All Chapters of Shattered Vows: Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

CHAPTER 40 – THE AFTERMATHAlthea’s POVThe silence after a storm is never peaceful.It’s heavy. Unnatural. As if the world is holding its breath, waiting to see what’s left standing.That’s how the house felt when I came back that night—too quiet, too large, too empty for a place that was supposed to be a home. The lights were still on in the living room, the soft glow spilling across the marble floors like nothing had shattered hours earlier.As if two brothers hadn’t torn each other apart.As if my marriage hadn’t finally collapsed under the weight of its own lies.I closed the door behind me gently, though there was no one to disturb.Damian wasn’t there.I knew he wouldn’t be.He always disappeared when things became real.I set my bag down by the console table and stood there for a long moment, staring at the reflection in the mirror. The woman staring back at me l

CHAPTER 42 – THE REUNIONAlthea’s POVI felt him before I saw him.That was the thing I hated most—that after a year of distance, silence, and deliberate forgetting, my body still recognized Damian Navarro before my mind allowed it.The air shifted.Not dramatically. Not like the movies.Just… subtly. Like the room had inhaled and was waiting.I steadied my breathing, eyes still on the tablet in my hands, scanning notes I already knew by heart.Don’t turn yet.You’re not that woman anymore.The hum of conversation around me softened into background noise. Glasses clinked. Laughter rippled across the ballroom. The summit was already in full swing—power suits, practiced smiles, ambition wearing expensive perfume.I told myself he was just another executive in another room.A lie.“I didn’t expect to see you here.”There it was.His

CHAPTER 44 – THE RETURN OF DARIUSAlthea’s POVI didn’t know Darius was back.That was the first thing that told me everything had changed.A year ago, his return would’ve arrived like a tremor—rumors first, whispers next, his name carried through hallways before his body ever appeared. The Navarro empire had always reacted to Darius like that. Like he was a fault line nobody wanted to admit existed.Now?Nothing.No warning. No anticipation.Just silence.Which meant he’d learned how to disappear.And that terrified me more than his presence ever had.---The Unspoken ShiftI was reviewing Damian’s contract again—because that was the kind of masochist I’d apparently become—when my assistant knocked.“There’s someone here to see you,” she said carefully.“Do they have an appointment?” I asked without looking up.“No,

CHAPTER 46 – FIRE AND ICEAlthea’s POVThe moment I stepped into the gala hall, I felt the air shift.Not because of the chandeliers or the polished marble floors or the strategically placed staff hovering like statues.No. The shift came from her.Celine.I could feel her eyes on me before I even saw her. Sharp, calculating, gleaming with that familiar venom that only she could carry so effortlessly.She had been waiting for this night, waiting for me. I could sense it.I walked slowly, heels clicking against the polished floor, deliberately making my presence known without acknowledging her gaze.She didn’t flinch. Instead, she smirked, a predator who knew she had me cornered.“Althea,” she called out, voice silky, loud enough to carry over the soft hum of the gala.I paused. Heart steady. Eyes forward.“You look… different,” she added. Too casual. Too pointed.I tilted my he

CHAPTER 48 – A Broken CEOAlthea’s POVI never thought I’d see Damian like this.Not truly broken.Not completely undone.The gala had ended hours ago, yet the echo of whispers and the sting of betrayal lingered in every corner of my mind. The scandal—Damian with Samantha—was out there, circulating faster than I could comprehend. Headlines were already forming in my imagination, the public narrative shaping itself against him, against us. Against me.And there he was. Damian.Sitting alone in his office, the city lights casting fractured reflections across the glass. His chair leaned back slightly, one hand on the desk, the other rubbing his temple in exhaustion. The suit he wore, once pristine and sharp, seemed weighed down by the tension surrounding him, as though it carried the weight of every expectation, every rumor, every mistake.I hesitated at the door. My instincts screamed at me to knock, to