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The Placeholder Bride's Secret Billionaire Revenge
For two years, I was the invisible force behind tech billionaire Kieran Douglas, convinced that our "private" romance was his way of protecting us from the tabloid spotlight. I managed his mergers, warmed his bed, and waited for a future that didn't exist. The illusion shattered at 6:00 AM when a Page Six alert debuted Kieran’s "real" romance with socialite Aspen Schneider. Before I could even process the betrayal, Kieran sent me a cold, professional text: "Order flowers for Aspen. Pink peonies. Her favorite." When I tried to walk away, my own mother called me a disgrace and threatened to lock my inheritance forever unless I married a sixty-year-old businessman to save her failing estate. At a high-society gala that same night, Aspen intentionally crushed my burned hand in front of the cameras, while Kieran stood by and dismissed me as a "mediocre assistant" who had overstayed her welcome. I stood in the cold New York rain, drenched in champagne and humiliation, realizing that every sacrifice I made for Kieran was a joke. I was a ghost in a penthouse that was never mine, discarded the moment his "soulmate" returned. To the world, I was just a placeholder whose time had run out. But Kieran forgot one thing: my father’s multi-million dollar trust fund unlocks the moment I legally marry. I didn't need love; I needed a signature and a shield. I walked into a discreet law firm and signed a marriage contract with a man I believed was the city’s most notorious, scandal-ridden playboy. I thought I was marrying a degenerate "beard" to buy my freedom and secure my revenge. I didn't realize the man who signed that paper wasn't a playboy at all, but Gaston Collins—the most powerful and dangerous man on Wall Street—and he had no intention of letting our fake marriage stay fake.Salisbury
April 1818
The second pint might have been a mistake.
Joseph Merton considered the stairs, which swayed a little. Yet it wasn’t every day a man discovered a fortune and the occasion demanded a celebration. He couldn’t wait to tell his wife.
A good woman, his wife. He’d thought himself lucky to get her. A humble bookseller’s assistant wouldn’t normally aspire to a pretty girl with a fine education and a knowledge of his trade. And then there had been the matter of her one thousand pounds. Enough to set him up in London. Certainly he had never expected any more.
Over dinner in the noisy tavern he raised a silent toast to Juliana, with a fondness undiluted by consideration of her more annoying traits. Her tendency to develop contrary opinions was forgotten in the prospect of a greater fortune coming his way.
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