Lahat ng Kabanata ng A Love Forged In Ruins : Kabanata 41 - Kabanata 50

Layla's pov I could feel the air getting thicker every day at Blackwood Enterprises. Tension clung to the walls like smoke, wrapping itself around every conversation, every sideways glance, every late-night whisper that never quite reached the surface. It wasn’t just the weight of Isabel’s attacks anymore—it was Damian. He was changing.Not in obvious ways. It was subtle at first—the way his jaw clenched tighter with each passing hour, the way his once-playful smirks became rare and brittle. His replies grew shorter. His presence colder. He stayed longer at the office, sometimes not coming home until dawn, sometimes not at all. Something inside him was unraveling, thread by thread.One night, I found him in his office, bathed in the low glow of a desk lamp, surrounded by piles of documents, contracts, and spreadsheets. His eyes were bloodshot, the shadows beneath them deep and hollow.“Damian, you haven’t slept,” I said quietly, leaning against the doorframe. “Come to bed. Please.”H

Layla’s POV The air felt heavy around Blackwood Enterprises, pressing down on me like a suffocating blanket. Even the glass windows seemed to distort the city skyline, bending light in a way that made everything look twisted and unreal. I stood by the door to Damian’s office, watching him as he leaned against the window frame, his head bowed. His profile was sharp in the waning sunlight, every line of his face carved with tension. I wanted to go to him, to hold him, but I hesitated, afraid that even the smallest touch might shatter what little control he had left. “Damian,” I said softly, my voice barely above a whisper. He turned slowly, his eyes dark and distant. They were usually so full of light when he looked at me, but now they were clouded, like the city beyond the glass. “She’s using everything she’s got,” he said, his tone flat, as if all the air had left his lungs. My heart twisted. I crossed the room, my heels clicking against the marble floor, each step sounding like a

Layla’s POVThe plan was risky. Dangerous. But it was the only option we had left.Damian and I had spent the entire night in his office, surrounded by files, laptops, coffee cups, and the steady hum of the city outside. Sleep had long since abandoned us. I sat on the floor with documents spread around me while Damian paced near the window, his jaw clenched, his mind spinning like a storm.“We have to get this right,” he said, for the third time that hour.“We will,” I replied, keeping my voice calm, though my heart was racing. “We know how they think. That’s our advantage.”He stopped and looked at me, the dim light catching the worry in his eyes. “Isabel is cunning. She’ll smell a trap if we make even one wrong move.”“And Alexander is a coward,” I added, meeting his gaze. “He talks tough, but he cracks under pressure. We just have to make him sweat.”A flicker of hope crossed Damian’s face. He came to sit beside me, his hand brushing against mine. His touch was warm, grounding me.

Layla's pov The paper in Damian’s hand was just that—a single, ordinary sheet of legal print. Cold. Simple. Straight to the point.But it changed everything.He stared at it in silence, standing in the middle of the living room, one hand in his pocket, the other holding the signed and stamped restraining order. I watched him from across the room, my heart heavy and hopeful at the same time.He didn’t speak for a long time.I didn’t rush him.I knew what that paper meant to him.“It’s done,” he finally said, his voice low and tired. “They can’t come near us again. Neither of them can.”Alexander and Isabel—. Two names that used to carry so much weight. Two names that had haunted Damian for a long time. But now, the legal system has placed a wall between them.And maybe, just maybe, that wall would give us the chance to breathe again.I stood and walked over to him. “How do you feel?”He let out a slow breath and looked down at the paper again. “Like I should feel free.”“But you don’t

Layla’s POVThey say healing isn’t a straight line.They were right.Some days I woke up feeling light, like I could breathe again, like the weight of betrayal and anger had finally lifted. Other days, it came back—quiet and heavy, settling in my chest like fog.But every morning when I opened my eyes and saw Damian beside me, I reminded myself: we survived. That had to mean something.Today, though, we were rebuilding—not just our lives, but us. The version of ourselves that had been chipped away by pain and pride.We sat across from each other at the long table in his office, stacks of paper between us. But it wasn’t about legal documents or contracts anymore. This time, we were building something together—a new business venture, something honest and clean.And personal.“I was thinking we could name it after your grandmother,” Damian said, flipping through design proposals. “Didn’t you say she taught you how to sew?”My chest warmed. “You remember that?”He looked up. “I remember e