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Bound To The Ruthless Wall Street Butcher

Author: Lan Zhen

Chapter 1 No.1

Word Count: 989 | Released on: 05/02/2026

ne, I can make sure the bridge loan

skin in oil. Under the table, his hand moved. It crawled up her knee, fing

violent lurch, a physical rejection of the man sitting across from her and the situation s

t. She tried to shift her leg away, but his gri

ed off him. "Your stepmother was very clear. If you walk out that door, the marshals will be at your father's gallery

ed around, her eyes darting frantically from table to table. The maître d'

taint of financial ruin was a diseas

going to throw up. She was going to scream. She was trapped in

ir in the r

s a sudden, vacuum-like

e loo

nter of them walked a man who didn't need to rush. He was tall, wearing a suit that cost m

widened, the arrogance draining out of th

Arthur b

companies for sport. The same man whose name had been plastered across the Financial Times f

he terrified chaos of her mind. Fear

If she thought,

ing over her wine glass. The dark red liquid spl

, jumping up, batting

rt hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. She walked fast, her heels sinkin

ped in her path,

ted. Her voice was h

d, hesitating for a

ne slipped past him. She reac

old and unreadable. He looked down at her, his expression not

ance to speak. She didn't g

the lapels of his jacket with tre

ed her li

. A collective gasp sucked

yielding, and cold. He didn't kiss her back. He stood th

her voice barely a tremor. "Play along, and

muscle in h

ur Sterling, pale and shaking, frozen by the table. He saw the girl in his arms, the ruined daughter of Richard Baxter. But the Ba

rm, and heavy. He cupped the back of he

play along. H

th with a brutal, calculated efficiency. It wasn't romantic. It

The paparazzi were getti

fled toward the side exit

st stumbled. He looked at her, his blue eyes devoid of any

e man standing

vibrated in Elayne's chest. "Find out which bankru

rity guards stepped forward to flank her. She had es

Chapter End

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Bound To The Ruthless Wall Street Butcher

Lan Zhen Modern

“I was trapped in a velvet booth at Le Bernardin, Arthur Sterling's hand crawling up my knee as he whispered that my father would be in handcuffs by morning if I didn't spend the night with him. Desperate to escape, I lunged at the only man more dangerous than Arthur-Gunnar Kirk, the "Butcher of Wall Street"-and kissed him in front of every camera in the room, thinking I was choosing the lesser of two evils. I was wrong; Gunnar didn't just play along, he took possession, forcing me into a cold-blooded contract to be his fake fiancée to save his corporate image from an SEC investigation. While my greedy stepmother and sister were busy fighting over the diamonds he sent, I was living in terror, trying to hide the one thing that truly mattered: my infant son, hidden away with a nanny in a cramped Queens apartment. When my baby suffered a febrile seizure and I rushed to the ER, I looked up to see Gunnar standing in the doorway, his glacial eyes boring into me as he realized the "ruined" socialite was hiding a child from her past. I tried to sabotage the wedding, setting up my fame-hungry stepsister as a decoy bride so I could flee to Switzerland with my son, but Gunnar caught me on the fire escape before I could take a single step toward freedom. He threw me over his shoulder like a sack of flour and told me that if I didn't walk down that aisle, he would personally ensure my father rotted in prison. We stood at the altar and exchanged vows in a ceremony built on blackmail and lies, but as we walked out as husband and wife, Gunnar didn't look at me with affection; he turned to his assistant and ordered a total deep dive into the medical records I had spent a year trying to erase. "Find out exactly what happened during those nine months in Switzerland, and tell me who that baby really belongs to."”