All Chapters of The Night My Best-Friend Ruined Me: Chapter 101 - Chapter 110

Julian’s POVI had not slept.That was not unusual anymore, but tonight it felt different... Like sleep had simply stopped being an option.Aria’s building was still lit in a few windows when I checked the feed again. The apartment itself looked calm. Leo was asleep. Aria had probably moved back and forth between her study and the kitchen once or twice before finally settling down. The place looked safe from the outside, which was exactly why I did not trust it.I stood in my security room with a coffee gone cold in my hand and a sidearm holstered at my hip, watching the street cameras in a loop. Cars passed. A delivery bike cut down the block. A man walked a dog. Normal life kept happening all around the building like the world had not already started turning ugly again.Adrian was in the city now.That fact kept bothering me more than I wanted to admit.He had made his decision. He was staying in Seattle. He had said it like a man announcing a business move, but I knew better. This

Julian’s POVBy the time I realized I had been set up, it was already too late to walk out clean.The server room smelled like dust and hot wires. Veronica stood near the doorway like she had every right to be there, composed as ever, while her two men closed in around me with the kind of confidence that only comes from thinking numbers are on your side.I had the drive…I had the proof.And now I had a problem.One of the men moved first.I ducked under his arm and drove my elbow into his ribs, hard enough to make him fold for half a second. Not enough to drop him, but enough to buy space. The other came in from my left, too fast for a clean dodge, and I felt the hit when his fist caught my shoulder and knocked me into the edge of a server rack.Pain shot down my arm.I gritted my teeth and pushed off anyway.“Get him,” Veronica said, calm as if she were ordering coffee.That made me angrier than the blow had.The first enforcer grabbed for my jacket. I twisted away and struck him in

Aria’s POVJulian was heavier than I expected when I got him fully into the chair.He had one arm pressed against his side, his shirt dark with rain and a growing stain that made my stomach twist every time I looked at it. His face had gone pale in a way that scared me more than the blood did. He was still breathing, still trying to stay upright, but I could see how hard he was working at it.I kept one hand on his shoulder like that might keep him anchored.“Stay with me,” I said, and I hated how shaky my own voice sounded.“I am here,” he said, but even that came out rough.His mouth tightened as he tried to sit straighter. He failed, just slightly, and hissed through his teeth.I looked toward the hallway again, then back at him. My brain kept trying to split itself into too many pieces at once. Leo was gone. Veronica had called. Julian had gotten me enough of the truth to destroy the little bit of calm I had left. And now I had blood on my hands and no idea where my son was being

Aria’s POVI had run out of ways to be scared.That was the first thing I realized, sitting on the floor of my apartment with my phone still in my hand and my whole body feeling strangely detached from itself. It was not calm. It was not strength. It was the kind of numb that comes after fear has burned through every part of you it could reach.Leo was gone.Veronica had said it plainly, like my son was a file on a desk and not a child with sticky hands and a toy airplane and a laugh that could fill a room.Leo was being held in a lab.Leo was being used.Leo had a marker in his blood that made him valuable to people who could look at a child and think in terms of research, profit, and power.I did not think a person could keep breathing after hearing something like that. Yet somehow I was still breathing. Shallowly. Badly. Like my lungs had forgotten what they were supposed to do.Julian was in the chair near the wall, still trying to stay upright despite the pain in his side. His sh

Aria’s POVThe silence in the lab was the worst kind.It sat around me like it had settled there on purpose, like the room itself had decided to watch and wait while I fell apart.I had not meant to end up here.I had come in because I could not stay in the apartment for another second. I could not look at Leo’s room. I could not hear Julian pacing. I could not keep pretending I was strong enough to breathe through the truth Veronica had handed me.Leo was gone.Leo had been taken because of something in his blood, because people with money and influence had decided a child was useful for their own sickness. And Adrian—My chest tightened so hard I had to stop walking for a second and put a hand against the workbench.Adrian had been at the school.He may have been involved…or not.I didn't know anymore. I only knew what it looked like. I only knew what my fear kept turning into when I tried to stop it. Everything I touched lately seemed to turn to damage. Every choice I made came too