Hinovel
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Stranded: The Billionaire Biker And The Chef Next Door
Summary
"Say my name," he whispered hoarsely, his lips at my ear. "I don't even know your name," I gasped between moans. He pulled back just enough to meet my eyes. "Good." He thrust harder. "Then remember me like this." ******* That stranger should've stayed a memory. But fate had other plans. I came to New York to disappear.....to outrun the night I killed my abusive father to save my mother. To start over without looking back. Then I had one reckless night with a man who made me forget everything. Dominic Hayes—billionaire heir, devastatingly dangerous, and impossible to forget. I thought I'd never see him again. I was wrong. Just when I'm trying to rebuild my life, Ethan Lennox reappears. My childhood best friend. My first love. The only person who knew me before—and the one man who could unravel everything I've been hiding. Now I'm caught between the man who makes me feel alive and the man who makes me feel safe.
Prologue
I knew I could never go back to the life I had left behind.
The night it all ended is still carved into my memory like a scar. I came home to the sound of my mother’s screams, sharp and broken, echoing down the hall. My stomach dropped as I rushed inside, and there he was….my father, that monster towering over her, his fists landing again and again on her fragile body.
“Stop it!” I screamed, throwing myself at him, clawing at his arm. I sank my teeth into his skin so hard I tasted blood, but he only roared, flinging me off like I was nothing.
My back hit the floor. Pain shot through me. I curled, clutching my stomach, fighting for breath as his shadow loomed over me.
My hand found the counter. I used it to push myself up, rage blinding my fear. My fingers brushed against cold steel. Without thinking, I grabbed the knife from the rack and wrapped my hand around it.
He turned just as I lunged. The blade sank into his stomach with a sickening sound, and his eyes bulged wide in shock. That guttural groan, that strangled noise he made, was the kind of sound villains made in movies when they realized it was the end.
I let go instantly, my chest heaving, and the knife clattered to the floor. My legs buckled, and I collapsed with it, my body folding into a squat as sobs tore out of me.
“Olivia…”
My mother crawled across the floor, her face battered and her lips trembling. She grabbed my hands, both of them slick with my father’s blood, and held them tight as tears spilled down her cheeks.
“You have to go,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “Run, Olivia. Don’t ever look back.”
“No! Mum, we can go together,” I cried, shaking my head violently. “We can leave, we’re free now, please…”
Her grip only tightened, desperate. “No. If you stay, you’ll ruin your life. This is your chance. Take it. Forget me. Forget everything. Just run.”
“Mum, no,” I said, bending my head down and shaking it slowly. “We’re free now and we can go wherever we want. I can’t leave you here alone.”
“My sweet girl,” she said, tucking my hair behind my ear, her tears falling .
“We’ll both become criminals if we go together and your life will be destroyed. Let me handle things here. This is my burden, not yours.”
I cried louder, my chest splitting with it.
My mother’s tears mixed with mine as she pressed my bloody hands to her chest, begging me with everything she had left.
And in that moment, I knew. My life here was over. The Olivia they knew would die tonight.
So I ran.
I didn’t know where I was running to, but I didn’t look back.
I ran until the screams, the blood, the smell of violence…. all of it, was nothing but an echo.