The Runaway Fiancée: Claimed By The Rival

The Runaway Fiancée: Claimed By The Rival

Lu Meng

5.0
Comment(s)
3.2K
View
22
Chapters

I watched the man I was contractually bound to marry dive into the freezing water. But he wasn't swimming toward me. Only seconds prior, his mistress had shoved me into the ornamental pool. I struggled to surface, my heavy silk dress dragging me down like a lead weight. Jax, the ruthless Underboss of Chicago, swam right past me. He reached for the woman who had pushed me, scooping her up as she faked a leg cramp. He carried her out, stepping over my hand as I clawed at the slippery edge. Every Capo and soldier in the underworld watched the heir choose a jersey chaser over his fiancée. "You are making a scene, Eliana," Jax said, his voice devoid of emotion. "Go home." He didn't offer a hand. He ordered me away like a disobedient dog. Later that night, when I tried to return his ring, his mistress laughed and shoved me down a flight of stairs. I lay at the bottom, broken and bleeding. Jax didn't check if I was alive. He comforted her instead. To him, I was just furniture. A guarantee. He thought he had broken me. He thought I had nowhere to go because our families were allied. He was wrong. I left the five-carat diamond on the table. I left my car keys on the dashboard at O'Hare Airport. I didn't just run away. I boarded a one-way flight to New York to join his mortal enemy, the Tran Syndicate. Jax Little thought he owned the board. He didn't realize the Queen had just defected.

Chapter 1

I watched the man I was contractually bound to marry dive into the freezing water.

But he wasn't swimming toward me.

Only seconds prior, his mistress had shoved me into the ornamental pool.

I struggled to surface, my heavy silk dress dragging me down like a lead weight.

Jax, the ruthless Underboss of Chicago, swam right past me.

He reached for the woman who had pushed me, scooping her up as she faked a leg cramp.

He carried her out, stepping over my hand as I clawed at the slippery edge.

Every Capo and soldier in the underworld watched the heir choose a jersey chaser over his fiancée.

"You are making a scene, Eliana," Jax said, his voice devoid of emotion.

"Go home."

He didn't offer a hand. He ordered me away like a disobedient dog.

Later that night, when I tried to return his ring, his mistress laughed and shoved me down a flight of stairs.

I lay at the bottom, broken and bleeding.

Jax didn't check if I was alive. He comforted her instead.

To him, I was just furniture. A guarantee.

He thought he had broken me. He thought I had nowhere to go because our families were allied.

He was wrong.

I left the five-carat diamond on the table.

I left my car keys on the dashboard at O'Hare Airport.

I didn't just run away.

I boarded a one-way flight to New York to join his mortal enemy, the Tran Syndicate.

Jax Little thought he owned the board.

He didn't realize the Queen had just defected.

Chapter 1

Eliana Carter POV

I watched the man I was contractually bound to marry dive into the freezing water, but he wasn't swimming toward me.

Only ten seconds prior, Catalina Manning had shoved me into the ornamental pool at the Riley Estate. I could still feel the phantom sting of her acrylic nails digging into my arm just before the splash.

The water was a shock of ice against my skin, instantly soaking the heavy silk of my dress and dragging me down like a lead weight.

I surfaced, gasping for air, the chlorine and my own mascara stinging my eyes.

I looked for Jax.

He was the Underboss of the Chicago Outfit.

He was the man whose diamond ring sat heavy as a shackle on my finger.

He was the apex predator in a ballroom filled with killers, a man who had ended a turf war last month by hanging three rivals from a bridge.

He was supposed to be my protector.

But Jax didn't look at me.

He swam right past me.

He reached for Catalina, who was flailing in the shallow end, screaming about a leg cramp she clearly didn't have.

He scooped her up in his arms, his bespoke suit ruined, his face etched with a frantic concern he had never once wasted on me.

He carried her to the poolside, stepping over my hand as I tried to grip the slippery edge.

The silence in the garden was louder than a gunshot.

Every Capo, every Soldier, every gossiping wife in the Chicago underworld was watching.

They witnessed the heir to the throne choose a jersey chaser over a Capo's daughter.

They saw the ultimate disrespect.

I pulled myself out of the pool, my limbs trembling.

My dress clung to my body, a freezing, second skin.

I shivered, but it wasn't from the temperature.

It was the sudden, hollow realization that I was utterly, irrevocably alone.

Jax set Catalina down on a lounge chair, wrapping his wet suit jacket around her shoulders.

She smirked at me over his shoulder, a small, victorious curl of her painted lip.

Jax finally turned to look at me.

His eyes were cold, devoid of apology or recognition.

"You are making a scene, Eliana," he said.

His voice was flat, stripped of emotion.

"Go home."

He didn't ask if I was hurt.

He didn't offer a hand.

He ordered me away like a disobedient dog.

I stood there, puddle water dripping from my hair onto the expensive stone patio.

The humiliation burned in my chest, hot and suffocating, clashing with the chill on my skin.

I realized then that the contract between our families was just ink on paper.

To him, I was furniture.

To him, I was a guarantee.

I didn't say a word.

I turned around and walked away, leaving a trail of water in my wake.

I walked past the staring guests, keeping my chin high even as my teeth chattered violently.

I reached the parking lot and pulled my phone from my clutch.

It was wet, but the screen flickered to life.

I dialed the one number I prayed wasn't being monitored by Jax's men yet.

Uncle Sal picked up on the second ring.

"I'm calling in the favor, Sal," I said.

My voice didn't shake.

"I need to disappear. Tonight."

Continue Reading

Other books by Lu Meng

More
Reborn Heiress Marries My Ex-Fiancé's Brother

Reborn Heiress Marries My Ex-Fiancé's Brother

Modern

5.0

Tonight was supposed to be the night I became the happiest woman in D.C., celebrating my engagement at the legendary Bolton Manor gala. I wore emerald silk and a diamond that cost more than most mansions, convinced that Hank Bolton was my soulmate and the key to my family's future. But behind the heavy oak doors of the guest wing, the dream died. I found my fiancé tangled with another woman, laughing about how I was nothing more than a "clueless cash cow" whose inheritance would fund his run for the Senate. In my first life, I reacted with tears and screams, which only allowed his family to paint me as an unstable lunatic. They stripped me of my dignity, bankrupted the Adams estate, and watched coldly as my brother, Lucas, died in a ditch trying to save me. I ended up gasping for air in a burning building, realizing too late that my perfect engagement was actually my execution. I died in the soot and the shadows, feeling the searing heat of a betrayal that burned worse than the fire. I lost everything because I was too blind to see the monsters hiding behind expensive smiles. But then, I suddenly gasped for air and realized the smoke was gone. I was standing in front of a vanity, the calendar mocking me: October 14th. The night of the gala. I had been given a second chance, and this time, I wasn't going to be the victim. I recorded the betrayal on my phone and walked into the library with a heart made of ice. I didn't just blow up the engagement; I demanded a new groom—Hank’s "invalid" older brother, Dereck, a man the world had written off as a dying recluse. "I'll take him," I told the stunned family. I wanted a husband who couldn't cheat, a puppet who would leave me a wealthy widow within a year. I thought I was choosing a safe, broken man to shield me from my enemies. I didn't know that under his blanket, Dereck was hiding a holster, or that the "dying" man was actually a predator who had been waiting for someone exactly like me to walk into his trap.

The Billionaire's Secret Heir: Sign the Divorce

The Billionaire's Secret Heir: Sign the Divorce

Modern

5.0

I spent three years as the perfect, silent wife to billionaire Ezequiel Sanford, enduring a marriage colder than the marble floors of our Manhattan mansion. The day I finally saw two pink lines on a pregnancy test was the same day my world burned down. I found Ezequiel at the hospital, but he wasn't there for me. He was cradling his ex-girlfriend, Alexa, with a gentleness he had never shown me, while my own father was being rushed into the ICU after a suicide attempt triggered by our family's bankruptcy. Instead of comfort, Ezequiel handed me divorce papers. He had checked a box that read "No Issue of Marriage," effectively erasing any claim I had to his legacy. He blackmailed me, promising to save my father’s company only if I signed away every cent of alimony and walked away with nothing. When Alexa called him claiming an emergency, Ezequiel shoved me aside so violently I hit the sharp corner of his glass desk. As I collapsed to the floor, clutching my abdomen in sudden, searing pain, he didn't even look back. "Stop acting," he sneered, his voice dripping with disgust. "It’s pathetic. I will never love you, Claudia, no matter how many times you fall down." He walked out to be with her, leaving me bleeding on his office carpet with the secret he had spent years trying to avoid. He thought I was a gold-digger faking a crisis, never realizing I was actually carrying the Sanford heir he claimed didn't exist. Now, I’m hiding in a private clinic while my husband’s security team scours the city for me. My childhood friend just handed me a one-way ticket to Paris and a chance to restart the medical career I sacrificed for a lie. The money just hit my father's account. I’m signing the papers and disappearing. By the time Ezequiel realizes what he’s lost, I’ll be a world away, and he’ll never even know my child’s name.

You'll also like

I Slapped My Fiancé-Then Married His Billionaire Nemesis

I Slapped My Fiancé-Then Married His Billionaire Nemesis

Jessica C. Dolan
4.9

Being second best is practically in my DNA. My sister got the love, the attention, the spotlight. And now, even her damn fiancé. Technically, Rhys Granger was my fiancé now-billionaire, devastatingly hot, and a walking Wall Street wet dream. My parents shoved me into the engagement after Catherine disappeared, and honestly? I didn't mind. I'd crushed on Rhys for years. This was my chance, right? My turn to be the chosen one? Wrong. One night, he slapped me. Over a mug. A stupid, chipped, ugly mug my sister gave him years ago. That's when it hit me-he didn't love me. He didn't even see me. I was just a warm-bodied placeholder for the woman he actually wanted. And apparently, I wasn't even worth as much as a glorified coffee cup. So I slapped him right back, dumped his ass, and prepared for disaster-my parents losing their minds, Rhys throwing a billionaire tantrum, his terrifying family plotting my untimely demise. Obviously, I needed alcohol. A lot of alcohol. Enter him. Tall, dangerous, unfairly hot. The kind of man who makes you want to sin just by existing. I'd met him only once before, and that night, he just happened to be at the same bar as my drunk, self-pitying self. So I did the only logical thing: I dragged him into a hotel room and ripped off his clothes. It was reckless. It was stupid. It was completely ill-advised. But it was also: Best. Sex. Of. My. Life. And, as it turned out, the best decision I'd ever made. Because my one-night stand isn't just some random guy. He's richer than Rhys, more powerful than my entire family, and definitely more dangerous than I should be playing with. And now, he's not letting me go.

Chapters
Read Now
Download Book