Page 71 of The Billionaire’s Contract Bride

The truth hurt far worse than a lie would have.

“The authorities are outside,” Damien said, his voice hollow. “Lucien can take you anywhere you choose. The hospital. A hotel. My home.”

“Your home?”

“I will not set foot in the penthouse if you select it.”

Aria stared at him. “You would leave?”

Every muscle in his frame resisted the admission. “If that is the price of keeping you somewhere secure.”

For the first time since they had met, Damien offered a choice without secretly removing the alternatives.

Aria stepped towards him. She stopped directly in front of him and extended her right hand, setting the gun down on the desk with her left.

Hope—fragile and terrifying—entered his expression.

“This is not forgiveness,” she warned.

“I know.”

“I am returning because Victor and Augustus fear you, and right now I need the protection of what they fear.”

“Use whatever part of me keeps you alive, Aria.”

Aria let him take her hand. His long fingers closed around hers with extreme care, as though he finally understood that holding her was not the same as keeping her.

Outside, flashing red and blue strobes painted the estate driveway.

Two men in plainclothes were loading a handcuffed Victor into an unmarked black sedan rather than a standard police cruiser.

Aria turned to Damien. “Where are they taking him?”

“Somewhere he will answer questions without an attorney present.”

“You said the police were here.”

“They are.”

“But they aren’t taking Victor.” It wasn’t a statement, it was an assessment. She was analyzing everything now.

Damien held open the rear door of his armored vehicle for her. “No.”

“What are you going to do to him, Damien?”

Before he could answer, Lucien approached the car carrying a sealed evidence bag. Inside sat a narrow, antique brass key.

“Found beneath the van used in the abduction,” Lucien reported softly. “It was lodged inside the base of the ceramic figure.”

Aria took the bag from Lucien’s hands.

A set of alphanumeric characters had been hand-engraved along the key’s stem:

BGT-714

Damien recognized the designation instantly. “Blackthorne Grand Terminal,” he said, his voice darkening. “Locker seven-fourteen.”

Her father’s master evidence had been sitting inside a locker at a transit station owned by the very family that murdered him—waiting in the dark for nineteen years.