His Golden Ambition, Her Ruin

“My name is Ava Green, and I have a secret. Anything I touch with intense emotion turns to solid gold, a strange Midas Touch responsive not to greed, but to love, fear, and passion. Mark Sterling, my brilliant and ambitious husband, was the recipient of my deepest love, and our penthouse glowed with five hundred shimmering testimonies to our shared intimacy. Then the five-hundredth transformation happened, a golden lace tear on a pillowcase, signifying I could make one powerful wish. Mark begged me to wish for his ultimate ambition: to be the CEO of Innovate Global, hailed as a visionary. My heart broke for him, seeing his vulnerability, and I closed my eyes, making the wish for the man I loved. The next night, the world changed. Mark became CEO, a savior to the media, but at his first press conference, he announced his engagement to Dr. Emily Hayes, his "childhood friend." He destroyed me. When he came home, surrounded by our golden memories, he revealed his cruel plan: Emily was his path to power, and I, merely "convenient," was to remain his wife, in name only, lest my prominent family's shares suffer. He needed my family' s influence-and my power-but I was just a piece on his board. I was trapped, my love, my magic, my soul, all sacrificed for his kingdom. Then, a text from Leo Vance, my childhood friend and a cybersecurity genius, offered a glimmer of hope: "The library. Midnight. Don't be followed." He revealed Mark' s orchestrations, how he' d ruined a man' s life, and then, a passage from my family's archives: a forbidden technique, a reverse Midas Touch, fueled by profound pain, where malicious wishes come true. "He thinks he broke you, Ava," Leo said. "Let him think that. We can use this." And so, my plan began, sharper and clearer than any gold.”