CHAPTER 4

​I uncapped the sleek black pen, my fingers trembling slightly as I pressed the nib to the bottom of the final page.

​Aria Sterling Vance.

​The moment the ink dried, Killian tapped his phone screen once. The red countdown vanished, replaced by a green confirmation pop-up: TRANSFER COMPLETE — $2,000,000 SENT TO ST. JUDE MEDICAL CENTER.

​A flood of relief washed over me, heavy enough to make my shoulders sag. Toby was safe. His operations were covered for the next year.

​Killian’s hand slid from my waist to my chin, tilting my head back until my eyes met his dark, unreadable gaze. “You belong to me now, Aria. Remember that every second you breathe in this house.”

​I woke up the next morning alone in the massive king-sized bed, the plush silk sheets cold where Killian had slept beside me.

​My body still ached with a deep, thrumming heat from the previous night—a constant physical reminder of his hands, his mouth, and the brutal authority he claimed over every inch of me. But as I pulled myself up against the headboard, my mind cleared, sharpening into tactical focus.

​I reached for the heavy silk robe at the foot of the bed and stepped out into the quiet penthouse suite. Through the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, the city sprawled below like an empire built on glass and concrete.

​Two armed guards stood silently by the elevator in the main foyer. Killian had locked me in his gilded cage, just as promised.

​What he didn't know was that my brain was a weapon no security guard could search.

​I walked into the opulent walk-in dressing room, stepping past racks of designer clothes Killian had ordered for his new trophy wife. I approached the mirrored vanity table at the back of the room, sat down, and reached beneath the soft velvet lining of the lower drawer.

​My fingers pressed a concealed release catch. A thin panel popped open, revealing a ultra-compact, modified satellite laptop and an encrypted drive—devices I had smuggled in under the lining of my bridal train yesterday.

​I booted up the system, watching lines of green code cascade down the dark screen.

​Ghost-X online.

​Within seconds, I bypassed Killian’s internal Wi-Fi network entirely, routing my connection through seven bouncing proxy nodes across Asia and Eastern Europe. My target wasn't Vance Enterprises' front-end accounts; it was the shadowy sub-network tied to Marcus Vance, Killian’s uncle.

​If I wanted to buy my complete freedom and protect Toby forever, I needed to unearth the hidden ledger—the one that proved who really orchestrated the ruin of the Sterling family years ago.

​For two hours, my fingers flew across the silent keys, dismantling firewalls and mapping out hidden offshore slush funds. The data bloomed across my screen: millions moving through shell companies in Panama and Zurich.

​Suddenly, the silent security indicator in the corner of my screen flashed yellow.

​A hardwired pressure sensor on the private elevator down in the garage had just tripped.

​Killian was back. Three hours early.

​My blood ran cold.

​I hit the emergency wipe macro instantly. The laptop screen went pitch black as the drive dismounted and purged its temporary cache. I slammed the compact laptop shut, slid it into the hidden compartment beneath the velvet drawer, and snapped the wooden panel back into place.

​I grabbed a bottle of perfume from the vanity counter, spraying a light mist over my neck just as the heavy oak door of the dressing room swung open.

​Killian stood in the doorway.

​His suit jacket was off, his tie loosened at his throat, and his dark eyes swept over the room with slow, terrifying precision. The sheer weight of his presence seemed to contract the space between us, making the air instantly heavy.

​“You’re home early,” I said, forcing my voice to drop into a soft, docile tone as I set the perfume bottle down.

​Killian didn't answer right away. He walked into the dressing room, his slow, heavy footfalls echoing softly against the marble floor. He didn't look at my face. His eyes were fixed entirely on the vanity table.

​He stopped directly behind my chair, hovering over me so close I could feel the heat radiating off his chest.

​Slowly, Killian reached out over my shoulder. His long fingers reached for the base of the vanity mirror, right above the hidden compartment lining where my encrypted drive was stowed.

​My heart hammered so violently against my ribs I was certain he could hear it.

​Killian’s hand slid under the velvet cushion edge—and pulled out a thick, heavy cream envelope stamped with a gold wax seal.

​He dropped the envelope onto the glass tabletop in front of me, his dark eyes meeting mine in the mirror.

​“Get dressed, wife,” Killian rasped softly against my ear. “We have an invitation to your worst nightmare.”