All Chapters of Forbidden By Her Sister's Husband : Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

The summons came at 6:00 AM on a Monday.Aria was asleep in her apartment, Unit 40B, curled under the heavy duvet, trying to ignore the gray light filtering through the curtains.Her phone buzzed. It wasn’t a text. It was a call.Cross Industries - Executive Office.She sat up, her heart hammering. She answered.“Miss Hale,” a crisp female voice said. It was Damian’s executive assistant, a woman named Sarah who terrified Aria almost as much as Damian did. “Mr. Cross requires your presence at the private airfield in Teterboro at 0800 hours.”Aria blinked, still half-asleep. “Teterboro? The airport?”“Pack a bag for five days,” Sarah continued, ignoring the question. “Business attire. Formal evening wear. And layers. London is rainy.”“London?” Aria gasped. “I can’t go to London. I have my online classes. I have—”“The university has been notified of your absence,” Sarah cut her off. “Your professors have granted an extension on your final exams. The car is downstairs. Do not be late.”T

The lock clicked at 2:14 AM.Aria heard it even through the fog of exhausted sleep. The sound was sharp, mechanical, and terrifyingly close.She bolted upright in bed, clutching the duvet to her chest. The room was pitch black, save for the sliver of golden light widening as the connecting door pushed open.Damian stood in the frame.He was a silhouette against the light of his suite. He had removed his jacket and tie. His white shirt was unbuttoned at the collar, gleaming in the dim light. He leaned against the doorframe, swaying slightly.He smelled of scotch, cigars, and the damp London night.“Damian?” Aria whispered, her heart hammering against her ribs.He didn’t answer. He walked into her room.He didn’t turn on the light. He moved through the shadows with the familiarity of a creature that hunted in the dark. He stopped at the foot of her bed.He stared at her.Aria shrank back against the headboard. “What do you want? Is… is the hotel on fire?”“No,” he said. His voice was rou

The flight back from London was a funeral procession at forty thousand feet.Aria sat in her seat, staring at the back of Damian’s head. He was working again, typing furiously, ignoring her existence. He hadn’t spoken to her since the car ride from the Savoy, where he had scrubbed her hand with a wet wipe like she was contaminated.She felt hollowed out. Used.He had dragged her across the ocean, locked her in a room, used her to unsettle a business rival, and now he was putting her back in the box until he needed her again. Between the long hours of cross-referencing files for him, she had managed to submit her final online exam on the jet’s Wi-Fi. Her degree was finished, her online classes finally over, but she felt no sense of victory. She was just tired.The plane descended. The skyline of New York rose up to meet them, shimmering in the thick, hazy heat.Home, Aria thought bitterly. Or what passes for it.The wheels touched down with a screech of rubber. The jet taxied to the pri

August in New York was a season of stifling, heavy heat. The city felt like it was simmering under a glass lid, the air thick with humidity and the smell of hot asphalt. For Aria Hale, the late summer didn't feel like a time for vacations or rest; it felt like a countdown to an execution.The date of the Vow Renewal was set for August 15th. Only days away.Every day was a fresh hell of logistics. Aria had become the unofficial wedding planner, the shadow secretary, the person who carried the binders and absorbed the stress so Cassandra could focus on “glowing.”Today was the venue walkthrough.Cassandra had rejected the idea of a garden party. “Too rustic,” she had declared. “I want God involved. It looks more expensive.”So they were at St. Jude’s Basilica.It was a cavernous, Gothic monstrosity of stone and stained glass in the Upper East Side. It was older than the city around it, a fortress of silence that smelled of beeswax, incense, and centuries of judgment.Aria walked ten pace

The padlock necklace was a cold, unyielding weight against Aria’s sternum.It was a small thing—a square of solid silver no larger than a thumbnail but it sat in the hollow of her throat like an anchor dragging her down. It warmed against her skin, a constant, burning reminder of the man who had placed it there in the dead of night.To ensure you do not run again.Aria touched the metal through the fabric of her high-necked blouse. She was in the dining room of the Hale Estate. It was Sunday. The mandatory family dinner. Outside, the late August humidity was thick and stifling, but the dining room was chilled to a bone-deep cold by the aggressive air conditioning.She hadn’t taken the necklace off in three days. She couldn’t. There was no key. She had tried to pick the lock with a hairpin late one night in Unit 40B, desperate to breathe without the reminder of his ownership, but the mechanism was complex, expensive, and completely unforgiving.Just like him.“Pass the wine,” Cassandra