Semua Bab THE BILLIONAIRE'S STAND-IN BRIDE: Bab 11 - Bab 20

Aria’s POV The gate cameras showed her before we reached the door — a woman collapsed against the iron bars, soaked from the rain that had started sometime during Romeo’s interrogation. Her blonde hair lay plastered dark against her skull. Even ruined and shaking, she looked exactly like her photograph. “Stay behind me,” Romanov said, already moving. For once I didn’t argue. Whatever courage I’d found over the last week didn’t stretch far enough to walk toward a ghost. The guards had her sitting upright by the time we reached the gatehouse, a blanket around her shoulders that did nothing to stop her trembling. Up close, Elena Voss looked less like the polished woman in Romanov’s file and more like someone who had been running for a very long time. Her nails were broken. A bruise bloomed yellow-green along her collarbone — old enough to be healing, fresh enough to still hurt. “Romanov.” Her voice cracked on his name, relief and terror tangled together. Her eyes found me

Aria’s POV Romanov handed me a stack of files the next morning without a word of explanation, which by now I understood was simply how he communicated most things that mattered. “What am I looking for?” I asked, flipping open the first folder. “Inconsistencies,” he said, not glancing up from his own laptop. “Elena’s father’s financial records, the original marriage contract, and correspondence from the past two years. Somewhere in there is the reason two families agreed to something neither of them should have wanted.” I spent the next two hours at his desk, coffee going cold at my elbow, cross-referencing dates against bank transfers, contract clauses against correspondence timestamps. “Here,” I said, sliding a page toward him. “This transfer date. It’s three weeks before the marriage contract was even drafted.” Romanov set down his pen. “Which means?” “Which means someone already knew the marriage was happening before either family officially agreed to it.” I tapped

Aria’s POV The safe room smelled like steel and dust, the kind of place built for emergencies and never actually used until now. Elena huddled on the bench across from me, knees pulled to her chest, while security’s voices crackled through the intercom in clipped, urgent bursts I could barely follow. Somewhere above us, the house I’d started to think of as a beautiful cage had become an actual battlefield. “How many?” I heard Romanov ask through the small speaker mounted near the door, his voice cutting through the chaos with the same flat control he used for everything. “Two confirmed at the east fence,” a guard answered. “Possibly a third near the garage. They’re not local. Professional.” “Casualties?” “One of ours. Grazed, not critical.” I pressed my palm flat against the cold wall, willing my pulse to slow, and failed. It felt like an hour before the door finally opened, though the clock on the wall insisted it had only been twenty minutes. Romanov stepped throug

Aria’s POV I told Romanov about the call before I even had time to decide if it was wise. He listened without interrupting, his face unreadable in the harsh light of the security office, and when I finished, he simply said, “Say that again. Word for word.” I repeated it. Tell your husband to stop looking in Elena’s direction. It isn’t her leaking information. “Someone wants me to trust her,” Romanov said slowly, more to himself than to me. “Which means either she’s innocent and someone’s trying to protect her, or she’s guilty and someone’s trying to protect their asset.” “That’s not helpful,” I said. “No,” he agreed. “It isn’t.” He didn’t tell me which theory he believed. He never did anymore—not since the night in the study, not since he’d told me things and then let Elena’s interruption swallow whatever might have come next. I’d noticed the shift even if I couldn’t name exactly when it happened. He’d opened one door and quietly closed it again, and I was beginning to

Aria’s POV Romanov had Romeo brought inside within minutes, though “brought” felt generous for the way two guards half-carried him through the side entrance and deposited him in a chair in the security office, hands still bound. “Proof,” Romanov said, standing over him with his arms crossed. “Show me.” “It’s not on me,” Romeo said. “I hid it before I came, in case they caught me first.” “Convenient.” “I know how it looks.” Romeo’s voice cracked, exhaustion and fear bleeding through the words. “But I’ve spent the last week trying to fix something I helped break without even knowing I was breaking it.” I stood near the door, arms crossed, watching my brother in a way I never had before—not as the cruel, careless boy who’d mocked me my entire life, but as someone genuinely frightened, someone who looked smaller than I remembered. “Start from the beginning,” Romanov said. “Everything. Now.” Romeo’s throat worked. “About two months ago, a man approached me. Said he repres