Semua Bab The Billionaire’s Broken Angel… and His Darkest Desire: Bab 101 - Bab 110

Maya woke up at 3 AM on the floor of the inn's library, her cheek pressed against the cold hardwood, the velvet box clutched in her hand so tightly it had left an imprint on her palm.She'd made it exactly twelve hours before she'd broken.The panic attack had hit around midnight—a full-body assault that left her gasping for air, convinced that saying yes to Ethan meant signing away every piece of herself she'd fought so hard to reclaim. She'd ended up here, surrounded by her grandmother's books, trying to remember how to breathe. Trying to remember that not all storms ended in destruction.The box was still unopened. She hadn't been able to bring herself to look inside, because looking meant confronting a future she wasn't sure she deserved.Her phone buzzed on the floor beside her—a text from her therapist, Dr. Chen, whose number she'd programmed to bypass Do Not Disturb after the third time she'd needed emergency support at ungodly hours.Check-in? Haven't heard from you in a few d

Lucien stood in the doorway of the Tidewater Inn's kitchen, watching Maya laugh at something Caleb said, and felt his heart crack clean down the middle.It had been three months since the night they'd uncovered the truth about Eleanor's death—three months since the town's dark secrets had spilled into the light like oil on water, spreading and staining everything it touched. Three months since Maya had almost died in the lighthouse, and Lucien had realized that loving her meant more than just keeping her safe. It meant letting her choose her own path, even if that path led away from him.He'd thought he could do this. Though he could stand by and watch her rebuild her life, find her strength, become the woman she was always meant to be. But watching Caleb Monroe lean against the counter—his perfect hair catching the morning light, his easy smile drawing out Maya's laughter—was harder than anything Lucien had faced in his thirty-four years.Because Caleb could give her everything Lucie

The sound of hammering echoed through the Tidewater Inn at dawn, pulling Maya from a restless sleep. She knew without looking that it was Ethan. He'd been here every morning for the past two weeks, working in silence, keeping his distance, respecting the boundary she'd drawn after everything that had happened. After the lies. After the secrets. After discovering that the man she'd been falling for had known the truth about her grandmother's death all along.Trust, Maya had learned, breaks in an instant but rebuilds grain by grain, like sand slowly filling an hourglass.She pulled on her robe and padded downstairs, the October chill seeping through the old windows. Through the dining room doorway, she could see him on the back porch, replacing the rotted boards she'd been meaning to fix for months. His breath misted in the cold air, and even from here, she could see the tension in his shoulders—the same tension that had lived there since the night she'd told him she needed space. Since

Maya had spent her entire life believing that strength meant armor. That survival required walls thick enough to keep the world out and her heart safely locked away. But standing in the doorway of the Tidewater Inn's sunlit kitchen, watching Ethan teaching her ten-year-old niece how to fix the temperamental oven door, she realized that everything she'd thought she knew about being strong was wrong.Real strength, it turned out, looked like letting someone in even when every instinct screamed to run. It looked like Ethan's calloused hands gently guiding small fingers, his patient voice explaining how the hinge mechanism worked. It looked like trust—messy, terrifying, and more vulnerable than anything she'd ever attempted."You see, Lily? It's not broken. It just needs someone to understand how it works," Ethan was saying, his storm-gray eyes crinkling at the corners as Lily successfully rehung the door.Maya's throat tightened. Six months ago, she'd arrived in Moonlight Cove with nothi

The gun wasn't pointed at Maya anymore—it was pointed at the man she loved.Everything that had happened over the past six months, every secret uncovered, every ally gained and enemy revealed, had led to this moment in the Tidewater Inn's basement. Marcus stood between Maya and Detective Sarah Chen, his hands raised, his jaw set with the kind of determination that made her heart ache even as adrenaline flooded her system. Behind them, the hidden room her grandmother had died protecting lay open, its contents finally exposed to the light."Put the gun down, Sarah," Marcus said, his voice steady despite the tremor Maya could see in his shoulders. "This doesn't have to end with anyone else getting hurt."Sarah laughed, but there was nothing humorous in the sound. Blood trickled from a cut above her eyebrow where Maya had struck her with the iron poker minutes earlier, and her carefully constructed mask of small-town respectability had shattered completely. "Doesn't it have to end badly?