WARNING!!! , SOME CHAPTERS IN THIS NOVEL CONTAINS EXPLICIT SCENES 

"Sign it, Aria. Don’t make this more pathetic than it already is."

The smell of his expensive cologne mixed sickeningly with the scent of her stepsister’s perfume on the damp hotel sheets. Julian didn’t look like the man who had whispered promises of forever an hour ago; he looked like a predator closing a trap. Beside him, Elena smirked, pulling the silk duvet higher over her shoulder—a silent, triumphant taunt.

"You were having sex with her," Aria whispered, her voice cracking as the roar of the fashion show’s bass thumped through the walls of the dressing suite. "On my runway night. In our bed."

"Technically, it’s my bed now," Elena chirped, her eyes gleaming with malice. "Just like it’s my lead spot in the show. You’re trending, sister. But not for the fashion."

Julian shoved the fountain pen into Aria’s trembling hand. "The scandal hits the press in ten minutes. Your career is dead, your reputation is ashes, and this divorce is your only way out before the sponsors sue you for every cent you own. Sign the papers, take your shame, and disappear."

With a numb heart and a hand that felt like ice, Aria scribbled her name, severing her life.

An hour later, rain lashed against the neon lights of the city as she stumbled into a darkened bar, a ghost in a couture gown. She didn't want comfort; she wanted to feel something other than the knife in her back. When the man in the corner—shadowed, lethal, and radiating a terrifying power—offered her his hand and a night of forgetting, she took it.

She didn't know his name. She didn't know he was the most dangerous man in the financial world. She only knew that as she walked away from the wreckage of her life the next morning, she was carrying a secret that would one day bring the world to its knees.

"So what do you think they are now fighting for?" I asked, my voice quieter now as I stared at the glowing laptop screen. "Money? Power? Control? What could possibly be worth all this?"


Dominic leaned back slightly in the chair and rubbed a hand over his jaw. "There should be more to it," he said thoughtfully. "This is really getting out of hand. But what could their motive really be?" He looked at me carefully. "Groups like this don't move for small reasons, Aria. Whatever they want… it's bigger than us."


I paced in the room, biting my nail nervously.


"This is definitely crazy," I muttered. "I thought life was throwing all kinds of things at me because of money, not knowing it's because of something else." I laughed bitterly. "Every time I think I understand what's happening, something worse appears."


Dominic watched me pace. "Hey," he called softly.


Chapter 36 - 036 THE WARNING