Page 26 of The Billionaire’s Contract Bride

Aria pushed them open without knocking.

The office was quiet. Financial tickers cycled across multiple wall monitors. Bookshelves and locked display cases lined the walls, and a grand executive desk faced the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Manhattan.

“Damien?”

No answer.

She should have turned around and left. Instead, she stepped inside.

The mahogany desk was immaculate: a laptop, an engraved pen, and a silver picture frame resting face-down.

Aria approached the desk slowly. Her heart hammered against her ribs before her fingers even touched the silver frame.

She picked it up and flipped it over.

The photograph showed her standing outside the hospital. She was wearing her old green coat—the one she had donated months ago when the zipper broke. Her hair was longer. Her mother was standing beside her, laughing at something just out of frame.

Aria remembered that moment clearly. It had been taken fourteen months ago.

On the back of the frame, a line of text had been written in precise black ink.

A date... followed by three words:

Aria Evelyn Vale.

The heavy office doors clicked shut in front of her.

Aria didn’t move. She saw his reflection materialize in the dark glass of the window.

Damien had taken off his suit jacket and unbuttoned his collar. One hand rested on the door handle he had just locked.

“You were instructed not to enter my office,” he said, his voice quiet and level.

Aria gripped the silver frame so tightly the metal edges bit into her skin.

“Yesterday?” Her voice was barely a whisper. “That’s what you wanted me to believe? That you stumbled into my life yesterday?”

Damien’s gray eyes moved to the photograph in her hands. He showed no surprise, no guilt, no remorse.

“Put the frame down, Aria.”

“You knew who I was fourteen months ago!” she shouted, turning to face him. “How long have you been stalking me?”

Damien stepped away from the door, locking his gaze onto hers, cutting off any chance of escape.

“Long enough,” he said softly, “to know you were always going to become my wife.”

Chapter Five: The First Lie

Aria threw the silver frame directly at his head.

Damien caught it inches from his face, his reaction so quick, effortless, and controlled that it made her wonder how many times people had tried to hurt him.

“You followed me for fourteen months,” she said, her voice shaking with quiet fury.

He glanced down at the photograph as if it were merely a misfiled document. “I had you investigated.”

“Before you needed a wife?”