All Chapters of Protecting the Billionaire’s Daughter: Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

The silence upstairs was the first warning.Lisa had been banging on the door nonstop for nearly twenty minutes-screaming, cursing, clawing at the wood like an animal. And then suddenly... nothing.Not a sound.Not even her breathing.I stood at the bottom of the staircase, frozen, one hand still clutching the railing. Damon was behind me, his chest rising and falling carefully as he watched the ceiling like he expected it to crack open."She stopped," I whispered."I know," he said. "That's not good."Of course it wasn't. Lisa quiet was a thousand times more dangerous than Lisa furious. When she screamed, we knew where she was, what she was feeling, what she was planning.Silence meant she'd started thinking.Plotting.Calculating her next move.I swallowed, forcing myself to turn away from the stairs. We had more urgent problems downstairs.Lina swallowed hard. "You don't understand. Lisa has always been... strategic. She doesn't break things when she's angry. She breaks people."A

The pain cut through me like fire, sharper than anything I had ever felt. Not just the bullet—it was everything. Betrayal. Rage. Loss. And yet, even in that moment, my chest heaved with a scream I couldn’t hold back.“Why me? Why me, always me, why do I always have to be shot?” I wailed, the words tearing themselves from my throat, raw and uncontrollable. “Why can’t he—why can’t my father just see me happy?! Why does it always have to be me?”“My own father…” I choked, fists shaking. “He shot me. ME, Damon. Me. His daughter. His pregnant daughter. What did I ever do to deserve him as a father?Damon was instantly at my side, his arms wrapping around me like a shield against the world. Lina appeared next to him, her hands trembling as she tried to steady me, trying to absorb even a fraction of my agony.We collapsed together in a heap, the three of us sobbing, shaking, the hospital’s sterile lights and distant beeping fading into nothing compared to the storm inside me.Somewhere in th

I don't remember how I got out of the police station.One moment, I was staring at Richard's face twisted into that sickening smile...And the next, the world became nothing but noise.Noise inside my head.Noise in my chest.Noise in every step I took toward the exit."Miss Aria? Miss Aria?" the officer kept calling behind me, but her voice sounded like it was coming through water.I stumbled out into the sunlight-too bright, too sharp-and leaned against the concrete wall outside. My breath shook uncontrollably. My hands trembled like they didn't belong to me.I wasn't his.I wasn't my mother's.I wasn't even the maid's child.I was a stranger's baby stolen by mistake.A mistake.A mistake he hated all my life.A mistake he shot.A mistake he blamed for everything he destroyed.My legs buckled, and for a second, I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the pavement, hugging myself tightly, trying to hold together what was left of me.People walked past. Cars moved. Life continued.

The first thing I noticed when we stepped into our new apartment was the quiet.Not the tense, suffocating quiet I grew up with.Not the silent treatment Carl used as punishment.Not the eerie stillness of a house that never felt like mine.This quiet was soft.Warm.Healing.It smelled like fresh paint and hope.Damon dropped our last box on the floor and stretched his back with a groan.I laughed, shaking my head. "You carried two boxes. Two."He shot me a glare he didn't mean. "They were heavy.""Oh please."He walked over, cupped my cheek, and kissed me lightly. "Welcome home, Aria."Home.The word settled on my shoulders like a blanket. I hadn't felt at home anywhere for so long that hearing him say it made something in my chest crack openMoving to a new country felt like stepping into a world wrapped in silence.No sirens.No yelling.No shadows from the past creeping behind every thought.Just air.Fresh, quiet, healing air.For the first few days, everything was chaotic.We h

Damon’s POVThe scent of sizzling garlic drifted through the kitchen—Aria’s doing, of course.She always cooked like the world depended on it: focused, humming, completely at peace.I leaned against the counter, quietly watching her taste the stew with a small wooden spoon. When she nodded to herself, satisfied, it made something warm settle in my chest.“This tastes great,” I told her.She rolled her eyes. “You didn’t taste it.”“I don’t need to. You’re the one who made it.”She was still smiling when she added, “Don’t forget to set the table. Brenda should be here soon.”Brenda.The neighbor with the too-bright smile, the too-long stare, and the pie that had tasted like guilt.I wasn’t stupid. I’d seen the moment her eyes changed.The moment the harmless “welcome to the neighborhood” melted into something… heavier.She’d stared at me the way people stare at things they shouldn’t want.And every time I remembered that, I felt a tightening in my jaw that Aria never seemed to notice.I