Contract Marriage: The Heiress Returns のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 11 - チャプター 20

The door slowly cracked open.Lisa's head was bowed, and her arms were clutched tightly to herself, trying to steady her shaking body. The shadow moved closer, silent and deliberate, and her heart leapt into her throat.A sudden weight on her shoulder made her jolt, her breath catching in panic.She raised her head – and froze.It was Joseph.Relief and emotion crashed over her all at once.Without thinking, she flung her arms around him, hugging him like she could never let go. Tears streamed down her face, and her body shook uncontrollably.Joseph froze at first, stunned by the rawness of her emotion, his heart tightening painfully. Slowly, almost instinctively, his hands rose, wrapping around her trembling body, holding her as if he could shield her from every danger in the world."It's just me, Lisa", he whispered, his voice low and steady, each word a lifeline. "It's just me".Her body melted into his embrace, every shiver of fear easing under his touch.When he finally lifted her

Lisa's pulse hammered in her ears. The small black device lay scattered across her desk, its tiny red lights blinking like mocking eyes. Every one of them was a reminder – she had been watched. Listened to. Hunted.Joseph loomed over the pile, his jaw tight, his eyes like sharpened steel. His silence was worse than shouting. When he finally spoke, his voice was low, lethal. "Tell me, Lisa. How long have they been inside your life without you noticing?"Her throat constricted. "– I don't know", she whispered, her voice trembling. "I didn't – ""You didn't know?" His tone cracked like a whip, making her flinch. He strides precisely, predatorily. "First, you keep things from me. Now I find your office crawling with surveillance. And you expect me to believe you noticed nothing?"Lisa's breath hitched. Shame and fear twisted in her stomach. "Joseph, I wasn't trying to hide anything. I just… I thought it was nothing. I didn't want to make things worse."Worse?" His eyes burned into hers, un

Lisa walked into her suite the next morning at the office with a quiet determination. The board had been restless for weeks, investors demanding updates, and she was ready to steady the ship—or so she thought.Her assistant set a heavy stack of reports on her desk. "The latest numbers, ma'ma. From finance".Lisa nodded, dismissing her with a polite smile, and sat down to work. She flipped open the first file, scanning – then frowned. The figures were…off.Revenue had taken a sharp dive. Whole projects bled money at impossible rates. Expenses ballooned in departments that hadn't needed funding in months.Lisa leaned closer, her pen tapping against the margin. This doesn't make sense.At first, she thought it was carelessness. Someone in accounting cutting corners, maybe a late – night error that had snowballed into disaster. "Sloppy work", she muttered."I'll have to clean it myself".But as she turned page after page, her pulse began to quicken. The errors weren't random. They were de

Morning light streamed across the skyline like liquid fire, catching on the glass towers that loomed around the Corporation. To the rest of the city, it was another bright day in the financial district, polished shoes, briefcases, and reporters gathering like hawks near the revolving doors. But for Lisa, it was the sound of her world cracking, one leak at a time.Her office smelled of ink and paper, the remnants of sleepless nights spent poring over reports. She stood stiffly behind her desk, holding a folded newspaper with trembling hands. Her jaw clenched as she read the headline again, each word sharper than a blade.“ Empire Bleeding: CEO’s Carelessness Risks Millions.”“No,” she whispered, as though denial could rewrite the ink. “No, this isn’t true. This isn’t….”Her eyes scanned the numbers on the leaked report reprinted beneath the headline. False, all of it. The projections had been twisted, the context cut out. She knew the original figures; she’d signed off the reports hers

The press releases for the upcoming annual gala stacked higher than the files on Lisa’s already cluttered desk. The gala was supposed to be a showcase of triumph, a night to reaffirm the company’s legacy under her leadership. Instead, it felt like a battlefield being polished for her public execution.Whispers followed her wherever she walked, she caught fragments of the gossip in the breakroom, in elevators, even in the corridors outside the boardroom. Dane’s coming, he’s going to make his move. She won’t last the night after this, she didn't know what to do if this turns out to be true.The thought of seeing her ex husband left a huge knot in her stomach. Lisa huffed as she thought about it, he had made himself quite popular in ruining her name and now he tends to follow her to the one gala that could save her company's reputation.What an Idiot! She hated his guts.And she tried not to allow any of the whispers to affect her, she totally ignored them with every ounce of strength s