Married To My Bully's Father

Name: Married To My Bully's Father
Rating: 5.0 (1 reviews)

zeera

Romance | Ongoing

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When my father collapsed, I sold my last piece of freedom. I married a stranger to keep him alive. I thought that was the end of my story. But on the wedding night...I saw him. Chase Grayson. My high school bully. My worst nightmare. The boy who made me hate myself. And now? He's my stepson. His father is my husband. A man who sees straight through me but never looks away. Now both men want me, one wants to rewrite the past but the other wants to own my future. But I'm done being someone's regret or contract. I will burn this world down before I disappear again.

Family Modern Forced love Contract marriage Age gap Bully Arrogant/Dominant Romance Billionaires Age gap

Chapter 5 Something borrowed, nothing blue

06-09 18:10

Chapter 1 Where it hurts

The night air was thick with the smell of grease, burnt toast, and the faintest trace of rain seeping in through the cracked window above the back exit.

Scarlett Rivers stood behind the counter of Betty's 24-Hour Diner with her hands plunged into soapy dishwater, scrubbing at a stubborn coffee stain on a chipped white mug. It was her fourth double shift in a row, and the skin around her knuckles was raw. The red, swollen cracks stung every time she dipped her hands back into the water, but it was better than stopping. If she stopped, the silence would get too loud. And the silence always brought the panic.

The diner was nearly empty just two truckers dozing in a corner booth with half-eaten plates of hash browns and a college kid silently scrolling through his phone over a cold milkshake. The radio hummed something soft and old from the back room. Outside, the neon sign buzzed, flickering over the slick pavement.

Scarlett's reflection in the glass of the milk machine startled her. She looked pale. Not delicate-pale like in romance books, but sick-pale drained and smudged with exhaustion. Her dark hair was pulled back into a low bun, and her eyes looked older than twenty-one.

She dried her hands on her apron, then checked the battered phone she kept hidden behind the register.

There were no calls nor messages.

The hospital was supposed to call.

The thought alone made her chest tighten. She bit the inside of her cheek and fought the urge to call them again. The nurse had already said it: "We'll call you if anything changes." But the problem was things were already changing, weren't they?

Her dad had collapsed at noon.

Just crumpled to the kitchen floor like his body had given up on being a body. One second he was humming over the stove, trying to make pancakes with barely any flour, and the next, he was groaning, clawing at his chest. Scarlett had never moved so fast. She'd dropped her phone twice trying to dial 911, screamed when the operator asked for their address, and nearly broke her own fingers trying to unlock the front door for the paramedics.

They'd taken him to County General.

He had severe heart attack.

And there was no insurance, no savings and no time.

Scarlett blinked hard, pulling herself back to the present. She was still here. Still working. Still in the same dirty apron, still making barely enough to cover last month's electric bill, let alone the hospital's.

"Refill?"

She turned and asked the college kid out of habit. He shook his head without looking at her.

Scarlett exhaled and leaned against the counter. Her shoulders ached. Her head throbbed. Her stomach growled, but she hadn't eaten since that half-bagel in the break room, and even that felt like a memory.

She pulled out her cracked phone again, staring at the last bank notification. Her balance was $14.83.

Her shift pay wouldn't come until next Friday.

And the hospital bill? The nurse hadn't said a number, but Scarlett didn't need to hear it. She already knew. Tens of thousands, at least. Maybe more. And she didn't have a single dollar to spare.

The knot in her chest tightened. It sat there like a rock pressing down on everything her lungs, her thoughts, her hope.

She blinked fast, willing away the sting in her eyes. Not here. Not now. She couldn't afford to break.

"Scarlett," Betty's voice came from the back, raspy and tired. "Clock out for a few minutes if you need. No one's coming in this late."

Scarlett turned. Betty stood in the doorway to the kitchen with a towel slung over her shoulder, hair pinned in a messy bun, her eyes soft with something too kind to be pity and too knowing to be sympathy.

Scarlett shook her head. "I'm okay."

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

Betty hesitated, then nodded. "Holler if you change your mind."

Scarlett watched her disappear, then turned back to the register and sank onto the stool behind it, the leather torn and taped over with duct tape. She let herself breathe just a little.

Then, finally, she checked the hospital portal on her phone.

One new message.

From: County General Billing Department

"Preliminary charges have been posted to your account. Please log in to view and take appropriate action. If no payment plan is established within 14 days, your account may be forwarded to collections."

Her hands trembled as she clicked through the login. Her fingers typed slow. She didn't want to see it.

But there it was.

$39,684.92

She stared at the number like it was a joke or a glitch. Something impossible.

But it wasn't.

It was real.

It was more than she'd ever made in a year. It was enough to drown her.

Scarlett pressed the phone to her chest and sat perfectly still. The edges of her vision pulsed slightly. She couldn't breathe.

Her dad could die.

And she couldn't even afford to keep him alive.

A drop of something warm slid down her cheek. She didn't even notice it at first. She hadn't cried in months not when the water heater broke, not when they had to skip groceries, not even when she got her rejection letter from the only college she applied to.

But this.

This was too big to push down.

Scarlett hunched forward, gripping the counter edge with both hands, the tears now silent but steady. No sobs, no dramatic gasps. Just quiet devastation.

She didn't want charity. She didn't want someone to swoop in and save her. She just wanted the world to stop spinning so fast. To catch a damn break. Just once.

She heard the radio buzz faintly in the kitchen again. An old rock ballad about heartbreak and home. The kind of song that might've made her dad hum along if he were here.

If he still could.

Scarlett wiped her face with the inside of her sleeve and straightened her back. Her eyes were red, but her jaw had hardened.

She didn't know how yet, but she had to figure something out.

There had to be a way.

She just didn't know how much it would cost her.