CHAPTER 3: THE LIMOUSINE CAGE

~MAYA~

My heavy silk train swept behind us like a dying white bird, catching on the concrete floor, but Julian didn't care. He walked with the single-minded focus of a executioner heading to the gallows.

"Julian, wait! Please!"

A frantic voice echoed from the stairwell. It was Evelyn. She was running after us, her high heels clicking frantically against the concrete, her face masked with panic.

Julian stopped dead in his tracks just three feet away from his idling, armored luxury limousine. He didn't turn around to face her. He kept his back to my mother, his broad shoulders casting a terrifying shadow over me in the dim garage lighting.

"Vance Security," Julian barked, his voice cutting through the damp air like a blade.

Instantly, four broad-shouldered men in sleek black suits stepped out from the shadows, blocking Evelyn's path.

"Julian!" my mother screamed, her voice cracking as a guard physically intercepted her. "We need to talk about the registry! The contracts! Julian!"

"The Lin family has fulfilled their half of the bargain by providing a body for the altar," Julian said, his voice terrifyingly calm. He slowly turned his head sideways, exposing a sharp, cold jawline. "Your credit lines will remain open until midnight. Use that time to pray I don't find a reason to erase your family name from this city by morning. Remove her."

"Julian! No! Maya—"

A guard clamped a hand over Evelyn’s mouth, dragging her backward into the stairwell. My heart plummeted into my stomach. She had almost said my real name. She had almost exposed the final shred of my cover in front of his men.

Julian ripped open the heavy, bulletproof door of the limousine and shoved me inside. The sheer force of the push sent me sprawling across the premium leather seats, my heavy tulle train tangling around my legs. Before I could scramble upright, the door slammed shut with a heavy, airtight thud, and the locks engaged with a terrifying electric click.

A second later, the opposite door opened. Julian slid into the spacious, tinted interior. The door clicked shut behind him, plunging the limousine into a soundproof silence.

The car smoothly pulled out of the garage, the dark city lights blurring past the heavily tinted windows.

I scrambled into the furthest corner of the limousine, pressing my back against the door panel, my breath coming in short, ragged gasps.

He looked at me. His eyes were completely devoid of warmth, fixed entirely on the heavy lace veil still covering my face.

"Take it off," he commanded.

My hands shook so violently I could barely lift them. My fingers tangled clumsily in the hairpins securing the heavy headpiece. Seeing my hesitation, Julian lunged across the short distance between us, his frame completely eclipsing mine.

RIP!

He grabbed the edge of the veil and violently tore it off my head. A few strands of my hair ripped along with it, drawing a sharp gasp of pain from my throat.

My real face was completely exposed.

Julian froze. His hand was still raised in the air, his fingers curled into a fist around the remnants of the lace. He stared down at me, his eyes tracing every single feature of my face. He looked at the slight curve of my jaw, the shape of my nose, and finally, his gaze dropped to my left cheekbone.

A dark, purple bruise was blooming beneath my expensive bridal makeup—the mark where my mother had slapped me twenty minutes ago.

"You're not Ayra," he whispered. It wasn't a question. It was a cold realization. He leaned in closer, his face mere inches from mine. "You're the shadow. The twin they kept hidden in the back room while she played the prodigy."

"M-Maya," I choked out, my voice cracking as a single tear escaped my eye, cutting a clean path through the heavy foundation on my cheek. "My name is Maya."

"I don't care what your name is," Julian snarled, his hand suddenly reaching out to wrap securely around my jaw, his thumb pressing directly against the edge of my fresh bruise. I winced in pain, but he didn't let go. He forced me to look directly into his bottomless eyes. "Where is she? Did your family think they could pull a cheap bait-and-switch to secure my grandfather's billions? Where did Ayra run?"

"I don't know!" I cried, my hands automatically coming up to grasp his iron wrist, trying to pull his hand off my jaw. "I swear to you, I don't know! She vanished two hours ago! She left a text message on your server breaking off the engagement! My mother forced me into this dress, Julian! She threatened to cut the life-support funding for my little brother if I didn't walk down that aisle! I had no choice!"

"A text message?" Julian murmured, his thumb slowly tracing the edge of my bruised cheekbone. "Ayra spent ten years clawing her way into my bed. She wouldn't run from a multi-billion-dollar merger over a text message."

He slowly let go of my jaw, pulling a sleek, encrypted smartphone from his pocket. He tapped the screen, his fingers flying across the glass as he accessed the Vance family's private security server.

"Julian, please," I begged, clutching my stomach as a sudden wave of nausea hit me—a strange, fluttering ache deep inside my belly that I had been feeling for the past three days. "Just let me go. Let me take the dress off. I'll get my brother and we will leave the city. You can tell the media the marriage is annulled—"

"Shut up," Julian interrupted coldly, his eyes still fixed on his phone screen.

Suddenly, his movements stopped. Julian stared at the phone, his face turning an unreadable, stony white.

"What is it?" I whispered. "Did they find her?"

He slid the phone across the leather seat, forcing me to look at the screen.

It was a high-end medical laboratory report, dated exactly three days ago. The name printed at the very top of the document in bold, black letters wasn't Ayra Lin.

It was Maya Lin.

And right beneath my name, stamped in bright, undeniable red ink, were the words:

PREGNANCY TEST: POSITIVE. GESTATION: 12 WEEKS.