Todos os capítulos de My Ex-Boyfriend is my New Step-Brother: Capítulo 81 - Capítulo 90

The backstage of the West Hall smelled like floor wax and expensive perfume. I was surrounded by men in suits. Not Marcus’s guards, but the studio men. Mr. Gable, the head of Vance Studio, stood in front of me. He was short, but he held a cigar like a weapon. He looked at me like I was a car with a cracked windshield."She looks tired," Gable said. He didn't say it to me. He said it to Chloe. "The lighting on the carpet is going to catch those bags under her eyes. Fix it.""She’s been under a lot of pressure, Arthur," Chloe said. She stepped between us. "The house search, the security upgrades—""I don't care about the house," Gable snapped. He poked a finger at my chest. "I care about the twenty-million-dollar opening next month. Scarlett, look at me. Are you high? Are you on something? You look like you’re about to faint.""I'm not on anything," I said. I tried to make my voice hard. "I'm just tired of being watched.""You get paid to be watched!" Gable yelled. He turned to a man wi

The ballroom was a sea of moving bodies and loud laughter. I stood by the buffet table, my heart hammering a rhythm that made my ribs ache. I felt the notebook—the one I’d swiped from the Miller woman's clutch—pressing into the skin of my waist under my dress. It was a secret weight, a heavy truth hidden in silk."You’re spacing out, Scarlett," Marcus’s voice cut through the noise. He was suddenly there, a wall of expensive wool and power. He didn't look at me; he was busy waving at a senator across the room. "The Miller woman is looking for her bag. She says she misplaced it near the powder room. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?""I don't keep track of where drunks leave their things, Marcus," I said. My pulse was a frantic bird in my throat."Watch your mouth," Marcus said. He turned his head just enough for me to see the predator in his eyes. "You’ve been acting different since the car. Quiet. Sharp. It makes me think you’re holding onto something you shouldn't be.

"There she is. Our Angel returns just in time for the main event," Marcus said, his voice booming across the head table as I stepped back into the gold-leafed glare of the ballroom.I didn't flinch. I didn't let my eyes dart to the sweat cooling on my skin or the way my thighs felt heavy and sensitized from Roman’s touch only minutes ago. I just smoothed the red silk of my dress, tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, and smiled the smile I had been practicing since I was five years old. It was a mask made of porcelain and lies, and for the first time in my life, it felt like armor instead of a cage."I had to fix my lipstick, Marcus. You know how you hate it when I look unpolished for the cameras," I said, my voice as smooth as glass. I walked toward him, my heels clicking a steady, lethal rhythm on the marble."You look... radiant, Scarlett," Lydia whispered, leaning in from his left. My mother’s eyes were glassy, her hand clutching a champagne flute like a lifeline. She was l

"Go back to sleep, Scar. I’m almost done with the first bridge," Roman muttered, the rapid-fire clicking of his keyboard cutting through the heavy silence of the shack.I blinked, my eyes feeling like they’d been scrubbed with sand. The kerosene lamp was nothing but a dying ember now, casting long, skeletal shadows against the warped wooden walls. The air was biting—sharp enough to make my lungs ache—and it carried the metallic tang of Roman’s blood mixed with the scent of old dust. I shifted on the cot, the rusted springs letting out a piercing wail that made me flinch. My body felt heavy, used, and tender in a way that made the events of the night feel like a fever dream I was still trapped in."You haven't slept at all," I said, my voice coming out as a dry, cracked whisper. I sat up, pulling the scratchy wool blanket tight around my shoulders to ward off the chill. "Roman, look at your shoulder. You’re going to rip those bandages open if you keep hunching over like that.""Bandage

"It’s happening, Scar. The first leak just hit the wire in London," Roman whispered, his face illuminated by the harsh, flickering blue of the tablet screen.I crawled across the cold floor of the shack, my knees scraping against the grit, until I was shoulder-to-shoulder with him. The air was still freezing, but I didn't feel it anymore. My heart was thumping against my ribs so hard I thought it might crack one of them. "Is it the video? The one from the study?""No, that’s too big to start with. We’re boiling the frog, remember?" Roman’s fingers danced across the screen, pulling up a secondary browser. "This is just the Northcrest ledger. A small British tabloid just published a snippet under the headline: The Billionaire’s Ghost: Did Marcus Reed Pay to Bury a Scandal? It doesn't mention us yet. It just mentions a million-dollar transfer to a 'distressed party' that doesn't exist on any tax record.""A million dollars," I breathed, reading the jagged black text on the screen. "That’