Filed To Story: The Broken-Hearted She and The Icy He Book PDF Free
Lily hated riddles. If something bothered her, she asked directly.
“James, Jack isn’t a puppy. What nonsense are you imagining?”
“He is the puppy!”
Even with her in his arms, James’s mind was still drowning in jealousy, remembering the social media posts Jackson had made back when he was pretending to be her fiancé.
“He called himself your puppy back then. He even posted about it on purpose.”
Lily blinked, recalling the time before their divorce, when James had lost his temper after she’d murmured “puppy.”
So he’d thought, all this time, that the puppy she spoke of was Jackson?
This misunderstanding was massive.
Looking at the sulky man in front of her, she found him ridiculously childish.
But what could she do? Even when he was childish, she still adored him.
She didn’t have the heart to let him stew in doubt, so with a sigh of helpless fondness she explained, “The puppy isn’t Jackson. In the princess room Mom gave me back at the family estate, there’s a huge plush dog on the bed. When I lived there, I always slept holding it. That’s the ‘puppy’ I was talking about. If you don’t believe me, when we go back, you can see for yourself. He’s soft and adorable-you’ll like him too.”
James’s handsome face flushed crimson in an instant.
He had never imagined the “puppy” was just a stuffed animal.
The jealousy evaporated, replaced by a rush of warmth that felt like spring sunlight breaking through clouds.
But even with his heart finally at ease, he still wanted to kiss her.
He held her tighter, his lips brushing hers. “Lily, I want to kiss you…”
She had already cleared up the misunderstanding, yet he still wanted a kiss?
Well, so be it.
After all, kissing wasn’t a crime. And truthfully, she loved kissing him too.
With that thought, she looped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his.
After parting from Lily, Adeline received a call from her mother, Hailey Lund-the woman who had given birth to her and raised her in that poor countryside village.
When Adeline was ten, Lily had helped her escape her father, a man who valued sons and treated daughters as nothing. Since then, she had never once contacted him.
But sometimes she still called her mother.
Because she believed Hailey loved her.
She could never forget the time she had burned with fever as a child, kicking off her blanket in the night. Her mother had picked it up, gently covered her, and held her hand, weeping as she whispered, “My precious girl, you have to get better soon.”
And she could never forget the day she left that village, when her mother had pressed a crumpled fifty- dollar note into her pocket, crying as she said, “Don’t ever come back…”
So when Hailey called now, saying she had a terminal illness and was in Capital City, begging to see her one last time, Adeline rushed to the hotel address she gave without hesitation.
“Mom…”
But when the door opened, it wasn’t Hailey standing there.
It was two greasy, leering middle-aged men.
The hunger in their eyes told Adeline everything in an instant. She spun to leave, but it was already too late.
A choking cloud of aroma filled her lungs, making her vision blur. Her legs turned weak, collapsing beneath her until she fell to the floor.
The two guys, Evan and Rob, looked down at her with undisguised hunger.
They’d seen her on stage before, painted and singing softly, stunningly beautiful, the kind of beauty that drove men mad.
And now, with no makeup, she looked even more ethereal, breathtaking in a way that made their blood boil.
Evan grinned and reached down, seizing her delicate hand.
“Let me go!”
She tried to yank free, but her body was too weak. She couldn’t escape his grip.
Rob bent down with a sly smirk, pinching her chin and shoving a dark pill between her lips.
“Mm-1”
Adeline’s brows knitted in pain as she fought to spit it out
But Rob had done this before. Ifis hold on her jaw was practiced and unyielding, forcing her throat to contract until she swallowed it
Her eyes burned with fury, “What did you give me? Let me go, or I’ll call the police! Even if I die with you, I’ll make sure you pay!”
“Call the police?”
Evan sneered, looking down on her as if she were an ant.
Clearly, he didn’t take Adeline’s threat seriously at all.
“You came running to us, begging to be kept. You only want to call the police now because we didn’t give you the jewels you wanted. You think anyone’s going to believe you? Sweetheart, that pill I just gave you- it’s the good stuff. Cost me a fortune to get it. Tonight you’ll need us, or else… even the hospital won’t save you. You’ll burn up from the inside out. So be a good girl, and we’ll take real good care of you.”
“Animals!”
Adeline trembled with rage, every word of his twisted threat making her sick.
She refused to let these filthy beasts ruin her life. Even if she died tonight, she wouldn’t let their stain mark her body.
“Mom… Mom…”
The door to the suite stood wide open, and from the hallway, Adeline saw Hailey-her mother-standing there, watching.
With the last of her strength, Adeline reached out a hand, begging, “Mom, help me… call the police…”
“Don’t blame me.”
Hailey’s voice was cold, her eyes indifferent. She didn’t take a single step toward her daughter.
“Back home, even a pretty girl like you would only fetch us a few tens of thousands at most. Mr. Evan and Mr. Rob are rich men. For them to take an interest in you is a blessing. Your brother wants to build a future here in the capital, and they promised me that if you serve them well, they’ll give him a brand-new two- bedroom apartment in their latest development. Do you know how much that place is worth? Four, five million. You’re his sister. You have to help him.”
Adeline’s tears spilled freely.
The moment she’d seen those two greasy faces at the hotel entrance, she had suspected her mother’s betrayal. But because she loved Hailey, she’d clung to a shred of hope.
Now that hope was gone.
She had always believed her mother was different from her father, who had treated her as nothing but a commodity, only useful if she could be traded for her brother Taven’s benefit.
She thought Hailey cared. After all, when she’d been sick as a child, her mother had cried at her bedside. Even later, when she had foster parents, Hailey sometimes called to remind her to dress warmly,
But now she saw the truth: they were the same.
To them, Taven-the lazy, useless son-was everything. She, no matter how hard she worked or how much she achieved, was nothing more than a sacrifice for his sake.
Hailey did feel a flicker of discomfort as she watched the tears streaking Adeline’s face. But then she remembered Taven’s threat to starve himself if he didn’t get the apartment, and she pushed the guilt aside.
Her son was the future of their family. She couldn’t let him waste away.
Besides, after seeing the glittering city, she had no intention of returning to their rundown village. With a new apartment in the capital, she could live a life of comfort with her precious son.
Turning away from her daughter’s desperate gaze, she looked nervously at Evan and Rob. “I brought this girl to you like we agreed. You won’t go back on your word about the apartment, right?”
“Relax,” Mr. Evan said with a grin. “As long as she keeps us satisfied, I’ll give your son a fully furnished three-bedroom place.”
Three bedrooms?
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