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Chapter 77: Liam's Admiration

ผู้เขียน: Evve
last update วันที่เผยแพร่: 2026-01-05 02:10:51

The morning after the livestream, the world looked different from the eighty-first floor of the Cross Empire tower.

Liam Cross stood by the window, his back to the room, a cup of coffee cooling in his hand. The rain had stopped. The sky over Manhattan was a brilliant, piercing blue, the kind of clarity that usually follows a storm.

Below, three blocks away, the siege at the AVA flagship had broken. The paparazzi army had retreated, replaced by a line of customers that wrapped around the block
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  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 430: FINDING EMMA

    The binder was heavy. Cream-colored leather, embossed with the agency’s logo—a stylized lotus flower that looked suspiciously like a corporate merger of nature and commerce.Aurora sat in the high-backed chair, the binder open on her lap. The room was aggressively soothing. Beige walls. White noise machine. A tea service that smelled of chamomile and contracts."Take your time," the agency director, a woman named Mrs. Sterling (no relation, simply the universe repeating its favorite joke), said softly. "It’s a matching process. Like... finding a home."Aurora turned the page.Candidate 412.Age: 24. BMI: 21.Hobbies: Yoga, watercolor painting, organic gardening.She looked perfect on paper. They all did. They were vetted, screened, psychologically profiled, and presented like luxury real estate listings. Good bones. Great light. Move-in ready.Liam sat next to her. He wasn't looking at the binders. He was looking at Aurora. He was checking her structural integrity, watching for the cr

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 429: THE CONVERSATION

    The iPad screen went black, extinguishing Sophia’s radiant, pixelated face.Aurora set the tablet on the limestone railing of the terrace. The silence that followed the video call wasn't empty; it was heavy with the echo of Sophia’s laughter and the image of her hand resting on a six-month bump.Sophia was glowing. She was complaining about heartburn and swollen ankles, but she was glowing with the specific, terrifying bioluminescence of a woman growing a life she had thought she would never have.Aurora looked out at the city. The wind was warm tonight, carrying the scent of late summer rain and hot asphalt.She wrapped her cardigan tighter around herself. Underneath the wool, her stomach was flat. Scarred, yes. Marked by the silver line of the C-section that had brought Hope into the world and nearly taken Aurora out of it. But flat.Empty."She looks good," Liam said.He was sitting on the outdoor sofa, watching her. He had a glass of wine in his hand, the condensation dripping ont

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 428: THE OVERPROTECTOR

    SophiaThe brownstone in Brooklyn was supposed to be a home. Marcus had turned it into a biosphere.Sophia lay on the velvet chaise in the living room, a cashmere throw tucked around her legs with military precision. The thermostat was set to seventy-two degrees. The humidifier hummed in the corner, maintaining a humidity level that Marcus had decided was optimal for placental health.On the low table next to her sat a glass of water (room temperature), a bottle of prenatal vitamins, and a plate of sliced pears arranged in a fan.She shifted her weight. Her hip ached from three weeks of modified bedrest."Don't move," a voice rumbled from the doorway.Marcus walked in. He wasn't wearing his boots. He was wearing socks, moving silently across the restored hardwood floors. He carried a fluffier pillow."I am just shifting, Marcus," Sophia said. "I am not running a marathon.""Dr. Evans said minimize strain," Marcus said. He walked over and lifted her legs—gently, as if they were made of

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 427: THE SCARE

    The blood on the white tile of the bathroom floor looked like a mistake in the design.It was too bright. Too red. A violent, organic splash against the cool, veined marble of the master bath in the Hamptons estate.Sophia stared at it. She was holding a towel to her body, her hands trembling so violently the terry cloth vibrated.Twelve weeks, she thought. The danger zone is supposed to be over.She felt a cramp. Not the gentle flutter of the wedding night. A hard, twisting knot low in her pelvis."No," she whispered.She didn't call Marcus. He was in the city, at a site meeting for the foundation housing project. He was two hours away. If she called him, he would drive like a madman. He would kill himself trying to get to her.She called the only person who knew what it felt like to lose a blueprint before the foundation was poured."Aurora," she choked into the phone. "I'm bleeding."The hospital room in Southampton was small and smelled of iodine.Sophia lay on the gurney. She was

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 426: WEDDING NIGHT

    The silence in the honeymoon suite was heavy, but it wasn't the heaviness of concrete or steel. It was the weight of velvet.The room smelled of the ocean—salt and cold water—mixed with the lingering scent of the beeswax candles that had burned down to nubs on the mantelpiece. The sounds of the reception had faded hours ago, the last car door slamming, the last laugh carried away by the wind.Now, there was only the tide.Sophia stood by the French doors. She hadn't turned on the lights. The moonlight spilled across the floor, turning the hardwood into a sheet of silver.She wore the gold dress. It felt different now. In the garden, it had been a statement. Here, in the quiet, it felt like a wrapping she was ready to shed."You're quiet," Marcus said.He was sitting on the edge of the massive bed. He had taken off his tuxedo jacket, his tie, his shoes. He looked unmoored without his boots, but solid. Always solid."I am listening," Sophia said."To what? The ocean?""To the house," sh

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   CHAPTER 425: THE DANCE

    The reception tent was a canopy of white silk and Edison bulbs, glowing against the deepening indigo of the Hamptons twilight.It smelled of salt air, roasted figs, and the heavy, sweet scent of the peonies Aurora had fought for.Aurora stood at the edge of the dance floor, a crystal glass in her hand. The wine was a vintage Rosé, pale pink and crying with condensation. She ran her thumb over the stem.She hadn't had a drink in eight months. Between the IVF cycles, the two-week waits, and the brief, bright flares of hope that had eventually flickered out, her body had been a temple. A laboratory. A waiting room.Tonight, it was just a body.She took a sip. The wine was cool, tart, and grounding. It tasted like permission."You're hiding," a voice rumbled in her ear.Liam.He stepped up beside her, sliding his arm around her waist. He had shed his tuxedo jacket, his white shirt glowing in the ambient light, cuffs rolled up to reveal his forearms. He smelled of sea breeze and the expens

  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   Chapter 40: New York Skyline

    The thud of the landing gear was a physical blow.It was a violent, mechanical slam, a punctuation mark at the end of her seven-hour truce with the sky. The void was gone. The dark, pressurized, anonymous cabin was no longer a shield.They were here.Aurora’s eyes, which had been closed, snapped op

    last updateปรับปรุงล่าสุด : 2026-03-19
  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   Chapter 39: The Flight Home

    The sterile, white-on-white expanse of the Air France First Class lounge was a different kind of prison.Five years ago, she had arrived at Charles de Gaulle as a ghost, a refugee in a cheap, gray hoodie, her face hidden, her name a lie.Today, she was leaving as "Madame Ariane Rousseau," a myth.S

    last updateปรับปรุงล่าสุด : 2026-03-19
  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   Chapter 20: Paris Rain

    The thud of the landing gear on the tarmac at Charles de Gaulle was a physical blow.Aurora’s eyes, dry and burning from a sleepless, seven-hour flight, snapped open. She had not slept. She had existed in a pressurized metal tube, a ghost at 30,000 feet, her hand pressed flat against her stomach as

    last updateปรับปรุงล่าสุด : 2026-03-18
  • Runaway Heiress: The Billionaire’s Forgotten Bride   Chapter 21: The Art of Survival

    The "art of survival" was not a masterpiece. It was a daily, brutalist sketch.It was the 5 AM alarm on her burner phone, a jarring, digital sound that ripped her from a few hours of shallow, restless sleep on the lumpy attic mattress.It was the wave of acidic, sour nausea that greeted her before

    last updateปรับปรุงล่าสุด : 2026-03-18
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