The Hourglass Heart
By @john1208
I am Irena Nowakova, CEO of Aethelframe, and I live by one rule: control everything. When my brother, Ludwik, is killed in a suspicious 'accident', that control shatters. His final act was to name me guardian to his five-year-old daughter, Zoya - a variable I cannot afford. To maintain my grip on the company and hunt for Ludwik’s killer among the vipers on my board, I hire her teacher, Dariusz Pawlak, as a live-in tutor. He is everything I am not: warm, patient, and infuriatingly kind. He sees the cracks in my armor, and his quiet defense of me in a world of corporate sharks is a novel, disarming sensation. While my brother’s AI construct, the ‘Echo’, helps me navigate the investigation, Dariusz and Zoya are thawing a part of me I thought long dead. But Ludwik's secrets run deeper than corporate espionage. Hidden within the Echo is a final protocol I never knew existed, one that has already begun its countdown. What happens when the woman who controls everything discovers her own time is the one thing she can't manage?
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The Quiet Art of Ruin
By @john1208
It started with a shattered espresso cup. By noon, Rixa Corthell’s life's work had been stolen by the very tech conglomerate she bled for. Burned-out, deeply depressed, and running on pure spite, she flees to Oskra Farm - a quiet, remote countryside estate - to lick her wounds and engineer a flawless, cold-blooded revenge. She has no time for the idyllic scenery, the chaotic teenage farmhand Paxen, or Toris, the wandering traveler who spends his days capturing the valley through the lens of a vintage camera. Yet, Toris’s quiet presence chips away at Rixa's proud, prickly armor. They form a silent, bittersweet routine: she maps out corporate sabotage in a sunlit barn, and he photographs the dust motes around her. But neither speaks of the future, and nobody mentions the cruel time limit ticking down behind Toris's camera lens. He is capturing the world before an aggressive optical condition steals his sight forever. When Rixa finally returns to the city to execute her ruthless vengeance, the victory feels hollow. If she returns to the farm a year later, will the photographer who never asked her to stay still be waiting in the dark?
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A Recipe for Forgetting You
By @john1208
Jarek Novak is a man without a past, armed only with a cheerful smile, a cheeky attitude, and a talent for making the perfect cup of coffee. His life is simple until he meets Dr. Stasya Borislav, a surgical prodigy whose brilliance is matched only by the chilling frost in her eyes. Stasya is infamous at Varsov General Hospital for her cold demeanor, but Jarek sees the flicker of pain she hides from the world. Compelled by an instinct he can't explain, he makes it his mission to crack her icy shell, one meticulously crafted meal at a time. But as Stasya slowly thaws under his relentless warmth, fragments of a forgotten life begin to surface in Jarek's mind: a shared history, a desperate promise, and a devastating choice. He realizes his connection to her isn't a coincidence, but a carefully constructed plan. Can Jarek unravel the truth of the past he willingly erased before the cure he offers her becomes his own personal tragedy?
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The Unwitting Starlet
By @john1208
I just wanted to act. When I struck a deal with the notoriously demanding director, Bastian Vieri, to be the understudy for his magnum opus, I knew the rules: keep my head down and survive his grueling studio tests. I just didn't expect the 'tests' to be this intense. My meticulously annotated script goes missing? A brilliant exercise in raw improvisation! My bespoke silk gown shredded? An invitation to portray unvarnished, tragic poverty! What I don't know is that the glamorous lead actress, Zita, isn't helping me train. She is secretly bound to a sinister mechanism that demands she steal my most cherished possessions to harvest my despair. Too bad for her, I am far too stubbornly optimistic to ever give up. Every time Zita tries to ruin my life, I wholeheartedly embrace the 'challenge,' accidentally stealing the spotlight, sparking fashion trends, and slowly winning Bastian's guarded heart. But as my bittersweet, unspoken love for him deepens, Zita's supernatural ticking clock grows louder. Will I ever realize my eccentric method-acting training is actually a desperate sabotage attempt before the final curtain falls?
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