CHAPTER 8: CRACKS IN THE MASK

Aria found him at 3 AM. He was in his study. The lights were low. There was whiskey on the desk. An empty glass in his hand. His tie was loose. His jacket was gone.

He was drunk. Not sloppy. Never sloppy. Damian Wolfe didn't do sloppy. He was the kind of drunk where everything was still controlled, but the control was hanging on by a thread.

"You should be sleeping," he said. He didn't look at her. Just stared at the glass in his hand.

"So should you."

She took the glass from him. He let her. That's how she knew he was really drunk. Because Damian never let anyone take anything from him.

"The board voted," he said quietly.

"They approved the Chen acquisition."

"That's good, isn't it?"

"It's because of you. They approved it because you were in that room. Because suddenly I look like a man who's settled down. Like I have someone supporting me instead of controlling me." He turned to look at her. His eyes were darker. Less controlled.

"I'm becoming my father."

"What?"

"A man who uses people. A man who leaves damage wherever he goes."

His voice was barely a whisper. "I orchestrated your entire fall from grace. I planned our marriage. I used you to manipulate a board full of powerful men. And now I feel like I'm losing myself."

Aria set down the glass. She sat next to him. The desk was so big their knees almost touched.

"Why me?" she asked. "Of all the women in New York, why me?"

"Because you had nothing left to lose," he said.

"That's not an answer."

Damian was quiet for a moment.

"Because the first time I saw you, you were laughing at a terrible joke your best friend made. You didn't know I was watching. You just laughed like the world wasn't trying to destroy you. And I knew that girl would be devastated if she discovered the truth. I needed her devastated so I could use her."

The honesty was brutal. It landed like a punch.

"But?" Aria prompted. Because she could feel the 'but' hanging there. Waiting.

"But then I watched you for three months. And the girl who laughed at bad jokes also worked late when she didn't have to. She called her parents every Sunday even though they never asked. She gave money to charities she couldn't afford. She was good. Actually good."

He reached out and touched her hair like he was afraid it might disappear.

"And I realized I was going to destroy something I couldn't fix."

"You can't fix it," Aria said. "But you can stop destroying."

"I've already destroyed. We're past that point."

She reached for his hand. "No. We're not."

He pulled away like her touch burned.

"Don't," he said. "Don't make this more than what it is. Don't make me the hero of your story. I'm not."

"Then what are you?"

"A man who inherited power and used it wrong. A man who wanted revenge so badly he was willing to hurt innocent people to get it." He stood up. Walked to the window. The city was sleeping below them.

"My brother died because of me." Aria's breath caught.

"What?"

"His name was Marcus. He was going to expose something. Something in our family business that didn't add up." Damian pressed his forehead against the glass.

"He was going to go to the authorities. And before he could, he died. Car accident. Official ruling was mechanical failure."

"But it wasn't."

"No. It wasn't. The brake lines were cut. Someone cut his brake lines and killed my brother." His voice was so quiet she almost couldn't hear it.

"And it was my fault."

"How could it be your fault?"

"Because I was ambitious," he said.

"I wanted what he had. I was willing to make deals with people who had no business making deals. And one of those people decided my brother was a problem."

"You were a kid."

"I was sixteen. Old enough to know better. Old enough to understand consequences."

Aria stood. She walked to him. She didn't touch him. She just stood next to him and looked at the city.

"And your uncle?" she asked quietly.

"Is he involved?"

Damian's jaw clenched so hard she thought his teeth might break.

"I don't know. Maybe. Probably. That's what I'm trying to figure out."

"You're using me to figure it out."

"Yes."

She should have been angry. She should have felt used. But instead, she felt something else. Understanding, maybe. Or the beginning of it.

"Then we do it together," she said.

"But you tell me the truth. All of it. No more games. No more lies."

"Aria—"

"I'm already in this," she said.

"You already married me. You already orchestrated my fall. The only thing left is whether you're going to let me help you or keep pushing me away."

He looked at her for a long time.

"If I let you in," he said quietly, "if I tell you everything, you're going to know enough to destroy me. To take the evidence to the authorities. To end this."

"Yes," she said. "I could."

"Why wouldn't you?"

She thought about his hands on her waist at the board meeting. She thought about his voice in the darkness, breaking apart. She thought about a girl who laughed at bad jokes and a man who'd been watching her for months because something about her made him want to be better.

"Because I don't think you want to be the villain of your story anymore," she said.

"And I don't think I want to be a victim of mine."

He reached out and pulled her close.

"This is going to hurt," he whispered into her hair.

"If you let me tell you everything, if you let me use you to find my brother's killer, this is going to hurt both of us."

"I know."

"And you're willing anyway?"

"Yes."

He held her like that for a long time. In the darkness of his penthouse. With the city sleeping below them.

And for the first time since she'd married him, Aria felt like maybe—just maybe—they were becoming something real.