All Chapters of Bound by Deception : Chapter 1 - Chapter 6

Nadia was washing dishes when she heard the crash.She dropped the plate in the sink and ran to the living room. Her mother was on the floor, one hand clutching her chest, her face pale and covered in sweat."Mom!" Nadia dropped to her knees beside her. "Mom, can you hear me?"Her mother's eyes fluttered open, but she couldn't speak. Her lips were moving, but no sound came out.Nadia grabbed her phone with shaking hands and called for an ambulance. The next few minutes felt like hours. She kept talking to her mother the whole time, telling her to hold on, telling her help was coming, even though she had no idea if her mother could hear her at all.The hospital waiting room was cold and too bright. Nadia sat with her knees pulled up to her chest, still wearing her house slippers, still in the same clothes she'd had on when she was washing dishes hours ago.The days that followed blurred together. Scans. Blood tests. More scans. A parade of specialists who spoke to each other in low voi

Nadia hadn't slept the night before her wedding.She lay in her narrow bed staring at the ceiling, running through everything she'd overheard outside Mr. Grant's office again and again, trying to make sense of it. *Vivienne. Five years. Everything exactly where it needs to be.* None of it fit together into anything she could act on, and by morning she'd told herself the same thing a dozen times — that she had bigger problems than a conversation she didn't understand. Her mother needed the money. That was the only thing that mattered.She dressed in the small courthouse office Mr. Grant had arranged, a simple ivory dress that fit like it had been chosen by someone who'd never met her, which she supposed it had. No white gown, no flowers, no guests waiting in rows. Just Mr. Grant, a witness she didn't recognize, and a clerk who looked bored enough that Nadia wondered how many contract marriages passed through this same office in a single month.Damian arrived exactly on time, dressed in

"You must be Nadia," the woman said again, her smile still not reaching her eyes. "I'm Colleen. Damian's aunt."Nadia forced her expression into something calm, something that didn't betray the fact that she'd just heard this woman's name twice in the last ten minutes, once on a phone call not meant for her ears, and once in gossip whispered by strangers at a bar. She took the offered hand and shook it, keeping her grip steady even as her pulse hammered."It's nice to meet you," Nadia said. "Damian hasn't mentioned much about his family.""Hasn't he?" Colleen's eyes swept over her, slow and assessing, the way Nadia imagined she might look over a business proposal she hadn't yet decided whether to accept. "That does sound like him. He's always been protective of his privacy. Comes from losing his father so young, I think. Made him careful about who he lets close.""That must have been hard for him.""It was hard for all of us." Colleen's tone stayed light, pleasant, and somehow that ma