Why Must You Be So Cold?

As icons of Chicago's culinary elite, my husband Collin and I seemed perfect. Secretly, he exploited my talents to secure the Golden Spoon award while taking his young protégé, Casey, as a mistress. After a kitchen fire left me scarred, he discarded me and labeled me unstable to mask his betrayal. Forced into a corner by his cruelty, I am vanishing to dismantle the empire I created. I will leave him with nothing but the wreckage of his own greed.

After wearing his late mother's dress to a banquet, she faces the public wrath of her stepson, Tyron, who accuses her of murder. Her husband, Cameron, punishes her defiance by locking her away. Pushed to her absolute limit, she attempts a daring escape from a fifth-story balcony using knotted sheets. But her flight is cut short when Tyron confronts her on the ledge, holding a pair of scissors with a chilling suggestion to end her life.

Alessa Smith’s three-year marriage to Adrian was a sham, a strategic move to satisfy a will. When he discards her, she pivots from devotion to destruction, aiming to seize her inheritance and ruin him. She enlists Adrian’s lethal brother, Kai, in a provocative alliance to facilitate her revenge. Though Alessa views the biker as a mere tool for her schemes, his intense fixation on her ignites unexpected passions that threaten to complicate her path.

Approaching forty, a dedicated wife is blindsided when her husband demands a divorce. After a decade of driving trucks to provide for her family, she discovers his ongoing affair with their neighbor, Jenny. Worse yet, her young son Willy rejects her, choosing his father's mistress over his own mother. Realizing her sacrifices were for nothing, she decides to abandon her role as the martyr. She leaves her ungrateful husband and child behind, wishing them luck with their new life while she finally chooses herself.

Once the cherished princess of Lumenclaw, the protagonist finds her life shattered when her Alpha father brings home Callie. Suddenly, her brother Ryell and future mate Jovan turn their backs on her, favoring the newcomer’s feigned innocence. After a violent confrontation and a cruel rejection from her family, she chooses to leave her old life. Seeking refuge with her mother’s distant pack, she refuses to look back, even as those who discarded her realize their mistake and beg for her return.

Luna has long suffered Alpha Ryker’s indifference as he fixates on his former lover, Faye. When Ryker uses his Alpha Command to force Luna into a humiliating apology to her child's tormentors and seizes her family estate for Faye, the bond finally snaps. Luna rejects him and finds a powerful, mysterious ally who rescues her daughter. Armed with her mother’s ancient grimoire, she prepares to dismantle the legacy of those who dared to betray her family.