Chapter 2

ARIA HALE

I didn’t scream. 

I didn’t cry either. 

I lay still, my eyes trained on the ceiling. The sound of the whirring fan and the beeping of machines around me, like they were mocking me. Maybe they were. Maybe everyone was. I was a fool, after all. 

My chest hurt in a way no illness had ever caused before. The pain was sharp and hollow, like something had been taken out of me and I was left, bleeding. It felt like I would die, but I didn’t. 

Once she dies, we inherit everything. 

His voice echoed in my head. I swallowed hard. 

So that was all I was to him. Someone he could benefit from endlessly after a brief period. A long-time investment. 

Did he ever love me? 

My fingers curled into the sheets, nails digging into the fabric because I desperately needed a grounding—an anchor. After all, it felt like I was drowning and I needed something to hold onto. 

My eyes brimmed with fresh tears that were too stubborn to fall. I was nauseous. Angry. Humiliated. Betrayed. 

I should have known. 

Adrian had never looked at me like I was something precious or special. He looked at me like I was something temporary. Something to endure for a while. 

The door creaked open softly. I didn’t turn my head. I was exhausted both from my unending thoughts and my illness.

“Miss Hale?” a nurse called gently. “You’ve been discharged. You’ll be leaving shortly.” 

I nodded once, still staring at nothing but the white fan above me. 

“Your…security will arrive soon”

Security. Of course. 

A bitter laugh bubbled in my chest but I swallowed it back. When the nurse left, I finally pushed myself up from the bed, wincing sharply as pain shot in my ribs. I moved slowly, more carefully, like I would break completely if I rushed in any way. 

I dressed in silence. 

My eyes traveled to my phone that lay face down on the bed. I didn’t touch it. I hadn’t since the night before. 

********

The private hospital wing was quiet as I stepped into the hallway, escorted by a nurse. My legs felt weak, but I was too stubborn to succumb. I refused a wheelchair and any form of help. 

I had lost enough already. I wasn’t sure how much I had left to lose. 

At the end of the corridor, near the glass doors leading out, stood a man. From the back, I could make out his prominent domineering features. 

Tall. Broad-shouldered. Dressed in black. 

At first, I registered him only vaguely, until he turned around to face me. My steps slowed. 

Something about him felt….wrong?

The nurse beside me stopped walking. “There he is,” she told me. “Your bodyguard.” 

My heart skipped once. It was then that he turned fully. And my world tilted. 

Kade Wolfe. 

The air punched out of my lungs so hard I almost tripped over myself. 

No….no way! It can’t…it just can’t be.

It can’t be him. 

But it was. 

The boy I remembered was gone and he was replaced by this stranger with a poker face. His hair was darker and shorter now. His face was harder, like he had seen the other side of the world and had wrestled with it. Like it was a part of him now. His shoulders filled out his suit in a way that made my throat dry. 

But his eyes—God. I knew them so well. I had spent a good part of my life staring deep into them and later, just fantasizing about them. 

Steel-gray. Intense. Attentive. The same eyes that had knelt in front of twelve-year-old me years ago and handed me a bottle of water and a napkin with shaking hands because I couldn’t stop crying.

Now, they watched me. Something flickered in them. Recognition? Shock? But suddenly, it vanished completely. His face settled into something more stoic, more professional.

“Miss Hale,” he said. “I’m Kade Wolfe. I’ll be handling your security from now on.”

My head spun. Miss Hale, not Aria. There was not even a hint of familiarity. Did he not remember who I was? Had he forgotten? My chest tightened. 

“You don’t remember me?” I asked quietly, my voice barely above a whisper. 

His jaw clenched, almost unnoticeable. “I’m sorry. Should I?”

The lie hurt more than I expected it to. I forced a smile. I couldn’t understand the game he was playing, but I was going to play along. 

“No. I guess not.”

The nurse cleared her throat awkwardly and excused herself, leaving both of us standing in the glass corridor. The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable. 

Kade shifted, standing between me and the exit, blocking me from leaving. I raised a brow, “Is this really necessary?”

“Yes,” He replied calmly. “At all times.”

At all times. Of course. 

I stepped past him anyway, forcing him to move. His arm brushed mine just briefly, but enough to send a sharp jolt through me. I inhaled sharply. 

He must have noticed, because his fingers curled into a fist. He avoided my eyes too. 

Outside, a sleek black SUV was parked at the curb. He opened the back door for me. I hesitated briefly, then slid in without a word. 

He shut the door and the next thing, the car began to move. I stared out the window, watching the city blur past as I wondered how my life had unraveled completely in less than twenty-four hours. 

“You shouldn’t have gone to that audition,” Kade said suddenly.

I turned towards him, not quite sure I had heard correctly. My anger was flaring hot and fast. “Excuse me?”

“You collapsed. You could have died.” 

“So I’ve been told,” I snapped at him, “Repeatedly.” I glared at him through the rear-view mirror. 

His gaze hardened. “This isn’t a joke.”

“It’s my life not yours! You were hired to protect me, not control me. Mind your business.” 

A second passed.

“I can’t do one without the other,” he said quietly.

Something about that sentence unnerved me. I crossed my arms, “ You don’t know anything about me.”

His eyes flicked to my face. “I know you’re being targeted.”

My stomach dropped. 

“What?” 

“Your medication was tampered with,” he continued, his voice dropping low. “That wasn’t an accident.”

I stared at him. “So what—you think someone’s trying to kill me?”

“I know someone is.”

The car slowed as the Hale estate gates came into view. Tall. Towering. My heart pounded. I hated it here. Beyond these gates was a cage. One, I would never escape. 

My reflection stared back at me through the tinted glass. I hated how fragile and furious I looked. 

Good. 

Let them come.