All Chapters of The Billionaire's Contract Wife: Chapter 41 - Chapter 44

The world stopped existing outside that concrete room.Sophia stood frozen in the doorway of unit 71, the brass key still clutched in her trembling hand. The flashlight from Daniel's phone cut across the small space, illuminating the old man bound to the wooden chair.Her grandfather.Edward Carter.Twenty years.Twenty years of believing he had died in a car accident on a rain-slicked highway. Twenty years of grief that had shaped her father into a silent, guarded man. Twenty years of birthdays, holidays, milestones—all marked by absence.And he had been here the whole time.Alive.Trapped.Forgotten by everyone except the people who wanted him dead.Edward blinked slowly against the light, his eyes adjusting after what must have been hours of darkness. His voice came out cracked, barely above a whisper."Sophia..."She couldn't move.Alexander stepped forward first, his hand still steadying her arm. "Daniel, cut the restraints."Daniel moved immediately, pulling a knife from his bel

The dawn light was grey and thin, barely strong enough to cut through the mist settling over the estate grounds. It turned the grass silver and the old stone paths into pale rivers leading nowhere good.Sophia stood at the mouth of the tunnel exit, the cold earth still crumbling behind her, and stared at the man who had destroyed her mother.Stephen Vale.He looked exactly like the architect of two decades of pain should look: unremarkable in a way that was terrifying. No theatrical scar, no obvious madness in his eyes. Just a tall, gaunt man in an expensive coat, standing with the relaxed posture of someone who believed he had already won.Beside him, Simon held Emily with one hand clamped around her upper arm. Her face was bruised along the cheekbone, her lip split, her eyes wide and wet above the gag. But she was alive. Standing. Fighting to keep her knees from buckling.Sophia took one step forward.Alexander's hand shot out, catching her wrist."Don't," he said low.She didn't pu