Semua Bab Falling For My Ex's Dad: Bab 181 - Bab 190

Gabriel’s POV She was still standing there—fuming, heartbroken, stubborn as ever—and I couldn’t even look at her without feeling like I was splitting in two. This wasn’t how I wanted things to go. I didn’t wake up thinking I’d be the man pushing her into some twisted compromise. I never planned to dangle her dream in front of her like bait just to get her to do my bidding. When she made it clear she didn’t want this—when I saw how much she hated the deal, hated what I was asking—it made everything inside me burn. But I had to. Because love didn’t always look like roses and promises—it looked like sacrifice. Like doing the unthinkable to protect what little we had left. She had no idea what it was costing me to sit there and play the villain. God, I wished she understood. None of this was easy for me. Not one damn second of it. My voice dropped. “How do I tell him that the woman he loves is also the woman I'm in love with? That I’ve already had her?” The disbelief on h

Adrian’s POVCorporate bullshit.That’s what this was.I stared at the screen—project timelines, team performance updates, and task completion rates. None of it made any damn sense. Dad said this would be easy. Just sit in, observe, learn.But the moment I opened my laptop, I knew I was in way over my head.This wasn’t my world.I didn’t want to be here. I wanted to be back in my restaurant—sleeves rolled up, fire beneath the pan, knives gliding clean through ripe tomatoes.That was me.This? This was a cage dressed in fancy walls and giant windows.But I was here because of Dad—and his threat to cut me out of the will.I wasn’t about to let him hand over everything he built to strangers. I was his only blood. His legacy—whether he liked it or not.Still, I couldn’t call his bluff. I knew my father well enough to know he never made empty threats. He’d do it just to prove a point.And maybe—just maybe—there was still a part of me that wanted to make him proud. Wanted to see that look i

Clairessa's POVMy fingers tapped restlessly against the massive boardroom table. The contract lay in front of me—official, overly formal for something that should’ve been a straightforward meeting.I couldn’t understand why Gabriel had chosen the boardroom instead of his office.Everything felt rigid now, like we were strangers negotiating terms—when just weeks ago, we were lovers wrapped in each other’s arms, making love like it meant forever, whispering promises to love each other with every fiber of our being, dreaming aloud about a future we thought was ours.It was all moving too fast for me to process.I’d texted him earlier, letting him know I was ready to sign. Nicole’s lawyer—well, her friend who handled legal stuff—had reviewed the terms. She’d called me back sounding half stunned, half impressed.“This is a solid contract,” she’d said. “Honestly? Almost too good to be true.”There was only one red flag: no end date. The contract didn’t specify how long I was expected to ke

Clairessa’s POV I stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around myself. It was finally the weekend, and I was grateful for the silence—for the chance to just breathe. There was no reason to rush. No alarms. No buzzing phone. No morning meetings. Just stillness. A well-earned pause. I padded to the window and pulled the curtains open slightly, letting in the warm, golden morning light. I shut my eyes and let the sun wash over my skin—just for a moment—as my mind drifted. Three weeks had passed. Maybe a little more. The Randolph Project had consumed everything—days, nights, weekends. Everyone was working overtime just to keep up with the system updates and impossible deadlines. The final presentation was coming up in three weeks. Gabriel’s email had made the stakes clear: “Impress the CEO. No excuses. Failure will have consequences.” I didn’t need to be told twice. I wasn’t about to find out what those consequences looked like. I just wanted it all to be over. Thankfully,

Gabriel – POVI stood in my office, fuming—or at least, that’s what I told myself.But the moment our eyes met, the fire in my chest shifted into something else.Clairessa stood across the desk, arms crossed tightly, her lips pressed into a furious line.She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to.Her silence said everything.And still… I couldn’t concentrate on the anger in her expression—because all I could see was how damn beautiful she looked.Her hair was still damp from the shower, soft strands clinging to her cheeks, framing her face with an effortless kind of beauty that didn’t feel real.I wanted to run my fingers through the tangles, smooth them back, drag the ends across my skin… just to see if they still carried that familiar hint of vanilla.God, I used to love that scent.Sweet. Warm. Hers.Or had she changed it?I couldn’t tell from here, and it pissed me off that I even cared.My eyes dropped before I could stop them.She wore oversized joggers that swallowed her legs, but e