All Chapters of Forbidden By Her Sister's Husband : Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

Damian Cross sat in his executive office on the 50th floor of Cross Tower. Behind him, the view was a masterpiece of cold ambition, a panoramic sweep of Manhattan glittering in the twilight like a sea of jagged diamonds. But Damian wasn't looking at the city he ruled. He wasn't looking at the glowing ticker of the stock market or the legal briefs for his next multi-billion-dollar merger.He was looking at a plain manila folder resting on the center of his mahogany desk.Across from him sat Edwards, the head of his private security detail. Edwards was a former MI6 operative, a man who had spent decades finding needles in haystacks in the dark. He was a man who didn't flinch, and yet, sitting in the silence of Damian's office, he looked visibly uncomfortable.“Explain this,” Damian said. His voice was dangerously quiet, a low vibration that seemed to make the air in the room go still.“It’s the surveillance report, sir,” Edwards said, shifting slightly in the high-end leather chair. “It

It was the season of the lie. Outside the black glass of The Obsidian, the world was turning into a wind tunnel of dead leaves and biting frost, but inside Aria’s life, the only reality was the flickering screen of her phone.The tracker Damian had installed was a silent, blinking eye that never closed. It sat in her pocket, heavy as a stone, recording every keystroke, every location, and every pulse of her digital existence. Aria knew she had to feed the beast. If she stopped “communicating” with her fake boyfriend, Damian’s suspicion would boil over. He would come back to Unit 40B. He would tear the apartment apart until he found the sketchbook under the mattress.So, she created a ghost.On a rare afternoon when she was allowed to leave the building for "supplies," she had gone to a public library in Queens, wearing a deep hoodie and sunglasses to hide from the city’s cameras. There, she had set up a fake number using a burner app. She saved the contact in her phone simply as: Him.

“I… I can’t,” Cassandra stammered. “It’s rude.”“It’s persistent,” Damian countered. “Answer it, Cassandra. Put it on speaker. Let us all wish the committee a happy holiday.”Cassandra went pale. “I… I really shouldn’t.”“I insist.” Damian leaned forward, his hand reaching across the table for her phone.Panic flared in Cassandra’s eyes—the kind of panic that meant she was one second away from ruin. Aria acted on instinct. She grabbed the silver gravy boat. It was heavy and filled with scalding hot liquid. She “reached” for the salt shaker.Her elbow knocked the gravy boat.It tipped.A wave of hot, brown liquid poured across the white tablecloth. It missed Damian. It missed Cassandra. It landed directly in Aria’s lap.“Ah!” Aria cried out, jumping up as the heat seared through her denim.The boat clattered to the floor with a deafening crash. Chaos erupted.“Oh my god!” Cassandra shrieked, jumping back to save her silk dress. “Aria! You clumsy idiot! You’ve ruined the tablecloth! You’

They followed her for forty minutes. She didn't take the subway. She walked, her head down against the wind, her gait slightly stiff from the burn on her leg. She walked through the polished, expensive neighborhoods, past the boutiques where Cassandra spent her afternoons, and into the parts of the city where the streets got narrower and the buildings were covered in layers of history and grime.She turned onto a quiet side street in the Lower East Side.She stopped in front of a crumbling brick building with a faded sign hanging above the door. An old art supply store. The Ink & Quill.She went inside, the bell chiming a faint, tinny sound.“Park,” Damian snapped.The car pulled over to the curb.“Stay here,” Damian told Edwards, his tone brook no argument.He got out of the car. The air was cold, smelling of rain and wet asphalt. He buttoned his coat, turning up the collar to hide the sharp, recognizable profile of his face. He walked to the shop window, his movements silent and deli

But Damian’s head stopped moving.Across eighty feet of crowded ballroom, through the haze of gold light and moving bodies, he locked on to her.He stared at the shapeless gray figure by the door.He tilted his head slightly. A predator recognizing a scent.He knew.How did he know? Was it her posture? The way she held her hands? Or was it simply that he had spent the last five months dissecting every inch of her existence until he could recognize her in the dark?He took a step forward.Aria’s heart hammered against her ribs. Run.But she couldn't run. She was on duty. If she left the door, Cassandra would kill her.She looked down at her tablet, pretending to work. Please don't come over here. Please don't come over here.A hand slammed onto the table next to her tablet.Aria jumped, nearly dropping the device.She looked up.Damian stood on the other side of the small check-in table. He loomed over her, his black mask making his eyes look like voids."You look like a ghost," he said