Flower Meaning Strength Novels & Stories

I spent six months and over $300,000 planning our wedding trip to the Maldives. We had invited both sets of parents. It was supposed to be a small family wedding before we started our married life. I was a dock captain, running Pier Seventeen on my own and making more in one month than Ethan made in a year as an ordinary office employee. But when his childhood sweetheart Bianca heard about the trip, she begged to come with her parents. Ethan agreed without hesitation. He changed my parents’ first-class tickets to economy and gave their seats to Bianca’s parents instead. His whole family supported his decision without a second thought. So I changed my own travel plans. I canceled the villa, the private ceremony, and the wedding dinner in the Maldives, then took my parents somewhere else. That was when Ethan finally started to panic.

When my boyfriend hit the elevator button for my best friend's floor by mistake for the ninety-ninth time, he shot me an accusing look. "Why didn't you remind me? Forget it. Since we're already here, I might as well replace Gem's light bulb." I froze, then forced a thin smile. It was that line again. "Since we're already here." Ever since Gem Shaw moved into the apartment upstairs a year ago, my boyfriend Simon Lawson, had pressed the wrong floor every single time. When we were supposed to watch a movie together, he carried the milkshake to Gem's door and knocked. When my fever wouldn't break and I asked him to bring me medicine, he brought it to Gem's place instead because she had cramps. Our date for two became a movie for three, and my fever medicine became painkillers. Even on my birthday, he carried the cake to Gem's place. "Since we're already here, might as well celebrate your ten years of friendship." "Since we're already here, I might as well fix Gem's clogged drain for her." As I watched him walk into Gem's apartment without looking back, I silently pressed the close-door button. He had already forgotten that today was the day my lease ended, and it was also the day I was moving out. Since he was already here, he didn't need to come back to me.

When I opened my eyes, my sister Serena Shaw was kneeling in front of me, sobbing with a fruit knife pressed near her wrist. “Nora, I swear I didn’t mean it. I had too much to drink. I don’t even know how Lucas and I…” I almost laughed. Because I had seen this scene before. In my last life, Serena cried like a victim after sleeping with my fiancé, Lucas Arden. Everyone comforted her. Lucas married her to save her reputation. And I was pushed into a marriage with Graham West, Serena’s abandoned fiancé. Before the wedding, Lucas showed me my name tattooed on his wrist and promised he would only love me. I believed him. I wasted five years beside a husband who wanted my sister, waiting for a man who had married her. Then Serena died. I thought Lucas would finally come back to me. Instead, I found him at the funeral home, holding her photograph like he had lost the love of his life. “She was my wife,” he told me. “Let it go, Nora.” At my birthday party, Lucas and Graham fought over Serena on the rooftop. One had married her. One had never stopped wanting her. While they fought over her, I was shoved into traffic and died under the headlights. When I opened my eyes again, I was back at the beginning. This time, I thought I was the only one who remembered. I was wrong. Lucas remembered. Graham remembered. And even with a second chance, both of them still chose Serena. This time, I would not be traded, chosen, or discarded. This time, I would build something none of them could take from me.

"Mom, please stop searching for a lover. I don't want Fathe r's condition to deteriorate further due to your behavior. Ot herwise, I will destroy any relationship you have with any m an!" Chelsea admonished, giving a warning. She had lost c ount of how many warnings she had given, given the nume rous men her mother had approached for money, despite h er father's serious illness. "It's up to you, do whatever you want. I don't care anymore because I can't bear to live in poverty," the mother replied c almly, indifferent to Chelsea's feelings. "Fine, if that's what you want. I swear I will marry one of yo ur most meaningful lovers!" Chelsea promised her mother when the pain had taken over her.

After a devastating accident claims her parent's lives, Jenny Fleming is taken in by the Haynes family and raised as one of their own. Jenny grew up with Marcus Haynes, her first love and the man who marries her after his grandmother arranged their marriage in order to honor Jenny's parents and keep her in the family. Marcus, who felt indebted to Jenny's parents for saving his life in the tragedy that claimed their lives, agreed to marry her pressured by his sense of duty and obligation. But when his first love Anna returns to his life, Marcus is unable to control his emotions and lingering feelings for her and he ends up making a mistake that costs him his marriage and everything he holds dear.

It was the third anniversary of my registration of a mate bond with Xavier Ashford, the alpha of Shadowcrest Pack. My gift to him was a positive pregnancy test, but his gift to me was a contract terminating our bond as mates. I froze, too distraught to reach out and take it from him. Xavier cleared his throat awkwardly. "A wolf tricked Talia into getting pregnant. A pup born out of mate bond can't get the rights to live in the pack. My plan is to terminate our bond as mates and become mates with Talia for the time being so that her pup can have a legal identity. After she gives birth to her pup, then you and I can become mates again. How does that sound?" He passed me a bond termination contract. It had clearly been prepared a long time ago. He noticed my hesitation and explained gently, "You're my one true love. I'm only helping her as a friend. Even after we split up, I can guarantee that you won't be mistreated." I looked up at him with a smile and stayed silent. Then, I reached into my pocket and felt the pregnancy test under my fingers. The two red lines on the screen were as clear as day.

My boss, Paul Cunningham, blew a major investment. When the board came after him, he shoved me out as the fall guy. After I got fired, I couldn't keep up with the mortgage. As if things weren't bad enough, my husband fell sick and needed money fast. I went back to ask for severance. Paul stayed in his luxury car and flicked a couple of hundred bucks at me. "Severance?" he scoffed. "Selene, you cost me billions. And you still have the nerve to ask me for money?" He smirked. "Take it. Use it to pick out a decent urn for your husband." I stood there, watching the car disappear down the street, my fists clenched so tightly that my nails dug into my palms. That night, I dropped a bomb in a large investor group chat. [Hi, I'm looking for new job opportunities. I have years of experience cooking the books, and my ex-boss loved my work!]

I worked in bottle service at a nightclub for four years just to support my boyfriend. His startup business failed. He told me he owed a fortune to loan sharks, saying that they would cut off his fingers if he failed to pay up. I gave him every dollar I had saved just to help him clear off his debt. I even gave him the emerald bracelet my mother had left me before she passed away. That night, I unintentionally overheard a conversation from one of the private rooms while I was working. "Preston, your girlfriend never would have given you that bracelet she had been hiding if Mia hadn't suggested we pretend to be debt collectors and assist you with this little show." Preston Hale laughed smugly before draining the drink in his glass. "It's just an old bracelet. Mia liked it, so I gave it to her." Then, he leaned back and added, "Now, help me think of another way to test Nora." So that was the truth. The love I dedicated for four years was just a test to him. The loan sharks, debt, fear, and desperation—he had orchestrated it all. I turned, walking out on him and out of the nightclub. Then, I reached out to my older brother, Adrian Whitmore, with whom I had been fighting for years. "Adrian," I told him, "I lost. I'll marry the man you arranged for me to meet."

After my mother passed away, my father's lover brought her daughter, Winona Sweeney, into our family. From then on, I became the most hated person in the entire family. To protect myself, I became arrogant, withdrawn, and grew into a thorny rose — beautiful, but no one was allowed to approach me. I no longer believed in love. When I was once again subjected to cold violence and isolation at the banquet, Cameron Payne openly declared his love for me to everyone and said that he would break the necks of anyone who slandered me! He pursued me openly, gave me a grand wedding, and announced his love for me to the whole world. Everyone envied me. Then, when a fire broke out during my father's birthday party, I almost died inside. No one from my family tried to save me; it was Cameron who saved me. When I woke up in the hospital, I heard a horrifying truth. "I know I mistook Hazel for my savior. It's my mistake and I will make it up to Winona. But that doesn't mean you can hurt Hazel!" Cameron was furious. "But Winona's leukemia can't wait; she needs a transplant immediately..." My father chose to sacrifice me for his illegitimate daughter. "That doesn't mean you can hurt Hazel! The baby is only seven months old; a premature birth can be fatal!" Those things I thought were signs of love turned out not to be for me from the very beginning. In that case, I would help him fulfill his debt to Winona.

The night the family’s don was attacked, my husband had abandoned his post to win back his misbehaving mistress. The first time I lived through this, I activated his communication device to summon him back. He thus saved the don and rose through the ranks. However, his mistress had died in the firefight, and he blamed it all on me. Thus, on my delivery date, he dumped me in an abandoned factory and had some stray dogs rip me and my baby apart. “There were so many bodyguards there that night. Why did you have to call me back? You knew that she would die! You did this on purpose!” Somehow, right before I died, I went back in time to that night. I did not activate the communication device this time. I threw it into the fountain and watched it sink. Then, although I was eight months pregnant, I shielded the don and took the bullet meant for him.