ARIA
I stopped answering his calls.
Not out of anger out of survival.
Every time my phone lit up with his name, my chest tightened until I couldn't breathe.
I told myself it was better this way. That space would protect me. That if I could just stay quiet long enough, the world he belonged to would forget my name.
But the world didn't forget. It circled like vultures.
By Monday morning, my inbox was a battlefield journalists demanding comments, investors asking questions, and even old classmates suddenly "curious" about my relationship with the heir of Hale Technologies.
I shut the laptop before the nausea hit.
Sophie barged in a second later, out of breath. "You need to see this."
"Please don't say another headline."
"It's worse." She dropped a file on my desk. "Vivian's office sent this to the legal department."
Inside was a printed memo Internal Investigation: Breach of Confidentiality by PR Executive Aria Collins.
My blood ran cold. "She's accusing me of leaking confidential merger data?"
"She's trying to make you the scapegoat," Sophie said. "If this sticks, you're finished not just here, everywhere."
I pressed a hand to my forehead. "How does she keep getting away with this?"
"Because she's rich, ruthless, and no one tells her no."
"Not even her son," I whispered.
"Especially not him."
Hours later, I sat alone in the rooftop garden the same place Nathan had tried to explain himself days ago.
The city looked different from up here. Colder. Like it didn't care who broke as long as it kept shining.
I didn't hear her until she spoke.
"Beautiful view, isn't it?"
Vivian Hale stood behind me, flawless in white, every inch the queen she believed herself to be.
"Mrs. Hale."
"Vivian," she corrected with a smile. "No need for formality now. You won't be here much longer."
I turned slowly. "What are you talking about?"
"Don't play naïve, dear. You've served your purpose. My son needed to learn a lesson about distraction and I believe he finally has."
"Destroying someone isn't a lesson. It's cruelty."
She stepped closer, eyes sharp. "Cruelty is believing love makes you untouchable. You walked into my world thinking it would bend for you. It doesn't."
"You think power makes you invincible."
"Power is invincibility," she said quietly. "Love is weakness. Ask my son he's learning that now."
My throat tightened. "You'll lose him."
"Maybe for a while," she said, shrugging. "But he'll come back. They always do. The world has rules, Aria. I just enforce them."
"You're afraid of me," I said.
Her smile didn't falter, but her eyes flickered. "Afraid? Hardly. You're a chapter that doesn't belong in our story."
"Then why not just end it?"
"Oh, I have." She leaned in, her perfume sharp and sweet. "By tomorrow morning, you'll be the reason the Carter deal collapses. And when that happens, Nathan won't be saving you. He'll be saving himself."
She turned to leave, heels clicking like a clock counting down.
I stood frozen, her words sinking in like poison.
By tomorrow morning.
That meant she'd already set something in motion.
Downstairs, the building buzzed with late-night chaos security in motion, whispers running through the halls.
Sophie found me by the elevators. "Where were you? IT just found something a leak came from your office network. Someone sent Carter Holdings the wrong pitch file under your name."
My chest tightened. "What?"
"They're saying it cost the company millions."
"It wasn't me!"
"I know. But the email's real, Aria. It came from your address."
"How is that possible?"
Before she could answer, the elevator doors opened and Nathan stepped out.
He looked exhausted, furious, and desperate.
"Aria," he said. "We need to talk."
The crowd in the lobby went silent.
"Not here," I whispered.
"Then where?"
"Anywhere but in front of them."
He took a step closer, voice low. "My mother's behind this. I found out she accessed the corporate servers. She's framing you to make the Carter family back out."
My breath hitched. "Then stop her."
"I'm trying."
"Try harder."
"I can't do that if you keep shutting me out!"
The pain in his voice cracked through my anger for half a second but then I remembered Vivian's words.
By tomorrow morning, you'll be the reason the Carter deal collapses.
I looked at him, tears burning behind my eyes. "She's already won, Nathan. You just don't see it yet."
He reached for me. "Aria"
But before he could say anything else, security rushed toward us—the head of compliance holding a printed letter.
"Mr. Hale, Ms. Collins both of you need to come upstairs. There's been a board summons."
Nathan frowned. "Now?"
"Yes, sir. It's urgent."
The man's voice wavered, eyes flicking nervously between us.
Then I saw it.
In his hand, the letter bore Vivian's signature urgent review: merger misconduct.
My stomach turned.
This wasn't a meeting.
It was an ambush.