HER "ROMANCE IN THE LAB"
READING AGE 18+
Maxine Medina, 23, has always lived her life with discipline and quiet determination. A working student taking up Nursing, she juggles hospital duties, late-night studying, and endless shifts,anything to survive and finish her degree. But when she lands a job under Mike Urdanzo, the powerful, manipulative CEO of a private medical corporation, her life begins to spiral into a dangerous kind of dependency.
Mike gives her everything she once believed she could only dream of: financial stability, tuition, protection, and a future she desperately wants.But in exchange, she becomes trapped in a twisted relationship built on control, desire, and unspoken threats. Every rule he gives is a chain. Every act of “care” is a leash she cannot slip off. And Maxine obeys, because if she doesn’t, she loses everything she has worked for.
But when Alden Reyes, her childhood best friend, returns into her life, he immediately senses the darkness surrounding her. Protective, stubborn, and secretly in love with her for years, Alden refuses to let Max drown in the hands of a man he knows is dangerous. He wants her safe. He wants her free. He wants her, to choose herself, or maybe… choose him.
Caught between the man who chains her and the man who tries to save her, Maxine must finally face a decision she has avoided for too long:
Will she continue living under Mike’s rules to survive?
Or will she break free, even if it means abandoning her studies, her future, and everything she sacrificed for?
In the end, only Maxine can decide whose world she will live in… and whose heart she will risk.
Unfold
Maxine closed her book slowly, staring blankly at the ceiling as her chest tightened.
Six months. Not a single text. Not a single call.
Not even a cold congratulation from him. And she hated how much she wanted one. How much she wanted him.
Tonight, something inside her finally snapped, not out of weakn……
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