All Chapters of Love Me Then Destroy Me: Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

Lana's POV"I did not know this would be a group discussion," Adrian said.He had stopped at the edge of the table, and for a moment the three of us existed in a strange, fragile triangle - history on one side, consequence on another, and something that felt very much like the future waiting quietly in the middle.Elias didn't turn to look at him straight away. He stayed seated, posture easy, hands loosely folded on the table as though this was simply an appointment he had already factored into his day. That calm unsettled Adrian more visibly than any show of hostility would have - I could see it in the slight tightening around his eyes, the way his weight shifted almost imperceptibly."It is not a group discussion," Elias said, finally lifting his gaze. "This is a courtesy."The word landed clean and final, like a door being closed from the inside.Adrian's jaw tightened. He looked at me instead, searching for something familiar - permission, maybe, or the particular softness that us

Elias's POV"Be cautious," the message read. "They are not targeting the journalist."I had been sitting at my desk for nearly two hours by the time it arrived, the city outside my window settled into its late-night register - low and continuous, never completely silent, the kind of hum that tells you a place is still alive even when most of the people in it are asleep. My apartment was deliberately quiet. No television. No music. Just the faint mechanical sound of the elevator cables somewhere in the building's walls and the occasional rhythm of traffic eleven floors below.I read the message twice before typing back.Clarify.The reply came within seconds.There is talk of framing her as unstable if the inquiry expands.I sat with that for a moment, feeling the familiar tightening in my chest that arrives not from fear but from the specific weight of responsibility - the feeling of understanding that what you do next will matter to someone who has no control over what you do next.T

Lana's POV"I did not know we were expecting company."Adrian's voice was smooth and measured, carrying that particular calm that had once made me feel held and now only made me alert. I was standing near the window when he said it, sunlight cutting across the floor in long, quiet lines, and I did not turn around immediately. I let the silence stretch. I let the weight of the moment settle exactly where it belonged - in the room, between all three of us, undiluted by any attempt on my part to soften it."We were not," I said finally. "I invited him."Then I turned.Elias stood just inside the doorway - not too close to me, not too far - his posture easy but deliberate. He had not moved since Adrian walked in, and something about that particular stillness changed the quality of the air in the room. It was not passivity. It was intention, the kind that does not need to announce itself.Adrian's gaze moved from me to Elias, slow and assessing. No visible reaction came first - just the sl

Lana's POV"You look pale.""I am not pale," I said, though my voice carried a thinness I could not fully conceal and both of us knew it.Mira stood in the doorway of my kitchen watching me with the quiet, particular assessment of someone who has learned over time to tell the difference between ordinary tiredness and the specific kind of fracture that goes deeper than the surface. She had that stillness about her - the kind that does not rush to speak because it already understands that the right silence draws out more than the right question ever does."You are holding your glass too tight," she said. "That usually means you are thinking about something you do not want to say out loud."I loosened my grip before I had consciously decided to and set the water down on the counter."I met with my accountant this morning," I said."That is not what has you pale."I breathed out slowly and leaned back against the counter. "There is a trust," I said. "In my name. And I did not know it exis

Adrian's POV"You came."Her voice was steady when she spoke, but there was no warmth woven into it - just the plain acknowledgment of a fact."I said I would," I replied.The botanical courtyard of the Meridian was open to the sky, glass walls framing an interior garden that filtered the late afternoon light into something muted and golden. Guests moved through the surrounding corridors at a comfortable distance - visible but unhearing, present but not involved. No enclosed corners here. No controlled acoustics. No accidental intimacy created by a carefully chosen private space.She had chosen the table nearest the fountain, which put the sound of moving water between us and the rest of the room.Distance measured in architecture. She had learned that language from somewhere, and I recognized it because I had spoken it for years.I approached slowly and stopped across from her without immediately sitting.She looked composed - hair pulled back, minimal makeup, a pale blouse that offe