2525 Book(s) Related to from substitute to his regret

The rules were supposed to keep me safe:

Rule #1: Fix my shattered swimming career.
Rule #2: Hide the crippling panic attacks drowning my future.
Rule #3: Never, ever fall for my new coach.

Too bad Liam James is also my best friend’s brother.

After a tragic accident stole my parents, the pool went from my sanctuary to my worst nightmare. Enter Liam: arrogant, devastatingly intense, and brutally demanding. He thinks I’m a lazy, washed-up athlete wasting his time. I think he’s a heartless tyrant.

But every explosive confrontation at the pool edge only fuels a suffocating, forbidden chemistry we can't ignore.

He’s completely off-limits. Breaking the rules means risking my career, his future, and my best friend’s trust. But when the world spins out of control, his arms are the only place I can finally breathe.

Can we survive the forbidden heat, or will our secrets drag us under?

BLURB

“I don’t love Selena anymore. All I see is a broken shell…a barren woman.”

Those words, spoken by my husband behind the closed door of his study, were the jagged shards of glass that finally shattered my world.

For years, I endured the physical agony of ten miscarriages and five failed IVFs, believing Franklin was the anchor holding me together. I didn’t know I was actually the anchor dragging him down.

He wants a divorce.

He wants a woman who can give him the family I couldn't.

He wants to be free of the burden of a wife who is falling apart.

But Franklin doesn't know my biggest secret. It isn't just my womb that is failing; it’s my entire body.

I am dying.

Stage four cancer is aggressive, and my time is measured in hours, not years.

I could tell him the truth.

I could watch him stay out of pity, trapped by guilt for the rest of my numbered days, but I love him too much to let him become my martyr.

So, I’ve made him a deal.

I will sign the divorce papers and walk out of his life forever but first, I want twenty-one hours.

One hour for every year we’ve known each other.

One last day to pretend we are still the awkward intern and the protective man who fell in love.

He thinks he’s spending these hours saying goodbye to a woman he no longer wants.

He has no idea he’s actually saying goodbye to a woman who will be dead before the ink on our divorce papers is even dry.

Twenty-one hours of lies.

Twenty-one hours of love.

And then, I’ll let him go.

Forever

“You thought you could walk away from me, Rosella?”
He pinned her against the glass wall of his office, the city lights glittering below like witnesses to her downfall.
His fingers curled around her throat as he leaned in, lips brushing the shell of her ear.
“I’m going to take back what you stole, Rosella. Every night. Every moan. Every broken little plea you can’t help but make.”
“And by the time I’m done with you, you won’t remember a life that didn’t revolve around me.”
*
Rosella Summers never did reckless things.
Until one night, she fell into bed with a stranger.
Who turned out to be her ex.
Loving Thorn Rockwell was the biggest risk she ever took. The heir to the Rockwell empire. A blazing-hot racing icon. And a man born so far from her struggling world, loving him felt like trying to catch starlight with bare hands.
Six years ago, they were inseparable.
Then she left. Broke his heart. Disappeared without a trace.
She told herself it was the right thing—that walking away would save him.
But she was wrong.
Now Thorn is back. And he’s her new boss.
The soft boy she once loved is gone. In his place stands a cold, vengeful monster. A man who looks at her not with love, but with the promise of destruction.
He wants to ruin her. Humble her. Have her. Preferably beneath him.
But Thorn doesn’t know the whole truth.
Rosella isn’t just protecting her own heart anymore.
She has Thraia—her five-year-old daughter, her whole world, and a secret that could shatter everyone if Thorn ever finds out.
He wants revenge.
She needs a miracle.
And the only thing more dangerous than his hatred…
Is the love they never truly buried.

In my past life, I built an ironclad sanctuary in the zombie-infested wasteland, bleeding to keep four thousand people alive.
Yet the very people I risked everything to protect were brainwashed into overthrowing me.
When I opened my eyes again, I was back—right on the eve of that fatal rebellion.
Right now in the control room, my enemy has his arm around my wife. Fourteen rebels have their assault rifles pressed against my skull, laughing mockingly, convinced they've completely crushed this washed-up "Doomsday Tyrant."
What they don't know is that two days ago, I already emptied the bunker's entire stockpile of weapons and food.
You want "freedom" without rules? It's all yours.

Beau and I have been together for three years. I paid for the entire yacht charter out of my own pocket, and he shows up with his childhood best friend Sadie in tow, then goes around telling everyone it was his idea, his grand gesture.

Out on the water, Sadie spots a small octopus drifting near the surface and decides she has to have it. The thing pulses with glowing blue rings.

I'm a certified expert diver. I know exactly what it is the second I see it. I try to stop her.

She bursts into tears and tells Beau I'm going after her.

So Beau, ever the hero where Sadie's concerned, jumps in himself and fishes the thing out.

Sadie plays with it. It bites her. She's on the deck before she even knows what hit her.

Beau grabs me, screaming at me to suck out the venom. I refuse. He calls me a cold, heartless bitch, and in the chaos, shoves me overboard into shark-infested water.

I die out there. Nothing left of me.

They use my phone to fake a suicide note. Depression, they say. Jumped on her own. Then they take my company, my assets, everything.

They post online hinting I tried to push Sadie in and slipped.

My parents, worn down by the online harassment and the grief of losing me, both die of heart attacks.

Then I open my eyes. And I'm back. The morning of the trip.

Diya is a great, bold, and adventurous journalist. She is known for bringing out the darkest secrets of the high profile people. But, none knows about the darkest secret of her life.
Shourya is a sincere, emotionless, brave, and honest cop. He is a terror in the hearts of the criminals. His duty is everything to him, and love, relationships, and family are trash to him.
Unexpectedly, Diya and Shourya were trapped in a marriage by the Central Home Minister, an enemy to both of them. Shourya doesn't know about the darkest secret of Diya's life. After a long time, Diya's trials to win Shourya's love became successful. But before they get closer, her darkest secret comes out, ruining Shourya and his family's reputation. And her secret is also connected with his past, which none of them knows it.
What is Diya's past, and how is it related to Shourya? Is he going to forgive her for hiding such a big secret from him? Does he accept her after knowing her secret? Inspite of politics and many conspiracies, is it possible for Diya and Shourya to chase the happiness and love they craved?

I begged my mom for ten dollars, but she smashed my head with a frying pan instead.

The next day, my mother posted on a forum asking:
"Hi everyone. My eldest son lied about the end of the world just to get ten dollars. I want to ask, how can I sell him on the underground black market to pay off his younger brother's $20,000 debt?"

The moment I saw that post, any remaining love I had for them died instantly. I snapped my phone's SIM card in half.

What she didn’t know was that a world-ending acid flood would descend upon New York tomorrow.

I had begged so bitterly for that ten dollars just to trigger the Ten-Million-Fold Return System to build a three-billion-dollar Doomsday Ark.

Since she didn’t want it, I gave the throne of the Ark Queen to the female classmate who casually tossed me some charity.

Every night, he slips through my window. He never tells me his name.
He also never lets me touch him.
He owns me in the dark, then disappears before dawn.
For two years, he’s ruled my nights, taking me in every possible way.
Controlled me in ways I can't tell you.
Made me crave things I don’t understand. But when morning comes,
he returns to me as someone else. Natte Johnson.
The global hotel tycoon and rock star.
The man I grew up loving, my first love and losing.
Now I’m assigned to interview him.
The moment our eyes meet, something inside me pulls.
My body reacts to his voice alone and his gaze.

And I can’t stop wondering,
what if the man who commands me in the dark, makes me lose my sanity,
is the same man pretending not to know me in the light?
And if he is,
how long before he stops pretending
and claims me completely?

On our wedding night, my wife said to me: "Lucas's family needs an heir, and I've agreed to carry one for them."
Seeing me trembling all over, she gently cupped my face and added softly: "It's just IVF—a way to repay their kindness. The entire process is medical, with no physical contact at all. Once the baby is born and the debt is settled, I'll have as many children with you as you want, okay?"
For the sake of our ten years of love and the debt of gratitude we owed, I gritted my teeth and agreed.
Until three months later, when I found her lying naked on our wedding bed, frantically making love with Lucas.

“Does Mr. Howard Have an STD?”
With one sentence, Sienna tore apart her marriage to Ethan.
For three years of their secret marriage, she was his obedient wife, his silent assistant, and the woman he always overlooked.
Until she discovered that every business trip he took was spent living with his adopted sister.
While he was hospitalized after a car accident, she slipped divorce papers into his documents and tricked him into signing them.
She quit her job, moved out, and inherited a massive fortune.
The whole city mocked her, saying she was nothing without Ethan.
But she turned around and climbed back to the top of the industry, standing beside a man even more powerful than him.
Only then did Ethan realize what he had lost, kneeling before her and begging for another chance.
She leaned down slightly and smiled.
“Mr. Howard, when you cheated on me… did you ever think I could choose someone else too?”

In my last life, the city became a locked-down apocalypse zone.
My “family-first” elite father shoved my older brother into a raider’s shotgun just to survive.
My pampered socialite mother thought I was dead weight—and personally threw me into a tide of infected.
When I opened my eyes again, it was the third day after the world collapsed.
Watching my mother still dilute her luxury face cream with the last half case of water—while my father lectured me about principles—
I drew my tactical knife and pinned it clean through the solid oak table.
“From now on, supplies are split. Rot here and prove it to me.”

"Daddy... so cold... and it hurts..." When my precious daughter Mia whispered these words in her weak voice, my heart felt like it was being torn apart.
The life-saving medicine was just ten meters away, but that damned anti-magic barrier had become an insurmountable chasm between life and death.
What made me even more furious was that the vampire guarding the gate not only extorted my life savings, but also demanded I kneel like a dog and lick his boots before he would open the door.
He didn't know that if the door stayed closed, it wouldn't just be my daughter who died—his son and mother would perish too!

Five years into my marriage, I took off my Donna necklace at the Rossi family’s New Year’s Eve banquet and Noah still thought I could never leave him.
He stood by the long table with his mistress, Amelia, and said in front of every capo, “Some people will never measure up to her. Not even close.”
I didn’t cry. I didn’t make a scene. I just turned and walked away. On my way out, my cousin Lucas, my fixer, handed me a cup of coffee.
Three days later, he brought me two pieces of news.
Amelia was four months pregnant. And Noah was trading family territory to get his bastard child recognized by the family.
“What are you going to do?” Lucas asked.
I stared out the window, thinking about the red lipstick stain on Noah’s shirt. Thinking about the smug look in his eyes when he told me, “I only helped her because I felt sorry for her.”
“Wait,” I said. “Wait until they think they’ve won.”
What Noah didn’t know was I was still holding one last trump card.

At the family banquet, a power-hungry male special assistant projected a dimly lit bed photo onto the massive screen. He claimed he had slept with my wife—the heiress to the family—and demanded I walk away from the marriage with nothing.
While all the relatives were waiting for me to become the laughingstock, my eyes landed on a red rose burn scar in the corner of the photo. I couldn't help but laugh out loud.
He hadn't even turned on the bedside lamp. He had no idea that the woman he had just slept with was actually the wife of a psychopathic serial killer.

We’ve been married for five years. Then, she got pregnant with someone else's child.
In front of everyone, she said: "Ethan doesn't want this baby. You've always wanted one, right? Fine, take it and raise it."
In that moment, I finally understood: she wasn’t incapable of loving someone—she simply never saw me as a human being.
I took off my wedding ring, left it on the tray, and bought a one-way ticket to the North. My family said I wouldn't survive in the frozen North; she said that without her, I was nothing.
Three years later, she tracked me down using the GPS hidden inside that ring. She pushed open the door to my attic room, finding only a note I’d left: "Don't look for me. We're square."

Marilyn is a self made boss and a Baddie. She does not soften for anyone but she made an exception for her fiancé.
Until she found out her fiancé Tom was cheating on her. To make matter worse, he didn't feel remorse. He broke off the engagement and left her standing there like a fool.
She ends up at a hotel bar, where an arrogant stranger approaches her. He’s persistent, irritatingly sure of himself, and exactly the kind of man she doesn’t deal with. She dismisses him and leaves, refusing to give any man her time anymore.
The next day, she goes to her ex’s office with the intention of ruining his peace. Instead, she finds the man from the bar. His name is Dante. He is her ex’s boss.
Dante proposes an offer and she accepts when she realizes it would get her the revenge she wants on her ex and even more.
The arrangement is clear: No feelings attached.
But the longer they play the part, the more the line blur.

This is a story about control, ego, attraction, and what happens when two people who don’t surrender to anyone start wanting each other anyway.

A zombie outbreak occurred, and my brother and I were both reborn ten minutes before the disaster struck.
This time, he seized the initiative, stealing the two high-level god-tier abilities, [Flame] and [Hardening], and casually pushed me out of the security door, locking me in the zombie-infested corridor.
Through the security door, he arrogantly declared, "In my past life, you always stood in front of me; in this life, I'll take the mark of survival."
In his eyes, the [Tracking] and [Preset] abilities the system assigned me were nothing but useless pieces of paper.
He thought I would die a horde of zombies.
But he didn't know that in the hands of a top hunter, seemingly useless skills could weave a hellish web that made life unbearable and death unthinkable.

The system made me an outcast live-in husband in a werewolf clan for three years. The mission reward: 80 billion dollars. Now there's only half a day left until retirement settlement.

The arrogant pure-blood Alpha wants to force me into a deadly full moon execution array, roaring for me to kneel and die.

I don't even lift an eyelid. Right at quitting time, I directly withdraw my soul, leaving the body to the original owner "Ancestor Wolf Emperor" to handle, while I return to my Manhattan penthouse, sink into the leather sofa, and start a holographic livestream.

"Enjoy your night shift, everyone." I take a light sip of hot coffee, coldly watching the screen as the Wolf Emperor crushes that pure-blood Alpha's spine into mush with one foot, shocking my mission wife and mother-in-law into idiots.

In their eyes, my wife Emma—an Ivy League tenured professor in biological sciences—is ruthless, rational, and obsessively clean.
For seven years, even when she washed her hands, she would only ever touch the right-side sink—hers.
Until that night at 3 a.m., when I pulled a strand of sandy-golden short curl—hair that belonged to neither of us—out of my men’s shower loofah.
And around the neck of a pre-med student named Lucas, I saw the antique silver cross my dying father left in my hands.
When I confronted her, my always-icy wife protected the little homewrecker, slapped me across the face, and called me a jealous, controlling chauvinist.
She thought I’d swallow it like a coward.
But she forgot: as a top cardiothoracic chief, the thing I do best is cutting out tumors.

Framed for a crime she didn’t commit by the one person she trusted most — her best friend — Bella’s world crumbled the night her mate, Alpha Ethan, rejected her and cast her out of the pack. Heartbroken and alone, she thought her story had ended.

But fate had other plans.

When a rival pack takes her in, Bella’s hidden bloodline awakens — ancient, powerful, and destined for more than just survival. Now, she’s no longer the broken girl the Alpha abandoned... she’s the Luna their world never saw coming.

And when the past comes knocking, those who betrayed her will learn: the girl they threw away was born to rule.

They called me Specter. The King of Assassins. The deadliest blade in the Viper Syndicate's history. I never knew fear until the day my own brother in blood put a knife in my heart and threw me off a cliff.
I should have died.
Instead, I woke up in the body of Liana Vex, the discarded, illegitimate daughter of the most powerful duke in the kingdom. A girl so broken by abuse and grief that her spirit had already faded. In her final moments, she left me one desperate wish: Make them pay.
So I made a pact with a ghost. Her pain would become my fuel. Her enemies would become my prey.
Now I walk among the nobility in a body everyone calls weak. They see a fragile girl who should have died in the gutter. They don't see the killer standing in her shadow.
My former organization thinks they buried their king. They're about to learn that dead things don't always stay dead.
My new family thinks I'm a ghost they can ignore. They're about to discover that ghosts make the worst enemies.
And then there's him, the rogue mercenary with the sharp smile and sharper blade. The only person who sees through my masks. My rival. My equal. The wolf who should know better than to chase a shadow.
They say revenge is a dish best served cold. I intend to serve it frozen, bloody, and with interest.
The Viper Syndicate took my life. The Vex family took Liana's. I'm going to take everything they have.
And this time? I won't miss it.

After I retired, I was willing to do the dirtiest work at a small auto repair shop—just to give my sick daughter an ordinary childhood.
I endured my mother’s insults, my eldest brother’s wage cuts, my younger brother’s extortion.
But they actually joined forces to steal my daughter’s life-saving money for gambling, then sold me into an illegal mine to pay off their debts.
When the iron chain locked around my wrist, when my daughter cried in despair, the killing intent that had slept in my blood for three years finally woke up completely.
They had no idea I was once the iron-blooded God of War—commander of a million troops, the name that made enemy nations tremble.

Everyone said I’d traded five years of my youth and my unwavering devotion for an engagement that every woman envied.
My fiancé, Felix Smith, seemed to believe it, too. He gave me pearls, promised me a bright future, and wrapped me up in a web of tenderness, layer after layer.
Until that afternoon, when he held me close, yet used a language he thought I didn’t understand to weave the perfect "wedding" con over the phone.
That was the moment I finally realized: over these five years, who had he really been looking at through me? And every pearl he ever gave me, whose tastes was he remembering?
When the elevator failed and darkness crashed down, the person he protected on instinct wasn’t me.
When the wind howled across the empty outskirts, the person he chose to abandon was me.
I’d been learning how to love him, how to become a proper bride. In the end, what I learned was how to exit quietly, out of his world with Serena.
Only when I slipped off that pearl ring did I understand—
Some love stories, from the very beginning, are nothing but long letters written to someone else.

In my last life, for the spy I executed, she framed me for treason and injected me with the zombie virus herself.

I died in a dungeon—by the hand of the one I trusted most.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back before it all began.

This time I didn’t interfere. I watched coldly as she got scratched, handed the only dose of serum to the spy, and as the gates swung open and he finally showed his true face.

At last she believed me, kneeling in the dirt, begging for forgiveness.

I looked into her eyes as they clouded over. “I warned you in my last life. You didn’t believe me.”

This life, every blade she wanted for me—lands on her instead.

When the apocalypse struck, my brother Leo didn't hesitate to choose the offshore sanctuary.
In our past life, faced with a choice between a powerful inland warlord commanding a massive army and a leader clinging to a solitary island, Leo snatched up the first option.
But when a zombie horde overran the mainland and defenses collapsed, he fled to my island for refuge.
Jealous of how well I was surviving the end of the world, he and our parents knocked me unconscious in the dead of night and threw me into the ocean to drown.
Now that I've been reborn, Leo immediately took our parents to the maritime base, leaving the "dangerous" mainland to me.
He thinks the ocean is a natural barrier that guarantees his safety, that he can sit back and relax while the world burns.
But there's one thing he doesn't know.
Zombies aren't just static, mindless walking dead—they evolve.
And when they do, that offshore sanctuary will become a floating hell with no way out.