공유

Chapter 77

작가: Khogie
last update 최신 업데이트: 2025-12-29 17:16:11

The kiss ended as soon as it started, the atmosphere was immediately awkward and I felt a twinge of regret.

“Hails..” His voice was raspy.

I couldn’t bring myself to look him in the eye, I didn’t want to see the emotions that he had never made any effort to conceal.

I cleared my throat. “Take me home Dorian”.

Silence.

“Look at me Hailey.” He whispered.

“Please don’t” I whispered back. My cheeks burned from shame that I had kissed him, after everything I’ve shared with Santino. “Take me home” my voice was steady though I felt opposite inside.

I could practically feel his stare boring holes into the side of my face, I turned my face to the window as he started driving .

The air in my father’s study is cold. It has been a week since we put Ethan Carter in the ground, but in this room, his presence is still a heavy, suffocating weight. I sit in the oversized velvet chair across from the mahogany desk where he used to sit and play God with people's lives.

Beside me, my mother is a statu
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  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 86

    (End of flashback) Hailey’s POV For two weeks, I sat by Santino’s side, breathing in the smell of bleach and listening to the rhythmic hiss-click of the ventilator. Every time I looked up, I met the watchful, resentful eyes of his mother. She didn't trust me. She shouldn't.Finally, I can’t take the suffocating air anymore. I need to handle my own business.I drive my matte-black Lamborghini out of the hospital parking lot. The engine roars, a powerful beast beneath me. I leave the polished streets of the rich behind, watching the tall, glass skyscrapers fade into the distance. The scenery changes quickly. The buildings get shorter, the walls are covered in jagged graffiti, and the streets are littered with trash and broken glass. This is the rougher, more dangerous part of New York City the parts people like the Backwoods and Carters pretend don't exist.I pull the car to a stop behind a greasy, run-down restaurant. The Lamborghini looks like a diamond in a coal mine. It draws eyes

  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 85

    (FLASHBACK TWO)The memory flickers to life to the day my father told me about the arranged union with santino, bathed in the garish, over-bright light of my father’s dining room. Even then, I hated that chandelier. It had hundreds of glass pieces that made everything shine with a fake, aggressive brilliance. My father liked it that way. He thought light showed power, but I knew better. Light just makes it easier to see the cracks in the foundation.I sat at the far end of the mahogany table, my hands folded neatly in my lap. To anyone watching, I was a girl drowning in the heavy air of a house that wasn't hers. My stomach felt tight, but not from fear. It was the sharp, cold tingle of a hunter waiting for the trap to spring.I had been leading them all like dogs on a leash for months. I was the one who whispered to the right people about the Blackwood fortune. I had planned every little detail thoroughly, making sure my father felt "backed into a corner" so he would reach for the onl

  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 84

    (FLASHBACK ONE)The memory does not come to me in pieces; it hits me all at once, like a wave of ice water that freezes my blood. As I sit in the dimly lit hospital room, watching the green line of Santino’s heart monitor. I am twelve again, a small girl with long pigtails and a heart full of confusion.It was the summer the world turned grey. A week before that day, my brother Matteo had left for "work" with my father. I remember watching them walk to the car. Matteo looked different that morning. Usually, he was full of light, but his shoulders were slumped, and his eyes were red. I tried endlessly the previous day to cheer him up but nothing worked.I instantly disliked his friend that had hurt him. I didn't understand the complexities of the adult world then, but I hated seeing him hurt. I had spent the entire day thinking of creative ways to cheer him up drawing pictures of the garden and hiding his favorite chocolates under his pillow.But Matteo didn't come back.For seven day

  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 83

    I finish splashing the freezing water on my face and take a deep breath, trying to steady my racing heart. The threat from Santino’s mother still rings in my ears like a physical blow. When I finally unlock the bathroom door and step back into the hospital suite.The cold, lethal woman from five minutes ago is gone. In her place sits the warm, smiling woman I thought I knew. She looks up at me with such kindness it makes my skin crawl."Hailey, dear, you look so tired," she says, her voice as sweet as honey. She reaches out and pats the air toward me. "Go down to the cafeteria and get something to eat. You must think of the little one. It isn't good for the child's health if you starve yourself. Please, for me?"I stare at her, forced to offer a tight, fake smile. You are absolutely crazy, I scream inside my head. One minute she is promising to bury me and my "bastard" child, and the next she is worried about my nutrition. You two-faced old hag, I think, my eyes narrowing just enough

  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 82

    The fluorescent lights of the VIP intensive care suite hum with a cold, clinical indifference. Inside the room, the air is thick with the scent of ozone and expensive antiseptic. Santino lies in the center of the bed, a landscape of pale skin and shadows. I stand at the foot of the bed, my breath hitching in my throat. I stare at his face, his handsome, sculpted features are now as still as a statue’s. The only sign of life is the rhythmic, mechanical rise and fall of his chest, forced by the ventilator that hisses beside him. Whoosh. Click. Whoosh.I reach out a trembling hand, my fingers inching toward his arm, but I stop just before touching him. The sight of the tubes and wires snaking across his body makes my stomach turn. My fingers shake violently as they land on the sterile white sheet beside him, clutching the empty space instead of his skin. Suddenly, my mind flashes with the image of Lila’s twisted, manic face. In an instant, the grief I’m feeling is replaced by a frost so

  • The Billionaire's Rebellious Bride   Chapter 81

    Everything happened in a terrifying, jagged blur. Before I could even gasp, Santino’s massive frame lunged toward me. He used his entire weight to shove me out of the line of fire, his hands rough with the urgency of saving my life. I hit the floor hard, the wind knocked out of me. I curled into a ball, shielding my head and my stomach as the room erupted into madness. I heard the screech of heavy chairs against the wood and a piercing scream from my mother but I couldn’t look away from the center of the room.I looked at the floor, and my breath stopped. The white tiles, which had been polished to a mirror shine, were disappearing under a pool of deep, dark crimson. It looked like a nightmare had bled into reality.Santino was down. The blood was soaking through his crisp white shirt with a speed that made my head spin, turning the fabric into a heavy, wet shroud. His handsome face was losing its color, turning a terrifying shade of ash. Even as his strength failed him, his dark eyes

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