Robert Kuok: A Memoir

That day, my parents and sister who were all working abroad suddenly told me that I was a second-generation rich with trillions of dollars in wealth!Gerald Crawford: I am a second-generation rich?

My father was a senior HR executive. He used KPIs to define my life. "Rank top ten in your grade, and I'll give you a B, with a bonus of 250 dollars. "Place in a state-level competition, and you'll get an A, with a bonus of 500. "If your SAT score hits Ivy-level, I'll give you an S+ and a 5,000-dollar year-end bonus." I studied as if my life depended on it, and in the end, I got the acceptance letter. My father slapped a contract down in front of me instead. "Congratulations on onboarding into the next phase. Starting today, your allowance will be structured as base salary plus performance plus attendance bonus. "Base pay is 250 dollars a month, enough to keep you from starving. "To prepare you for a high-pressure work environment, I’ll conduct random inspections. Fail, and your pay gets docked." When I ran a 104°F fever, he cut my attendance bonus, saying my physical resilience didn't meet standards. When I forgot to submit a weekly report because I was buried in schoolwork, he froze all my money. To stay alive, I went behind his back and sold blood at the hospital. At the end of the semester, I held my transcript and scholarship certificate, thinking I had finally earned the highest rating. But my father looked at me without a trace of warmth. "Your S+ bonus has been reallocated. The company decided to invest it in your brother, Harry. He has more potential." I looked at the 100-dollar "consolation prize" he handed me and laughed. So in his company, I didn't even qualify as an "outstanding employee."

For five years, I played the ghost in my own marriage. I pressed Julian Daniel’s pristine suits, matched his cufflinks, and sat by the window like a loyal dog, waiting for the "Ice King" CEO to look at me with something resembling desire. Instead, I received clinical kindness and a box containing a gold watch. Every anniversary, the exact same script. It was his way of checking a box - a tax he paid for a life he felt obligated to support. I sacrificed my career as a prima ballerina, shattering my legs to push him out of the path of a speeding car. He didn't marry a wife; he locked away a debt. The anniversary script burned to ash on our fifth year. Standing outside the bathroom door, I heard the raw, unbridled passion Julian had denied me for half a decade. He wasn't breathing my name into the steam. He was choking out the name of his high school heartbreak: Penelope. The betrayal didn't end in our bedroom. It followed me to a high-end restaurant where Julian hosted a private lunch. Pushing open the heavy wooden doors, I didn't find a husband willing to defend his wife. I found his childhood friend dragging his foot in a cruel, mocking circle, mimicking my limp to a room erupting in roars of laughter. Penelope doubled over in delight. And Julian? He sat at the head of the table, watching my humiliation with a look of pure, unbothered boredom. “I owe her,” his voice cut through the fading laughter, calm and tired. “I am just trying to pay back a debt.”

Also known as Daddy Won't Know. Scarlett could have pulled out all of her hair and screamed into the void until her lungs give out thinking about being her dad's plus one to a week long business trip on the last two weeks of her summer vacation. Then she found out that for the week they will be sharing a luxurious rental with her father's boss: Mr Blackwood, one of the most powerful men in the world who has a reputation for being ruthless, deadly, feared by anything and everything that walks and is infamous for not being particularly fond of women- And she concluded that her summer was officially ruined. Scarlett hesitantly makes the trip having convinced herself that her father's boss is probably another ugly, rich, fat, power- crazy man with a collection of tacky vintage suits and she's set on going out of her way to avoid him. That is, until on the first night, she awakens in the middle of the night and finds the muzzle of a gun pointing at her and a very tall, very naked, muscular, sexy as hell man of otherworldly gorgeousness wielding the weapon. And when he spoke in that dark, deep, velvety voice, she knew that her summer was about to get very interesting. "Who the fuck are you and what are you doing in my bed?"

Everyone in my family knew I was a Bond-Seeker with ninety-nine lives. And still, not one of them loved me. During the holiday, I woke up early making breakfast for my family. My mother threw it all angrily. “You filthy little curse. Don’t dirty my kitchen.” When my father was hospitalized after a car accident, I stayed by his bed for three days and three nights. The moment he woke up, he grabbed the IV bottle beside him and smashed it against my head. “Was killing your twin sister not enough for you? Now you want me dead too?” I used my scholarship money to buy my elder brother a brand-new laptop. He threw it straight off the balcony and watched it shatter on the ground below. “I’m not using anything bought with a cursed girl’s money. I don’t want it shortening my life.” On my eighteenth birthday, I handed a love letter to Ethan Whitmore, the boy next door I had secretly loved for years. He tore it to pieces right in front of me. “What, were you hoping to trade my feelings for points? Get lost, Natalie. I don’t want you getting me killed.” In the end, the System ruled that my bond had failed. Then it took my life back. I thought no one would grieve for me. But before it disappeared, the System spent the last of its energy broadcasting every memory I had across every major platform.

She blamed him for her parents' death… until the truth destroyed everything she believed. She thought the man she loved was responsible for her parents' death. She never knew that the real traitor had been right beside her from the very beginning.