Ninety-Nine Lashes: A Heiress's Reckoning

“To escape my suffocating family and regain my mother's inheritance, I, Ava Monroe, struck a desperate deal: forced marriage to Liam Sterling, a Texas rancher comatose from a polo accident. But the true agony was knowing my secret crush, Ethan Hayes, my stoic head of security, was blindly infatuated with my step-sister Chloe, seeing her as an angel and me as nothing but entitled and cold. He orchestrated my public humiliation, allowing Chloe to take credit for my good deeds and gifting her my mother's precious heirloom necklace after outbidding me at auction; he believed every one of Chloe's theatrical lies, even when she accused me of malice, leading him to directly orchestrate a brutally personal act of violence against me-ninety-nine lashes that left me physically and emotionally scarred. How could the man I'd secretly loved be so cruelly mistaken, so completely manipulated, turning into my tormentor? My spirit, already worn by years of my family's psychological abuse, was shattered by his utter disdain. Yet, just before my escape to Texas, I overheard Chloe's cynical confession: every lie, every manipulation, her contempt for Ethan, and her role in destroying my mother's legacy. It was the final, devastating blow that confirmed my decision to abandon my old life-and the poisonous people in it-forever.”