After the Chaebol Forced Me to Bark Like a Dog
Angela · Completed · 8.0k Words
Introduction
Enduring the agony of broken bones, I survived ten brutal rounds, only to be handed swapped poison and witness a monstrous fire engulf the clinic.
Watching my sister's life-support indicators gradually fade in the sea of flames, and looking at the female doctor whose legs were shattered while trying to protect her, I shed no tears.
I calmly pulled a glass shard from my ribs and took out the black satellite communicator I had kept hidden and sealed away for three years.
"Command received, Supreme Commander."
Tonight, I will make the chaebols of this city completely vanish from the face of the earth.
Chapter 1
To get the only targeted drug for my sister's sudden rare disease flare-up, I knelt before the city's elites in a grease-stained janitor's uniform and barked like a dog. My wife in name only glared at me with absolute disgust, cursing that I was worse than a dog. The chaebol heir even crushed the medicine bottle under his shoe, forcing me into a "no fighting back" death match in the underground black market.
Enduring the agony of broken bones, I survived ten brutal rounds, only to be handed swapped poison and witness a monstrous fire engulf the clinic.
Watching my sister's life-support indicators gradually fade in the sea of flames, and looking at the female doctor whose legs were shattered while trying to protect her, I shed no tears.
I calmly pulled a glass shard from my ribs and took out the black satellite communicator I had kept hidden and sealed away for three years.
"Command received, Supreme Commander."
Tonight, I will make the chaebols of this city completely vanish from the face of the earth.
——
Ice-cold champagne cascaded down my forehead, smashing against the marble floor and splashing foam everywhere.
"Lick it clean, Arthur. This is a vintage Romanée-Conti. A sewer rat like you wouldn't get to smell this in ten lifetimes."
A bespoke crocodile leather shoe ground heavily into the back of my hand. Just beyond the polished toe, a custom glass vial bearing a German label was pinned under Victor's sole.
It was the only targeted drug that could keep Lily alive this month.
Wearing a janitor's uniform stained with grease and vomit, I knelt on the floor. Around me, the city's wealthiest tycoons and elites stood with champagne glasses in hand, circling me as if I were a circus monkey.
"Young Master Victor, move your foot," I rasped, my eyes locked on the fragile glass vial. My knuckles had turned white from gripping the floor so hard.
The smirk on Victor's lips widened. Instead of pulling back, he pressed down harder. A faint, sickening creak came from the stressed glass.
"Are you telling me what to do?" He suddenly swung his leg, kicking me squarely in the chest.
Agony flared as the impact sent me sliding backward across the slick marble. A metallic taste welled up in my throat, but I swallowed the blood back down. I couldn't fight back. If I caused a scene here, the medicine would be destroyed, and Lily wouldn't survive the night.
The sharp click of high heels against marble approached.
"Victor, don't let the filthy water splash onto your suit."
At the sound of that voice, my clenched fists violently trembled.
Elena, wearing a haute couture evening gown, clung to Victor's arm as she looked down at me from her high horse. She was my wife in name and the centerpiece of this chaebol marriage alliance, yet right now, her eyes held nothing but undisguised disgust.
"Elena, your legal husband is kneeling right at my feet." Victor deliberately pulled her closer by the waist.
"Don't disgust me." Elena took a half-step back in revulsion, covering her nose with a lace folding fan. "He's worse than a dog wagging its tail for scraps. If the old man hadn't gone blind with age back then, this slum trash wouldn't even be qualified to be a doormat for our family."
A chorus of harsh, mocking laughter instantly erupted from the crowd.
Victor bent down, pinched the vial of targeted medicine between two fingers, and dangled it in the air.
"You want this? Fine." Victor spread his legs and pointed at his crotch. "Crawl over here. Bark like a dog while you do it. Entertain us, and this vial will be your tip."
The entire banquet hall fell dead silent. Every gaze locked onto me, eagerly anticipating the grand finale of this twisted show.
Without a second of hesitation, I lowered my body, planting my hands on the freezing marble.
"Woof."
The sound wasn't loud, but it echoed with absolute clarity through the silent hall.
Elena's face flashed with momentary shock before contorting into ultimate disdain. "You really are a spineless wretch with zero dignity."
I ignored her mockery, my vision locked entirely on the vial in Victor's hand. Shifting my knees, I crawled forward, inch by inch.
"Woof."
With every inch I crawled, I let out another bark. Dignity? Compared to Lily's fading breath, my dignity was absolutely worthless.
Just as I crawled between Victor's legs, he snapped them shut, clamping my neck viciously between his knees.
"What an obedient mutt!"
He raised his arm and tossed the vial into a far, dark corner of the room.
"Go fetch!"
I violently wrenched free from his grip and lunged for the vial. But in the exact split second my fingertips were about to brush the glass, several heavy combat boots slammed down onto my back simultaneously.
Victor's four personal bodyguards had surrounded me.
"Loosen his bones," Victor ordered, picking up a freshly poured glass of champagne.
Steel-tipped boots rained down on my back, my ribs, and the back of my head. The sickening, muffled thuds echoed beneath the resplendent crystal chandeliers.
I curled myself into a tight ball, fiercely guarding my chest—I had managed to snatch the vial a fraction of a second earlier and shove it into my inner pocket.
"Beat him! Hit him harder! This trash has thick skin!" Elena's shrill voice pierced through the crowd.
A heavy rubber baton smashed into my left arm, accompanied by a nauseating crack of bone. I clenched my jaw, refusing to let out even a muffled groan. Blood ran down my forehead and into my eyes, dyeing the luxurious gold of the hall into a blinding, stinging red.
I locked my arms tightly around my chest. No matter how savage the assault from the outside became, the fortress protecting the vial remained absolutely immovable. Lily was still waiting for me. In that damp, cramped underground clinic, the faintly blinking life-support monitor was her only tether to this world.
For ten agonizing minutes.
The bodyguards, panting heavily from the exertion, finally stepped back. I lay motionless in a pool of my own blood.
"Boring. Dead already?" Victor walked over and nudged my face with the tip of his shoe.
I slowly opened my eyes. Deep within my pupils roared a suppressed, terrifying storm that could sink a continent. But in a mere fraction of a second, I completely concealed that murderous aura.
Using my unbroken right hand, I pressed against the floor and staggered to my feet. Blood dripped steadily onto the pristine white marble, leaving a shocking trail of crimson.
I didn't look at Victor, nor did I look at Elena. I simply reached up and felt the hard bulge through the fabric of my chest—the vial was completely intact.
I turned around. Dragging a leg that was still bleeding profusely, I limped step by step toward the grand doors of the banquet hall.
"Just a stray dog," came Victor's disdainful sneer from behind me, followed by a fresh round of clinking glasses.
I pushed open the heavy, carved wooden doors, and a biting night wind rushed against my face.
Spitting out a mouthful of bloody saliva, I pulled the collar of my tattered janitor's uniform tight and walked out into the boundless darkness.
Lily, your brother got the medicine.
Hold on. Wait for me.
Last Chapters
You Might Like 😍
Tempted By The Enemy
She escapes to Preston Island to attend the wedding without informing him only to collide with Lucas’s hot, fiery and arrogant brother, the twenty-three-year-old, Nicholas Donnelly. Sparks immediately fly between them but Alyssa refuses to acknowledge them fearing her brother's wrath.
The wedding is over and Alyssa tries hard to forget the mysterious Nicholas Donnelly but can he forget her? Can he ignore the attraction he feels for her, feelings that have resurfaced after ten years?
What will Allyssa do when she is stalked by the man who has been invading her dreams since the day she met him? What will she do when she is whisked away to a deserted island by the unpredictable Nicholas Donnelly? Can she tame her heart or surrender to sinful temptations? Read to find out!
Part of the Temptation Series. Can be read as a standalone.
Where The Ice Gives Way
Blake Atlas scents his mate the moment Charlotte arrives. The bond hits hard and unmistakable, but Charlotte doesn’t recognise it. She doesn’t know why her chest keeps pulling toward the one boy she absolutely cannot afford to want. Blake is Charlie’s new hockey captain. Charlie’s chance at making something good. Charlie makes it clear; his sister is off-limits and Blake tries to do the right thing, but secrets don’t stay buried forever. Rogues prowl the edges of town. The ice cracks. The bond tightens. Then Charlotte’s rare white wolf awakens, the very thing that makes her powerful, also makes her a target.
Shanti needs Shakti. (Peace needs strength.)
Where the Ice Gives Way is a slow-burn YA paranormal romance filled with fated mates, protective alpha energy, fierce sibling loyalty, found family pack bonds, hurt/comfort, and quiet, aching tension. It’s a story about first belonging, learning to be cared for, and what happens when the girl who has always held everyone else up finally falls, and someone catches her.
BROKEN TRUST
Neither of them knew she was carrying his child.
Emily’s affair didn’t just end her marriage—it erased the life she thought was guaranteed. Ryan left without looking back, carrying his anger like armor and leaving Emily alone with regret she would never outrun. Three years later, fate drags them back into each other’s world, along with a little girl who has Ryan’s eyes and a truth that shatters everything he thought he knew.
Old wounds reopen, grief masquerades as rage, and love refuses to stay buried. As parenthood binds them together and the past demands accountability, Emily and Ryan must face the question neither of them is ready to answer: is broken trust the end of their story… or the beginning of a love forged through loss, forgiveness, and brutal honesty?
Letters to a Dark Prince
Thrown into Isteros Academy—a world of old money, blood money, and cruel social games—she's an outsider by birth and an afterthought by design. Her sister Solyn is the school's untouchable queen and Mara is her favorite target.
Everyone expects Atreus to treat his fiancée’s scholarship sister like everyone else does—as if she doesn’t matter.
Instead, his dorm room sits directly across from hers, close enough that she can see his light go out at night. Some nights, he climbs the old maintenance trellis just to check on her. He teaches her chess. He shows up exactly when something's gone wrong—and never once asks to be thanked for it.
"Don't fall in love with one piece," he warns her, over a board neither of them treats like a game anymore. "It punishes the person who only sees half of it."
Mara doesn't understand why the boy who's supposed to make her life harder keeps quietly making it easier—not until she realizes the anonymous stranger she's been writing to every week already has a name.
His.
He doesn't know he's writing to her, either.
By the time they find out, it's too late to stop what's already happening. Far too dangerous for anyone to find out.
In an empty studio, in the middle of a rainstorm, she asks him: 'Am I the kind of girl who kisses a boy engaged to my sister?'
He doesn't answer.
So she asks: 'What are we?’
He told her not to fall in love with one piece.
She fell anyway.
And he was never far behind.
Faking It With My Worst Enemy On Ice
But on his birthday, everything falls apart when his girlfriend exposes Clare's most humiliating secret in front of the entire team.
Just when Clare is ready to disappear, Rhys Calloway, her worst enemy and the team's arrogant captain, pulls her into his arms and tells everyone she is his girlfriend.
She should have pushed him away, but she kissed him back instead.
Now Clare is locked into a two-month fake relationship with the most infuriating man she has ever met, trying to get over a stepbrother who never cared and survive a captain who makes her forget why she was supposed to hate him.
The problem is that Rhys kisses like he means every single second of it, and just when Clare starts to move on, Zane decides he wants her back.
One girl, two hockey players, and a heart that was never supposed to feel this much. Will she choose the stepbrother who broke her or the enemy who caught her when she fell?
Rejected By My Family, Desired By The Mafia
While the real heiress struggled to survive, the nanny’s daughter, Talia, was raised in luxury as the beloved jewel of the Laurent family, pampered by Camille’s parents, adored by her three brothers, and even promised to the prestigious Matteo Devereux through a childhood engagement arranged by their grandparents.
Then the truth came out.
Six months ago, Camille was finally brought back to the Laurent family. To protect the family reputation and prove their devotion to their bloodline, the Laurent patriarch transferred 35% of his personal shares into Camille’s name overnight, instantly making her one of the wealthiest heiresses in the country.
It brought anxiety to all the Laurent family. But what they don’t know…is that Camille never needed them.
Behind her elegant smile lies a woman filled with secrets powerful enough to shake the whole family. She's a miraculous healer capable of curing the incurable poisons.
Yet despite everything, her family still chooses Talia.
Every accusation against Talia is forgiven. Every scheme against Camille is brushed aside. Even Matteo, the man who was supposed to be Camille’s fiancé—cannot let go of the woman he always believed belonged by his side.
But while the Laurent family underestimates Camille, another man begins to see exactly who she is.
Dante Moretti.
The ruthless heir of an old-money dynasty. A billionaire CEO worshipped by the public…and the merciless king of a criminal empire hidden beneath the city’s glittering surface. When Dante is poisoned by a rival syndicate with a deadly toxin no doctor can cure, he offers a fortune for anyone who can save him.
Only Camille can. Their deal is simple: she becomes his personal physician, and he gives her anything she wants.
The MC Hacker’s Stolen Princess
She did not come to find out her father had promised her to another man.
As the only daughter of Shane “Rook” Rourke, president of the Lost Coast Renegades MC, Taryn has always known club business comes first. But when Rook signs a treaty with the dangerous president of Iron Mesa, he crosses a line even she never imagined.
Safe passage through Arizona territory comes with a price.
Her.
Kellan Stroud is thirty, powerful, ruthless, and already waiting at Sturgis to meet the woman he expects to marry.
Taryn wants no part of him, no part of the agreement, and definitely no part of a future chosen for her by two men who think a signature is enough to decide where she belongs.
Then she meets Bobby Fuentes.
At twenty, Bobby is one of the youngest fully patched members of the Sons of Doom MC. He is quiet until he has something to say, dangerous when he needs to be, and smart enough to get into places no one else can. Hacking is what he does best.
Until Taryn gives him a new problem to solve.
One reckless connection at Sturgis becomes something neither of them can ignore, and when Bobby realizes exactly what Rook has promised away, walking away stops being an option.
But stealing another president’s future wife is not a misunderstanding.
It is an insult.
A betrayal.
And in the MC world, it can mean war.
Taryn refuses to be anyone’s property.
Bobby has never been good at following rules.
And Kellan Stroud does not forgive what he believes belongs to him.
The road out of Sturgis may cost them everything first.
My Billionaire Husband's Secret
He was the CEO of the Blackwood Group — a man whose wealth and power eclipsed ninety-nine percent of the world.
He was gentle. Romantic. Attentive. I fell for him fast.
But a year into our marriage, I began to notice something — a pattern.
Lucas's sexual appetite was intense — he wanted me almost every night. Yet every single month, he arranged a solo trip to send me away. I told myself it was his way of spoiling me.
Then a message arrived from someone called Sweet An.
Do you really know your husband?
From that day on, my life filled with shadows.
I suspected my husband of having an affair.
When Lucas and I made love, something felt wrong — his body too large, too much, like something I couldn't explain.
I heard sounds during sex — animal sounds, like something feral had crawled into bed with us.
My best friend Mia said: "There are men sick enough to let dogs fuck their wives."
The family doctor, Daisy, told me: "You could never stay by Lucas's side forever. Your background doesn't make you worthy of being his wife. Do you understand?"
I went looking for whoever had been tearing my marriage apart. I fought to win my husband back.
But the deeper I searched, the larger the secret grew — something far darker hiding beneath this supposed betrayal.
Does Lucas truly love me?
And why, out of everyone in the world, did he choose to marry me?
The Legacy Game
When scholarship student Chris Linds stumbles onto a mystery someone has killed to protect, she becomes the next target. The only person standing between her and death is Ashen Ford, the academy's cold, untouchable Student Council President—and heir to one of Corvain's founding families.
As anonymous invitations summon twelve students into the legendary Legacy Game, alliances fracture, secrets surface, and every challenge brings another deadly truth to light. But the greatest secret isn't who will win.
It's why one winner vanished without a trace... and why someone will do anything to make sure history repeats itself.
Everybody is Guilty Here
Middlesbrough's underworld is a dangerous game, and Matthew Smith finds himself right in the middle of it. A once-feared gang leader, he is now forced to be a pawn in a deadly cat-and-mouse game. Matthew's only shot at freedom is helping the police bring down Mr. K, the elusive mafia boss of the city. The only problem is that the detective he is forced to work with is the same man who arrested him years ago.
Masahiro Payne is everything Matthew hates: cold, calculating, and relentless. But their only hope for survival is by pretending to be a happy couple, blending in amidst dangerous crime, deceit, and power struggles. The closer they find themselves to taking down Mr. K's empire, the more they are attracted to one another, an affair too potent to turn from.
As their undercover mission spirals into a web of lies and hidden desires, they face a growing threat from all sides. But the greatest risk is the one they can't control-their own feelings. With every touch, every stolen kiss, the line between their fake relationship and real emotions blurs.
In a world of betrayal, trust is a luxury, and falling for each other may be the deadliest mistake of all. Can they survive the deadly mafia games or will their passion be their demise?
Unwanted Mate Of The Lycan Kings
Ripped from her bed and thrown into a world of blood and treachery, Zirah’s fate is sealed, a forced marriage to one of the three Lycan Kings, each more monstrous than the last.
These kings, cursed by their sins, pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, and gluttony are at war, fighting to claim their father’s throne. But the last thing any of them want is a queen.
To them, Zirah is nothing but a pawn, an object to be used, discarded, or destroyed.
But they underestimate her.
If they think she will cower, they are wrong.
If they believe she will bow, they will bleed.
And if they want to break her, they’ll have to survive her first.
Inked Adonis - Mafia Romance
Of me saying I want to climb him like a tree.
And he just. Texted. Back.
It's the dog's fault, really.
If this untrained Great Dane I'm walking had any manners at all, I never would've ended up here:
With my leash wrapped around the most gorgeous man I've ever seen.
Lucky for me, the guy is a good sport about it.
(Although his joke that “Dogs take after their owners” hits a little too close to home when Rufus starts humping his leg.)
He leaves me with his business card and a smile that makes my knees weak.
I'm still pinching myself as me and the bestie resume our walk.
“Methinks you had a little crush on him,” she accuses.
Not thinking and a little flustered by the whole experience, I reply, “I’d wrap my legs around his waist tighter than that leash.”
THAT'S when she reveals that she'd been recording my response.
THAT'S when she gives me the most devilish grin I've ever seen and says, “You're welcome.”
And THAT'S when she hands me my phone and reveals...
She sent the recording to him.
My heart is in my throat as those three little dots appear…
Then a text.
“PROVE IT.”
