believe she will finally enjoy the blessings they once denied her.But what they don't know is this: after the cataclysm, fish become scarce. And a giant shark… does not survive on scraps. He needs flesh.

Before my boyfriend, August Cadwell, marked me, we went to register our mate bond at the Pack Affairs Department. Without a word of explanation, he unexpectedly had someone throw me out of the office. Then he walked in with his childhood sweetheart. He didn’t even blink when he saw me sitting there on the ground, shaking with disbelief. "Hailey's pup needs to be part of the Aurelis pack. The best and quickest method is for her to register a mate bond with a werewolf from the Aurelis pack. As soon as we sever the mate bond, I'll form a mate bond with you." Everyone assumed the lovesick version of me would wait just one more month for him. After all, I'd already waited seven long years. But that night, I did something unexpected too. I accepted my parents' arranged mate bond and quietly left for the Lymerian pack, disappearing from his life entirely. Three years later, I returned to my original pack to visit my family. My mate, Ryder Weyland, was now the lycan chairman. Because of an urgent council meeting, he arranged for someone to collect me from the airport. I never imagined that “someone” would be August. The moment he spotted me, his eyes immediately landed on the sparkling bracelet on my wrist. "Isn't this a knockoff of the bracelet Ryder Weyland, the lycan chairman, spent two million dollars on for his mate? Didn't expect you to turn this vain after just a few years. "You've caused enough chaos, haven't you? It's time to return. Hailey's pup is now of school age. You can take on the responsibility of pick-ups and drop-offs." I gently ran my fingers over the bracelet on my wrist. Little did he know that this was the cheapest one Ryder had ever given me.