No Longer Mrs. Cooley: The Architect's Return

I went to the City Clerk’s office for a routine copy of my marriage license to finalize a trust fund audit. I expected a simple piece of paper, but the clerk’s pitying look told me my entire life was a lie. "The license was never finalized, Ms. Oliver. In the eyes of the state, you are single." The three-hundred-guest wedding at the Plaza and the Vogue features meant nothing. My husband, Gray Cooley, had intentionally filed the documents with a "procedural defect" so he could discard me without a legal divorce. Moments later, an iCloud invite titled "Our Little Secret" popped up on my screen. It was a photo of my best friend, Brylee, holding a positive pregnancy test at our Hamptons estate. Gray’s text to her was the final blow: "Happy anniversary, babe. This baby is the best gift. Once the trust unlocks today, we’re done with the charade." I soon discovered they were even stealing my career, reassigning my architectural masterpiece to Brylee while preparing my eviction notice. Gray's mother called me a "barren mule" in a leaked recording, mocking the infertility I suffered after saving Gray’s life in a construction accident. I wasn't a wife; I was a three-year placeholder used to secure his inheritance. How could the man I bled for treat me like a disposable prop? How could my best friend carry his child while pretending to comfort me through my darkest moments? The betrayal burned until it turned into a cold, hard stone of fury. I didn't cry. Instead, I walked into the penthouse of the Barretts, the Cooleys' most powerful rivals. I signed a marriage contract with Kane Barrett, the man the tabloids called the "Beast of Wall Street." "I want a wedding," I told his father, my voice steady and lethal. "Bigger than the one I had with Gray." If they wanted me gone, they would have to watch me become the woman who owns their world.

Modern Revenge Divorce

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"Miss, Ning Ziying has passed out. Should I continue to beat her?"

Two women in fine clothes were sitting high up in the Yunying courtyard of the Lord Protector's Manor scornfully looking at the thing huddled on the ground. It was so badly mutilated that it could barely be recognized as a human being. They picked up their teacups and slowly took a sip of tea.

One of them walked forward and brushed aside the matted hair. She said with affectation, "Sister Ying! Wake up, Sister Ying!"

Ning Ziying raised her dirty face, covered with mud. A few bloody cuts were visible where she’d been scratched by Ning Ziyan's nails.

"Sister Ying, don't hate your elder sister. It’s not my fault you had an affair. And to think, Brother Yuhang almost married a dirty woman like you..."

"Ning Ziyan!" she bellowed with difficulty, "it is you who had an affair with my fiancé and caused him to break it off with me!"

Ning Ziyan put her hand holding a hanky under her nose as if to block something dirty while she said with disdain, "Brother Yuhang and I are fond of each other. It's you who shamelessly messed around! At first, I took pity on you. Maybe we’ll let you become Brother Yuhang's concubine; the minister's mansion can afford a concubine to serve me drinks."

Looking at the perky Ning Ziyan in front of her, Ning Ziying felt a surge of anger, “this woman, who had secretly had an affair with my fiancé and even got pregnant out of wedlock, dared accuse me of the crime she’d committed herself! What a vicious woman! I treated her like my own elder sister!”

Beaten by the servants, Ning Ziying lost her consciousness and lay on the ground. All of a Sudden, she waked up, with her eyes full of hatred, grabbed at Ning Ziyan, and fiercely bit her hand with her bloody, teeth-broken mouth. She felt her teeth cut open the skin and become embedded in the flesh, where bright-red blood oozed out. She didn’t know if the blood was hers or Ning Ziyan’s, and she didn’t care.

Madam Ling, the Lord Protector's wife, had been sitting next to Ning Ziyan watching the fun. Now she rushed over to beat and scold Ning Ziying. But no matter how much pain Ning Ziying felt when her back and body were being beaten, she did not let up her bite. She stared straight at Ning Ziyan and bit her with greater and greater force.

A powerful male voice suddenly resounded among the noise.

"Bitch!"

The next moment, Ning Ziying was struck ferociously in the stomach. Caught off-guard, she flew back, smashing into a large stone by the pond! Blood sprayed from her mouth, staining the ground in front of her.

"How dare you hurt Yan'er! Throw this shameless bitch into the pond," Xia Yuhang said.

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