All Chapters of A Story That Doesn’t Belong To You: Chapter 151 - Chapter 160

Being in Adrien’s home felt oddly right The walls the quiet hum of the place it wrapped around him like safety Adrien moved through the room with careful energy as though Ryan were fragile glass And Ryan found he liked it. He liked the way Adrien’s presence steadied him how his voice seemed to anchor him to the here and now.But there was Daniel sitting with his polite smile his eyes sharp despite the words he spoke. Ryan felt the tension like static in the air He remembered their history Daniel had been there through the fog a steady presence even when memories slipped. But his heart freshly mended gravitated to Adrien without hesitation.When Adrien sat beside him their shoulders brushing Ryan leaned into it instinctively. “I’ll be fine here,” Ryan murmured Adrien’s eyes softened. He nodded lips parting like he wanted to say something deeper but he simply squeezed Ryan’s hand under the blanket.Daniel cleared his throat. “I should head out let you two settle in You need rest, Ryan.

My stomach flipped His tone was too loaded, too sharp. He wasn’t just talking about trust. He was talking about himself.I shifted again, creating as much distance as the couch would allow My hands gripped the magazine like a shield. “I trust Adrien,” I said firmly trying to end it there.Daniel’s smirk widened, but there was no humor in it. “Of course you do.”The sound of footsteps echoed in the hall. Relief flooded me like air rushing into drowning lungs. Adrien.Daniel didn’t move He just leaned back, calm and collected, like he hadn’t just been pressing every button he could find.And then Adrien walked in.The first thing I noticed was how tense Ryan looked. His shoulders hunched, his grip on a magazine too tight, eyes darting to me the second I stepped inside like I’d just pulled him from the edge of something.The second thing I noticed was Daniel sitting way too close to him.My jaw tightened.“Everything okay here?” I asked, my voice even, though heat prickled in my chest.R

The call ended abruptly leaving me staring at my own reflection in the dark glass of a storefront My father’s expectations pressed down on me like iron chains but I’d long since learned to carry them.Adrien thought this was about competing for Ryan’s affection He couldn’t be more wrong.This was about dismantling Adrien piece by piece until there was nothing left And Ryan?Ryan was the perfect place to start.Ryan’s POVThe days at Ella’s house had started to fall into a rhythm, though the kind that didn’t feel entirely his own. Wake up to the smell of coffee, hear Ella bustling in the kitchen, see Adrien slipping in sometime midmorning or afternoon depending on his schedule. And then inevitably Daniel would appear always unannounced, always with some excuse for why he happened to be in the neighborhood.It left Ryan feeling suspended between two currents he didn’t fully understand. He liked Adrien’s steady presence, the calm anchor it provided. With Daniel, though… there was a tensi

The night air was heavy sticky almost suffocating as I crouched behind the low wall at the edge of Adrien’s driveway. From here, I had a clear view of his car the sleek black machine he was so damn proud of. A perfect, polished extension of the golden life he seemed to lead, the one I should have had.Adrien didn’t deserve Ryan. He didn’t deserve his laugh his loyalty the softness in his eyes when he looked at him. That softness had once been directed at me. I had tried to bury that truth tried to swallow down the bitterness like poison, but it always came back up burning my throat.And now? Now I was done waiting.I slid the small kit out of my backpack my hands steady despite the adrenaline spiking through my veins. A wrench a cutter a flashlight with a red filter. Nothing flashy, nothing clumsy. I’d learned long ago that accidents looked more natural than outright violence. A brake line severed in the right place, a small tampering with the steering by the time anyone realized it w

The house was quiet the kind of quiet that should have meant peace. Yet Adrien felt none of it Every sound the hum of the refrigerator, the distant ticking of the wall clock even the faint rustle of Ryan turning a page in the book he had been pretending to read pressed against Adrien’s ears like a reminder that silence could also suffocate.He sat on the couch with his laptop open the anonymous text still burned into his thoughts. Watch him carefully Daniel wasn’t acting alone. It had come hours ago and Adrien hadn’t told Ryan. He had stared at the words until they blurred, until he almost convinced himself to delete it. But he couldn’t. The warning felt too sharp too deliberate, and the thought of exposing Ryan to it unsettled him more than holding it back.Across from him Ryan shifted in his seat, pretending to be absorbed in the novel Ella had left on the coffee table. His eyes skimmed over the same paragraph three times. He wasn’t reading Adrien could tell by the absent way Ryan c