Chapter 2

“What did you say? We’re getting married?”

Aria’s question hung in the quiet hospital corridor beneath the cold glow of the fluorescent lights. Her voice trembled, weighed down by a mixture of confusion and mounting disappointment.

Lucas looked at her without the slightest hint of regret. His jaw remained clenched, his dark eyes radiating anger hidden behind a mask of cold calculation. He reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a thick document bound in a black cover, already prepared as though he had anticipated this very moment.

“You heard what my mother said yourself,” Lucas replied, his voice cutting sharply through the silence. “She thinks you’re the one who can save my life. She believes my life will be ruined if I don’t break free from my girlfriend, and somehow, you’ve become the solution. But we both know the truth. You were nothing more than a pawn in that dining room earlier. So let’s make this a fair business arrangement. One that benefits both of us.”

Lucas pressed the document against Aria’s chest.

“A two-year marriage contract. No emotional involvement, no actual married life. After two years, we get divorced. You get ten million dollars, and I get my freedom back, along with Sterling Group.”

Aria stared at the papers in disbelief. A surge of outrage burned through her chest. The man standing before her truly believed everything could be bought with money, including her dignity.

“Take your money and go to hell, Lucas,” Aria hissed, taking a step back. She straightened her posture and stared directly into his eyes. “I just rejected this ridiculous idea in front of your parents, and I’m not going to change my decision just because you shoved a piece of paper worth millions of dollars in front of me. I have my dignity. I’m not something you can rent for two years!”

Lucas gave her a cynical smile, a cold, humorless laugh escaping his lips.

“Dignity? Don’t act as though you don’t need money, Aria. You’ve lived under my family’s roof for years. Do you think I don’t know who you are?”

“I never asked for your family’s pity!” Aria shot back, her breathing quickening. “And I’m not going to start now. Find another woman for your cheap little charade!”

Aria turned, intending to walk away from the suffocating cold of the corridor. But she stopped when the phone inside her bag began vibrating violently.

With slightly trembling hands, she reached into her bag and saw the name of a debt collector appear on her screen, followed by an email notification from her university.

Aria stared at her phone, and suddenly, it felt as though the world had stopped turning.

An email from the dean of the architecture department had just arrived. Her application for funding for the International Young Designers Exhibition had officially been rejected due to the lack of a major sponsor.

The exhibition was Aria’s only chance to attract investors and establish her own architecture firm, the greatest dream she had built with blood, sweat, and tears in order to step out from beneath the Sterling family’s shadow. Without the exhibition, her dream of starting her own firm would be destroyed before it even had a chance to begin.

At the same time, a text message from the bank reminded her that the final installment of her late father’s debt was due.

The secret debt she had carried alone for years without ever burdening Mr. and Mrs. Sterling had finally reached its deadline. If she failed to pay it off this month, her father’s name would be disgraced and the small amount of remaining property would be seized.

Aria gripped her phone tightly. Her chest tightened.

She wanted to refuse. A marriage to Lucas was the last thing she had ever wanted in her life. But when she looked at the figure and terms written in the contract in Lucas’s hand, her mind immediately went to her father’s outstanding debt, the funding for the architecture exhibition that was on the verge of falling through, and her dream of building her own firm.

All this time, she had refused financial help from the Sterling family because she did not want to become dependent on them or be seen as a parasite. If she accepted this contract, all of those problems could be resolved professionally through a written agreement, without having to ask anyone for pity ever again.

It was not the ten million dollars she wanted.

This contract was simply the only remaining way out, the one path that could finally allow her to stand on her own two feet.

Two years.

Just two years.

After that, she would pay off every burden from her past and have a life that belonged entirely to her.

Aria slowly turned back. She looked at Lucas, who was still standing rigidly in place, watching the change in her expression.

“Give me the pen,” Aria said.

Her voice no longer trembled. It was cold, flat, and filled with unwavering determination.

Lucas raised an eyebrow, slightly surprised by Aria’s sudden change in attitude, before a victorious smirk returned to his face. He pulled a gold-tipped pen from the inside pocket of his suit and handed it to her.

Aria took the pen, placed the document on an empty nurse’s station, and signed it without the slightest hesitation.

“There’s one thing you need to remember, Lucas Sterling,” Aria said as she tossed the pen and document back against his chest. “I’m not signing this for your money, and I’m not doing this for you. This is a business transaction. When these two years are over, we’ll be two strangers.”

Lucas straightened the documents in his hands, looking at Aria with the same dismissive expression he had worn before.

“Call it whatever excuse you need to cover up your greed, Aria. What matters is that this charade begins tomorrow.”

Aria did not respond.

She turned and walked away down the hospital corridor, letting the sound of her footsteps echo through the silence of the night.

In her heart, Aria whispered to herself with unwavering conviction.

She only had to survive for two years.

But Aria had no idea that stepping into Lucas Sterling’s life was not something that could be resolved simply by counting down the days.

To be continued