Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 1 - Chapitre 10

ADRIAN’S POV Mistakes are expensive. People who get in my way are even more expensive. Usually, I don’t have time for either. But somehow, an ordinary Tuesday morning had managed to spiral into a disaster before I’d even finished my first coffee. The boardroom was deathly quiet. It was the kind of silence that usually preceded a firing. I stood at the head of the long obsidian table, my eyes bored into the presentation screen before flicking to the man standing there. He was trembling. Sweat was visible on his upper lip. “This projection is a fantasy,” I said. My voice was calm which was always more dangerous than when I shouted. He froze. “Sir, I—the data suggested—” “The data is off by twelve percent,” I cut him off. “And you didn't even notice. You just stood there and read it back to me.” Silence swallowed the room again. Nobody breathed. “I don’t tolerate carelessness,” I added, snapping the file shut with a crack that made the man flinch. “Fix it. Or don’t bother coming b

The silence on the 60th floor was the kind that made your ears ring. It wasn’t the quiet of a library; it was the quiet of a graveyard right before something digs its way out of the dirt. Adrian Knight sat behind a desk that looked like it was carved from a single block of shadows. He didn’t look up. He didn’t have to. He just sat there, staring at a manila folder like he was trying to set it on fire with his mind. “It’s a mess, Adrian,” Ethan said. He wasn’t smiling. Ethan always smiled, but not today. “The guy is a parasite. Julian Vane is drowning in debt, most of it from underground poker rooms. And the kicker? Your little ‘Cherry’ isn’t even his wife.” Adrian’s fingers twitched against the paper. A tiny movement, but dangerous. Not his wife. “The marriage license is a fake, Adrian. A high-quality forgery,” Ethan continued, leaning against the cold glass wall. “Her uncle, Arthur Laurent, set the whole thing up. He needed her tied down and isolated so he could bleed her

CHERRY’S POV The air outside the car didn’t just hit me; it slapped me. I didn’t wait for Adrian to finish his sentence. I didn’t wait for the logic, the deeds, or the explanation of how he knew so much about my own personal hell. I just fumbled for the door handle like a woman escaping a burning building, my fingers slick with cold sweat. My legs felt like they were made of damp sand as I stumbled out onto the gravel, the sharp stones biting into my heels through my thin soles. "Elara, wait—" His voice was a whip-crack behind me, but I didn't stop. I couldn't. I felt like the world was shrinking, the sky pressing down on my lungs until I couldn't breathe. Every breath was a jagged reminder that my entire existence was a carefully constructed lie. My husband was a vulture. My uncle was a murderer. And the man in that car… he was the monster who had sat in the front row and watched the show for two years. I ran. I didn't have a destination. I just needed the darkness of the r

ADRIAN’S POVThe ink was barely dry on the marriage license, the black lines still glistening against the cream paper. Elara stood there, her chest heaving as if she’d just run five miles uphill. She was still clutching that pen like it was a dagger, her knuckles white, her gaze a jagged mix of total defiance and a heartbreak so raw it made my own lungs ache just to look at her. She reached for her bag, her fingers brushing over that hideous, oversized thrift-store blazer—the one she used like a shield to hide her light from a world that didn't deserve her."I should go," she whispered, her voice cracking. "If I’m going to face them... if I’m going to do this... I need to get back to the house and change. I can't let them see me like this.""No." The word left my throat before I could think. It wasn't a suggestion. "No way in hell are you wearing that thing ever again, Elara."She froze, her hand hovering over the gray, shapeless fabric. "It’s the only decent thing I own

CHERRY’S POVThe drive to the Knight estate was a heavy, suffocating blur of neon lights and unspoken questions. Adrian hadn’t looked at me once since we stormed out of the Laurent study. He just sat there, jaw tight enough to crack bone, staring out at the city as it smeared into long, oily streaks against the window.I sat beside him, the ruby necklace feeling less like a gift and more like a heavy, cold collar. My palm still had that dull, pulsing sting from the slap I’d delivered a reminder that the girl who used to take hits was gone. I was the one giving them now. But as those massive iron gates groaned open, the fire in my blood started to turn to ice.If my house with Julian was a drafty cage, Adrian’s mansion was a fortress. It sat on the hill like a crown made of glass and marble, surrounded by miles of lawn so perfectly groomed it looked sharp.The car stopped, and the door was yanked open by a man in a crisp uniform. A line of staff stood there with terrifying precisio