The Ring That Broke Her

The Ring That Broke Her

Zara Thorne · Completed · 7.5k Words

246
Hot
462
Views
15
Added
Add to Shelf
Start Reading
Share:facebooktwitterpinterestwhatsappreddit

Introduction

When her father was wrongfully jailed, Ella’s fiancé Noah betrayed her for her best friend Cassandra, sending her to the disabled tycoon Sebastian to atone for a fake crime. For five years, she suffered abuse, three miscarriages and public humiliation, until she uncovered their cruel conspiracy: Cassandra stole her kindness, and everyone she trusted framed her family.
Ella faked her death to escape the endless abyss. As all betrayers perished, the guilt-ridden Sebastian traveled far and wide to seek his long-overdue redemption.

Chapter 1

When her father was wrongfully jailed, Ella’s fiancé Noah betrayed her for her best friend Cassandra, sending her to the disabled tycoon Sebastian to atone for a fake crime.

For five years, she suffered abuse, three miscarriages and public humiliation, until she uncovered their cruel conspiracy:

Cassandra stole her kindness, and everyone she trusted framed her family.

Ella faked her death to escape the endless abyss. As all betrayers perished, the guilt-ridden Sebastian traveled far and wide to seek his long-overdue redemption.


On the day my father was framed for embezzlement, Noah pulled the engagement ring off his finger and shoved it into Cassandra's palm.

"Ella, I can't cover for your father's mess. Rather than dragging me down to hell with you, it's better if you go suffer at that cripple's house for a few years. Once the storm blows over, I might look back on our past feelings and help you out."

When he said this, Cassandra stood right behind him. My best friend, wearing the floral dress I had helped her pick out, didn't even look at me. She lowered her head to study the engraved words inside the ring. It was what Noah had engraved last Valentine's Day: "The only one in this life."

On the afternoon he and Cassandra registered their marriage, I gripped shards of broken glass, pointing them directly at my husband Sebastian's throat. That cripple sat in his wheelchair, the blanket over his legs covering his atrophied muscles, but his eyes gleamed like two sharp knives.

"Do it," he said. "Do you dare?"

The door was kicked open.

Cormac stood in the doorway, his overcoat dusted with snow. It was exactly this kind of weather the year my father kicked him out of the house.

"Sebastian, she belongs to me tonight."

He threw a bank card onto the floor and hauled me up. The glass shards in my hand slashed the webbing of his thumb, but he merely reached up to wipe the blood away.

"Ella, stay alive. Just consider it living for my sake."

Later, he took me to the hospital for my third abortion. I lay on the hospital bed and heard Noah's voice drifting from the other end of the corridor.

"It's not like you don't know what happened back then. We personally stuffed the evidence against Cassandra's father into Ella's father's drawer. Now they're digging up the past, and you expect me to admit it?"

He paused.

"If I admit it, what happens to Cassandra? That cripple's old man was a victim's family member. If I didn't push Ella out to take the fall, Cassandra would have been the one to marry into that family. Could she endure that kind of life?"

Whatever was said on the other end of the phone, he laughed, keeping his laughter very low.

"Cassandra's hands are made for writing. She has never even washed a bowl. How could I ever bear to make her serve a madman?"

When he said "how could I ever bear it," his tone sounded like he was stating an absolute truth. Just like back then when he said, "Ella, I will marry you."

Someone was crying in the corridor. It wasn't me, but my eyes were wet too.

"I owe her," Noah's voice drifted over again. "I can't give her a proper title in this lifetime, but I can protect her. As long as Ella doesn't appeal the case, Cassandra will stay safe forever. Even if it's wrong, I accept it."

His assistant muttered something. The voice was too soft, so I only caught a few words: "body is giving out" and "can't get pregnant again."

"But regarding Ella, Sebastian has been getting worse lately. It's not like you don't know how many times he has pawned her off to others. Waiting like this, when will it ever end?"

Noah remained silent for a long time. Then he said, "Wait until Cassandra gets her degree abroad. Wait until she establishes a firm foothold there. Wait until..."

"Wait until what?" the assistant's voice rose sharply. "Wait until she's dead?"

No one spoke.

Then I heard Cormac's voice.

"No."

Who was he speaking to? The other end of the line?

"Ella cannot appeal the case," Cormac said slowly and methodically. "If she finds out, Cassandra's father will go to prison. Sebastian's case will also be reinvestigated. By then, everyone in this circle will be dragged down with them."

"But..." it was the assistant's voice.

"I said, no," Cormac interrupted him. "If she finds out, I will spend the rest of my life making it up to her. But as for revisiting the case, whoever brings it up will go meet God."

The voices drifted further away. I knelt on the floor. My stomach didn't hurt anymore; my heart hurt. It felt as if someone was churning a blunt knife inside it.

My phone lit up.

Sebastian sent a message: "Come out when you're done. There's a car waiting at the entrance. Don't let Cormac tag along."

My finger paused on the screen before I typed two words: "Another day?"

He immediately called me back.

"Are you fucking bargaining with me?" his voice squeezed through his gritted teeth. "When your father killed my dad, he wasn't bargaining with my dad, was he?"

I heard the sound of his wheelchair rolling across the floor, along with the noise of him pouring water into a glass.

"Cormac slept with you a few times, and you actually think he's protecting you? He's just looking for someone else's shadow in you."

I didn't say a word. Tears fell onto the back of my hand, stinging bitterly.

"If you're not back by eight, you know the consequences."

The line went dead.

I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes. The faces of those men surfaced in my mind once again. My father's former colleagues, his business partners, and Sebastian's racing buddies. When they came, they brought fruit baskets and medical records, saying, "We're here to take care of our sister-in-law." When they left, they slipped cash under my pillow.

Sebastian said this was "compensation." Compensation for his father's death, and compensation for the debts my father owed. When he said those things, he sat in his wheelchair and looked up at me, his expression twisted like a madman's.

I opened my eyes and picked myself up from the floor. The person in the mirror had disheveled hair and an unbuttoned hospital gown, displaying a fresh burn mark below the collarbone. Sebastian pressed his cigarette butt there last night.

I remembered the day my father was taken away. He turned to look at me from inside the police car. His lips moved, but no sound came out. Later, he had his lawyer pass on a message: "Stay away from Cormac. His kindness towards you comes with an ulterior motive."

Before I passed out, the last thing I saw clearly was the blindingly white light at the end of the corridor. It felt as if I had never walked out from beneath that light.

Last Chapters

You Might Like 😍

A Queen Among Darkness (Book 4 in the Gods' Saga)

A Queen Among Darkness (Book 4 in the Gods' Saga)

6.2k Views · Ongoing · ADB_Stories
Isolde’s life was full of love and joy. She was set to be High priestess of the makkari, but everything changed in a single night when she lost everything at the hands of someone she thought she could trust.

For centuries, she has been on the run, helping the supernatural community under the cloak of anonymity while she works to clear her name and save the very people after her from destruction.

Enemies are closing in, but an unexpected complication befalls her when she realises she’s been fated to someone who wants her species exterminated. After all, an evil chance seldom comes alone.

A Queen Among Darkness is the 4th book in the Queen Among Series/The Gods' Saga. This is an interconnected series. To see how it ends, I recommend reading the full series.

Books in the series in order:
A Queen Among Alphas - Book 1
Bite-Size Luna - A Queen Among Alphas Prequel (available under book 1)
A Queen Among Snakes - Book 2
A Queen Among Blood - Book 3
A Queen Among Darkness - Book 4
Whole Again - A Queen Among Alpha's spin-off (available under book 1)
A Queen Among Tides - Book 5
Valor, Virtue, and Verve - Tides Prequel Spin-off (will be available under book 5)
A Queen Among Gods - Book 6
Runaway Empress - A Queen Among Snakes Prequel (will be available under book 2)
A Queen Among Tempests - Book 7
Dark Vocation - Darkness spin-off (will be available under book 4)
A Court of Arcane Souls Anthology (side character short stories exclusive to Ream)
Royal Shadow Series (Next Generation Coming Soon)
Game of Destiny

Game of Destiny

1.3m Views · Completed · Dripping Creativity
Amie's wolf hasn't shown herself. But who cares? She has a good pack, best friends and a family who loves her. Everyone, including the Alpha, is telling her she is perfect just the way she is. That is until she finds her mate and he rejects her. Heartbroken Amie flees from everything and start over. No more werewolves, no more packs.

When Finlay finds her, she is living among humans. He is smitten by the stubborn wolf that refuse to acknowledge his existence. She may not be his mate, but he wants her to be a part of his pack, latent wolf or not.

Amie cant resist the Alpha that comes into her life and drags her back into pack life. Not only does she find herself happier than she has been in a long time, her wolf finally comes to her. Finlay isn't her mate, but he becomes her best friend. Together with the other top wolves in the pack, they work to create the best and strongest pack.

When it's time for the pack games, the event that decides the packs rank for the coming ten year, Amie needs to face her old pack. When she sees the man that rejected her for the first time in ten years, everything she thought she knew is turned around. Amie and Finlay need to adapt to the new reality and find a way forward for their pack. But will the curve ball split them apart?
The Family Books 1-3 (A Mafia romance)

The Family Books 1-3 (A Mafia romance)

2.5k Views · Completed · Emma Mountford
Saints and Sinners- She was the light to my dark.
The saint to my sinner. with her innocent eyes and devilish curves.
A Madonna that was meant to be admired but never touched.
Until someone took that innocence from her.
She left.
The darkness in my heart was finally complete.
I avenged her, I killed for her, but she never came back.
Until I saw her again. An angel dancing around a pole for money.
She didn’t know I owned that club. She didn’t know I was watching.
This time I won’t let her escape.
I will make her back into the girl I knew.
Whether she likes it or not.
2/ Judge and Jury- I can’t stop watching her.

I’m not even sure I want to.

Taylor Lawson, blonde, beautiful, and totally oblivious to how much dangers she’s in.

She’s also the one juror in my upcoming murder trial that hasn’t been bought.

The one who can put me behind bars for a very long time.

I know I should execute her.
After all that’s what I do.

I am the Judge.
I eliminate threats to The Family.
And Taylor is a threat.
But I don’t want to kill her.
Possessing her, making her love me seems like a much better plan for this particular Juror.

3/ Rags and Ritches-
The mafia princess return

The mafia princess return

947.9k Views · Completed · Tonje Unosen
Talia have been living with her mother, stepsister and Stepfather for years. One day she finally get away from them. Suddenly she learn she have more family out there and she have many people that actually love her, something she have never felt before! At least not as she can remember. She have to learn to trust others, get her new brothers to accept her for who she is!
BROKEN TRUST

BROKEN TRUST

7.6k Views · Completed · O.J Thewriter
She broke their marriage. He walked away.

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 Ice Between Us.

The Ice Between Us.

1.7k Views · Completed · Nora Obeche
In the world of elite hockey, discipline is the only currency that matters. For Julian Thorne, the perfectionist Captain of the Northwood Olympic Center, every stride is calculated, and every emotion is frozen solid. He is one season away from the pros, but the team is drowning under public scrutiny and a board of directors looking for any reason to cut the cord.

​Then comes Jax Miller.

​Jax is a hotheaded rookie with a lightning-fast puck and a reputation for burning bridges. He doesn't follow playbooks, he doesn't respect authority, and he’s determined to melt Julian’s icy composure. When a viral video of their on-ice collision threatens to bankrupt the program, Coach Clain delivers an ultimatum that feels like a death sentence: they must live together in a cramped, two-bed dorm for the duration of the season.

​Forced to navigate the high-stakes world of sports fame, "forbidden" locker-room tension, and the mysterious blackmailer who caught their first mistake on camera, Julian and Jax must decide what’s more dangerous: losing their careers, or losing themselves to the person they were supposed to hate.
Mated to Her Alpha Instructor

Mated to Her Alpha Instructor

203.9k Views · Completed · Marina Ellington
I'm Eileen, an outcast at the shifter academy, all because I don't have a wolf. My only saving grace is a knack for healing that got me into the Healer's Division. Then one night in the forbidden woods, I found a stranger on the brink of death. One touch, and something primal snapped between us. That night tied me to him in a way I can't undo.
Weeks later, our new Alpha combat instructor walks in. Regis. The guy from the woods. His eyes lock on mine, and I know he recognizes me. Then the secret I've been hiding hits me like a punch: I'm pregnant.
He has an offer that binds us tighter than ever. Protection… or a cage? Whispers turn ugly, darkness closes in. Why am I the one without a wolf? Is he my salvation… or will he drag me to ruin?
Reborn: My Biased Brothers Beg Me To Come Back

Reborn: My Biased Brothers Beg Me To Come Back

10k Views · Completed · Eleanor Sterling
In her past life, Arabella Oberon was the lowest-ranking member of the Oberon family.

She genuinely took in Regina, the butler's daughter, only to be constantly manipulated by this cunning and manipulative woman.

Regina gradually stole the love from her three brothers.

Arabella was forced to give Regina blood transfusions time and again, her weight plummeting to a mere eighty-eight pounds.

Ultimately, under the relentless pressure from her brothers, she jumped out of a window in despair and died. Her last words were,

"What about Regina's blood transfusions?"

When she opened her eyes again, Arabella found herself reborn three years earlier—the very day Regina appeared at her doorstep crying, begging for help.

Looking at the pitiful, tearful girl before her, Arabella smiled.

No more soft-heartedness.

No more groveling.

Instead, she "kindly" arranged for Regina to move into the servants' quarters, to earn her own living through honest labor.

Faced with her brothers who sided with her, she no longer bothered to please them.

And towards her former fiancé, Theodore, whom she had once fawned over, she remained cold, distant, and indifferent.

Moreover, in this life, they would discover that her identity was far more than just the eldest daughter of the Oberon family.
My Benchwarmer Boyfriend's Secret

My Benchwarmer Boyfriend's Secret

1.7k Views · Completed · Marina Ellington
A wild party night leaves me with fuzzy memories and a mortifying encounter I can't quite piece together. Then I meet Marco—the quiet basketball player who just transferred for training—and there's an instant spark I can't explain.

As the team's benchwarmer, Marco practices harder than anyone, though few seems to notice. There's something about his quiet determination that draws me in, and I find myself falling for the underdog.

But when Marco's true story starts unraveling—about that first night, about who he really is, about the future he's destined for—I realize I might have gotten in way over my head.

And there's another problem: this was always meant to be temporary. His training program has an end date, and we're both fighting against a reality that seems determined to pull us apart.

When everything is on the line, how far are we willing to go for love?
Where The Ice Gives Way

Where The Ice Gives Way

63.4k Views · Completed · Sheridan Hartin
Charlotte Pierce is used to surviving in motion. New towns, new schools, the same old house on the edge of nowhere, and the same rule that keeps her standing. Keep her twin brother, Charlie safe. Keep his hockey dream alive. Keep her own needs quiet. She works too much, sleeps too little, and saves the one thing that still feels like hers for the middle of the night, when she can lace up her worn skates and carve freedom into dangerous frozen ice. Charlotte and Charlie shifted once, years ago, and never understood what it meant. They had no pack, no guidance and no protection. Just two twins clinging to each other and pretending the voice in their heads was stress, imagination, or loneliness. Then they move to Wellington.
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.
Taste of Fate: The Vampire King's Human Mate

Taste of Fate: The Vampire King's Human Mate

5.9k Views · Ongoing · Miranda Carr
I never knew my blood could kill a king—until I met one. Sebastian, the ruthless and immortal King, rules with precision. For centuries, he's ruled with ruthless precision, his heart as cold as the stone throne beneath him. One moment, I'm nothing. The next, I'm his obsession. His touch burns like ice fire. His stare follows me through shadows. And when he feeds from me—God help me—it feels like drowning in darkness and craving more. He tells me my blood is unlike any he's tasted, that my scent drives him to the edge of madness.


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.
The Spy Who Left

The Spy Who Left

1.7k Views · Completed · Orion Vale
"She's naive. A pretty little socialite who got lucky marrying above her station."
"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.