I Quit Being His Hidden Girlfriend
Zara Thorne · Completed · 6.3k Words
Introduction
On the court, Jace Calloway, the star shooting guard of Northgate University’s Division I team, treated me like a stranger. Off it, I was his girlfriend. He said hiding us was for my own good. I believed him.
Then, in my senior year, he threw the drink I bought him in the trash, in front of the whole team. He hinted I might have spiked it. And he handed my job as team manager to the girl he couldn’t stop smiling at.
They left me on the curb. They called me a bully. They clapped while I was replaced.
So I sent him one text: We’re over.
He thinks I’ll cool off. I always do.
But Jace never asked who paid for the team’s dream trip. He never asked what I gave up to stand on his sideline. He never really knew me at all.
By the time he figures it out, I’ll be on the other side of the ocean.
Chapter 1
The final buzzer of the scrimmage was still ringing off the rafters when I reached the bench with Jace's drink.
Blue Gatorade, the frost still on the bottle. The flavor he'd lived on for two years. I’d jogged to the campus market and back during the second half.
Sloane Adler got there at the same time. She'd grabbed a room-temperature water off the folding table on her way over without even looking at it.
Jace looked at my hand. Then he looked past it, took the water from Sloane, cracked the cap, and drained it in one long pull.
I stood there with my arm still half-raised.
Someone laughed. Not at me, exactly. Just near me.
My face went hot. I lowered the bottle and started picking at the edge of the label with my thumbnail, like that was a normal thing to be doing.
"Hey. Manager." Theo Sinclair dropped onto the bench beside me, soaked to the collar, and held out his hand. "If Calloway doesn't want it, I'll take it. I'm dying here."
I could have hugged him. I handed it over.
His fingers hadn't even closed around it when Jace reached across, plucked the bottle out of Theo's grip, and lobbed it into the trash can by the tunnel.
It hit the bottom with a hollow thunk.
Jace didn't look at me. He was already toweling off his neck, already talking to the guy next to him about the second-half press.
That was Jace. He did what he felt like, when he felt like it. What it cost me never seemed to cross his mind.
And standing there, with a dozen guys pretending they hadn't seen it, something in my chest went very quiet.
A love that has to stay hidden isn't love. It's a waiting room.
I was done waiting.
Theo's grin was gone.
"What the hell, Calloway? She gave that to me."
He turned to me. "Ignore him. He's got the manners of a raccoon." Then he bent over the trash can, fished the bottle out, and wiped it on his shorts.
I caught his wrist. "Don't. It was in the trash."
"Cap's sealed." He twisted it open and took a long swallow. "Still good."
From the bench, Jace snorted.
"You sure it was sealed? You'd just take her word for it?" He tossed his towel over his shoulder. "Brave man. I wouldn't drink anything she handed me."
He didn't finish the thought. He didn't have to.
The bench lit up like a struck match.
"Wait. Did she do something to Jace's drinks?"
"That's why he's weird about her. I knew there was something."
"Bro, Calloway's polite to everybody. Refs. Reporters. That one guy from State who elbowed him in the throat. The only person he won't even look at is her."
"He won't let her touch his ball before warm-ups. Did you guys notice that?"
I stood there and couldn't find a single word.
Because all of it was true. Just not for the reason they thought.
When I'd gotten the manager job, Jace had made one rule: on the court, we were strangers. He didn't want anyone saying I'd gotten the job because I was sleeping with the starting shooting guard. So he never talked to me at practice. Never stood near me. Never took anything from my hands.
It had worked. Nobody knew we were together.
Now they thought he couldn't stand me.
"Honestly," somebody muttered, "should she even be handling team stuff? Water, meds, all that?"
The bench went silent.
Theo's head came up. He didn't say anything. He just looked down the row, and every mouth on it closed.
Sloane, of course, couldn't let a good fire burn out on its own.
She tilted her head at me, sweet as frosting. "Careful, Captain. Conference tournament's in two weeks. If something happened to you, what would this team do?"
My vision actually swam.
"I bought that at the market on Fifth twenty minutes ago," I said. My voice came out too high. "They have cameras. Go look. I didn't touch it."
Sloane shrugged one shoulder. "I'm just looking out for Theo. If you didn't do anything, why are you so worked up?"
I knew how this went. A lie takes one breath. Killing it takes a week.
I opened my mouth anyway. Theo's hand closed on my elbow.
"I believe you," he said quietly.
Then he turned to Sloane, and his voice wasn't quiet anymore. "No proof means it's just a rumor you started. This was a closed practice. You weren't invited. I need you to leave."
Jace pushed up off the bench with a long, bored sigh.
"Relax, Cap. It was a joke. You don't have to go full disciplinary hearing."
He hooked a thumb at Sloane. "And she was invited. By me. I talked to Coach last week about bringing on an assistant manager. He signed off this morning."
He smiled. "Sloane's officially staff."
My head snapped up.
Jace met my eyes. Calm. Steady. Then he looked away, like I was a stranger in the stands.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
It was a text from Coach Delgado.
Lena, based on feedback from the players, Sloane will be taking over team manager duties for the time being. Thanks for your work. —D
Around me, the guys started clapping.
I knew I was supposed to clap too. Smile. Welcome her.
My mouth wouldn't do it.
I picked up the towels like it was any other practice.
It was the last time I’d ever do it.
Last Chapters
You Might Like 😍
Taste of Fate: The Vampire King's Human Mate
He reached for the back of my head and pulled me up just enough to reach my neck. When his fangs slid into me, the pain was instant, electric. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. My hands found his shoulders, clawing for something to hold. My legs kicked. Tears streamed down my cheeks.
He moaned against my throat as he drank, and the sound was devastating.
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.
The Mafia King's Unknown Doctor Wife
CHASING GHOSTS
Love's Deadly Equation
I was sent to her.
To watch her. To protect her. And, when the order comes… to kill her.
My name is Keegan Caffery. I’m the Carter Mafia’s best hitman. I don’t miss. I don’t fail.
At least, I didn’t use to.
I don’t know what it is about her that got to me first—her mouth, her mind, or the way she looks at me like I’m not what she should fear.
I’ve had a gun to her head since I walked into her life.
She knows it.
And she still doesn’t run.
She just watches me back like she’s studying a problem she refuses to call impossible.
She’s the one variable I can’t control.
And God help me… I don’t want to.
I have an order. I have loyalty. I have a trigger.
But every time I imagine it—
I can’t stand it.
Her or me. That’s the math.
It’s a deadly equation I don’t want to solve.
⬥ Maisie ⬥
I’m not ordinary. I stopped pretending long ago.
My name is Maisie Seo. IQ 145. Clinical genius.
Which sounds impressive until you realize what it actually means: I don’t fit anywhere people expect me to.
I see patterns everywhere. Outcomes before they happen. People like equations I’ve already solved.
It gets lonely in a world you’ve already figured out.
So I dull myself down. Smoke the edges off. Pretend, badly, to be the kind of normal that lets people stay.
Then he walked in.
I knew what he was immediately. Dangerous. Intentional. Wrong in all the right ways.
I should be afraid of him.
I keep waiting for that to kick in.
Instead, I’m fascinated.
Because for the first time in my life… I’ve found something I can’t solve.
He is my deadly equation.
Reborn and Unleashed: The Boss Lady Takes No Prisoners
Now reborn, Vivian refuses to hide her strength. She's revealing her true identity, claiming her power, and rewriting her fate. No more submission, no more misunderstandings—this time, she'll take control of her life and her love.
As regretful brothers beg for forgiveness and powerful enemies fall at her feet, Vivian has one goal: to rise without mercy and make the man she once loved fall for her all over again—on her terms.
The Billionaire's Surrogate's Secret
“Who said that’s still fucking true? We stopped being just man and surrogate the first time our eyes met.” He walked towards me, boring into my eyes with those eyes of his. “I fucking want you, Vanessa.”
My heart stuttered.
This could not be real.
“But the rules—“
“I made them. I can destroy them. I already destroyed them when I kissed you.” He was dangerously close now, but all I kept getting was danger signals combined with the panic, alarm, lust and above all, the guilt.
It was killing me.
Vanessa Sterling who never liked men because of what her father did to her mother ended up having a drunken one night stand with a stranger and that might end up changing her life forever.
Rodri Darnell who doesn’t want to get married or have kids but is forced to give his father a grand child, decided to use a surrogate.
Vanessa Sterling was supposed to be an ordinary surrogate to Rodri Darnell of the Dolphin Emirates, but he fell in love with her.
Their only problem will be Vanessa's secret.
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.
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?
The Spy Who Left
"I still can't believe she actually did it. Aria Hart, filing for divorce. Who saw that coming?"
"How long do we think it'll take before she comes crawling back?" Another voice joins the conversation.
"Three days," Victoria declares. "Five at most. She has no money, no skills, no family. Where's she going to go?"
When Aria Chen divorced billionaire Leon Hart, New York's elite sneered, betting she'd crawl back within days. She never did.
Three years later, the world is rocked when Dr. Aria Vale, CEO of a revolutionary cybersecurity empire, steps into the spotlight. The mysterious genius who built a billion-dollar company from nothing is none other than Leon's discarded wife, the woman everyone thought was just a pretty ornament.
Now, every powerful man wants the queen Leon threw away a renowned scientist seeking partnership, a financial titan proposing an empire, and an actor offering devotion. Each sees the brilliance Leon ignored.
Then Leon discovers the truth: Aria's sacrifices, her secret double life, and the daughter she's been raising without him. For the first time, the man who once took her for granted must fight for her love. But can he compete with men who valued her from the beginning?
A story of love, betrayal, and power where the king must kneel before the queen who never needed saving.
Let Them Kneel
Cast out by her pack. Forgotten by the Lycans.
She lived among humans—quiet, invisible, tucked away in a town no one looked at twice.
But when her first heat comes without warning, everything changes.
Her body ignites. Her instincts scream. And something primal stirs beneath her skin—
summoning a big, bad Alpha who knows exactly how to quench her fire.
When he claims her, it’s ecstasy and ruin.
For the first time, she believes she’s been accepted.
Seen.
Chosen.
Until he leaves her the next morning—
like a secret never to be spoken.
But Kaelani is not what they thought.
Not wolfless. Not weak.
There is something ancient inside her. Something powerful. And it’s waking.
And when it does—
they’ll all remember the girl they tried to erase.
Especially him.
She’ll be the dream he keeps chasing… the one thing that ever made him feel alive.
Because secrets never stay buried.
And neither do dreams.
Mission: Steal the Male Lead
But the more Morwenna changes the story, the stranger the world becomes. The heroine seems to know the future, unseen spectators begin commenting on her life, and the gods watching from above grow obsessed with the drama unfolding before them. Trapped in a story where fate has already decided the ending, Morwenna must choose whether to follow the script or rewrite it entirely. But if the world itself was never meant to belong to its characters, can she steal the male lead before fate steals her freedom first?
