Page 67 of The Billionaire’s Contract Bride

“The police report said he fell asleep at the wheel!”

“The state troopers were paid to sign off on that report,” Victor corrected smoothly.

An old, familiar grief tore open inside her. “Who killed him?”

Victor took a slow sip of his cooling tea. “Damien knows.”

“Was it you?”

“I have orchestrated many ugly things in service of this family, Aria. Your father’s death was not one of them.”

“Why should I believe a word you say?”

“Because I do not require your affection,” Victor said smoothly. “Only the ledger.”

Aria’s mind raced backward into her childhood memories. Her father’s metal toolbox in the shed. The small ceramic bird on her mother’s dresser. Her mother refusing to pawn it even during the winter they couldn’t pay the heating bill.

The bird had rattled when she packed it.

Victor watched the sudden realization break across her face. “There it is,” he murmured softly. “You know where he hid it.”

Aria forced a dry, cold laugh. “I know you’re running out of time.”

Victor crossed the room in two swift strides, grabbing her jaw in a violent grip that drove his fingers into her cheekbones. “Damien’s indulgence has made you arrogant.”

Aria looked straight into his bloodshot eyes without blinking. “No. Surviving him did.”

She drove her knee straight up into his groin.

Victor groaned and released her, doubling over with a curse. Aria bolted for the double doors, but two heavily armed guards slammed through the entry before she reached the threshold, grabbing her arms and dragging her backward into the center of the room.

Victor straightened up slowly, his face twisted in rage as amusement vanished completely. “When Damien comes through that gate,” he sneered, “you are going to watch me tear away everything human he has left.”

High above them, an industrial siren began to scream.

The ambient lights cut out instantly, plunging the estate into pitch blackness broken only by red emergency strobes. Downstairs, the muffled chatter of automatic gunfire erupted through the floors.

Victor’s mouth curved upward. “Speak of the devil.”

Victor grabbed Aria roughly by the elbow, dragging her toward a hidden panel that swung open beside the fireplace chimney.

“Your husband just surrendered a billion-dollar corporate trust without a single counter-offer,” Victor hissed over the sound of breaking glass below. “Do you understand what that makes you?”

“Expensive?” She spat back.

“Fatal.”

Aria stomped the narrow heel of her boot directly into the bridge of his foot. Victor’s grip loosened as he grunted in pain, and she tore herself free just as dark grey smoke began pouring beneath the library doors.

The emergency strobes flickered once and died, leaving the house in total darkness.

In the sudden silence between gunshots, a voice crackled through the estate’s internal public address system.

“Aria.”

Just her name. Quiet. Controlled. Terrifying.

Victor froze at the sound of Damien’s voice.