After Rebirth, I Became My Ex's Aunt-in-Law

Chapter 278: No Tears Left to Cry

"Stay right there," Aria choked out, her voice a broken whisper. "Don’t come any closer."

Damien froze. His hands hovered in the empty air between them.

Aria turned her back on him and started walking.

She was barefoot. Sharp gravel and debris bit into the soles of her feet with every step, but she didn’t feel it. She didn’t feel anything except the hollow ache ripping her chest wide open.

She just walked down the rain-slicked highway, completely numb.

"Aria!" Damien roared.

The sound was swallowed by a loud crack of thunder, but the panic in his voice was unmistakable. He ran.

He closed the distance in seconds, his long strides easily catching up to her.

He reached out, his hand wrapping around her arm to stop her from going any further.

"Aria, wait. Please," Damien pleaded, his chest heaving.

Aria ripped her arm out of his grasp as if his touch physically burned her.

"Don’t touch me!" Aria shrieked, spinning around to face him. Her emerald eyes were wild, blazing with a cocktail of heartbreak and fury.

"You lied to me!" she screamed over the pouring rain. "For weeks, Damien! You...you knew all of this the entire time! About my mother...my father. The Vipers. You knew everything all this time."

"I was protecting you!" Damien shouted back, stepping closer, desperate to make her understand. "You were waking up screaming! You were having night terrors about drowning! I couldn’t tell you! You weren’t ready to know."

"That isn’t your choice to make!" Aria roared, stepping right into his space and shoving her hands hard against his chest. "You don’t get to decide what I can and cannot handle! You keep doing it, Damien! You do it over and over again. You treat me like a helpless child who needs to be kept in La La Land while the adults handle the real world!"

"Aria, no. That’s not—"

"You are a puppet master, Damien!" she cried out, wrapping her arms tightly around her shivering torso. "You manipulate everyone. And I was stupid enough to think I was the exception."

Damien’s heart felt like it stopped.

The devastating finality in her eyes, that look, as if she was looking at a stranger, terrified him to the core.

He was actually losing her.

Damien didn’t even think. His massive pride, his ego, his iron-clad composure simply ceased to exist.

Right there, in the middle of a flooding, debris-littered highway, surrounded by the distant gaze of his operatives, Damien dropped to his knees.

His trousers hit the flooded asphalt with a loud, wet splash.

Damien reached out, his hands trembling as he grabbed both of her small, freezing hands. He pulled them toward him, pressing her knuckles firmly against his forehead as he bowed his head in the pouring rain.

"I am sorry," Damien choked out, his voice cracking, raw and broken. "I am so fucking sorry, Aria."

Aria stared down at him kneeling at her feet. Her chest hitched in a ragged, painful sob.

"I was scared," Damien confessed, lifting his head to look up at her. His golden eyes were wide and desperate, the rain tracking down his jawline like tears. "I was a coward. I couldn’t stomach the thought of you getting hurt again. I thought if I just burned it all down myself, I could hand you the ashes and keep your hands clean. I was wrong. I was arrogant, and I was wrong."

He squeezed her hands, his thumbs stroking her cold skin.

"Scream at me. Hit me. Punish me," Damien begged, his voice a desperate, gravelly plea. "Hit me over and over again. But please, I’m begging you... please don’t look at me like that. Don’t look at me like you don’t love me anymore."

Aria squeezed her eyes shut, a fresh wave of tears spilling over her lashes.

Seeing him on his knees, stripping away every ounce of his pride just to beg for her forgiveness, tore her heart perfectly in two. She loved him. She loved him so much it felt like a terminal illness.

She gently pulled her hands out of his grip.

Damien’s breath hitched, a flash of panic crossing his features as his hands fell empty to his sides.

"I appreciate the truth, Damien," Aria whispered, looking down at him. "I appreciate that you found out who my parents really were. I do."

She let out a long exhale, wiping her wet face with the back of her hand.

"But I hate that you betrayed my trust to do it," Aria continued, her voice hardening with quiet resolve. "I asked you for a partnership. I asked you to stop keeping me in the dark. And you proved today that you will always, fundamentally, choose control over communication."

Damien opened his mouth, but Aria took a definitive step back.

"I can’t do this right now," Aria said, shaking her head. "I need space. I need time to process the fact that my entire childhood, my father, and my mother were a massive, fabricated lie. And I need to process it away from you."

Damien froze on the wet asphalt. "Away from me?"

"I’m going back to the penthouse to pack my bags," Aria announced, turning her back on him. "I am going to stay at Zoe’s apartment for a while. Don’t follow me."

She began to walk away again.

Damien remained on his knees for a few more seconds.

The realization that she was actually intending to walk out of his house and sleep under a different roof flipped a very dark, very dangerous switch in his brain.

If apologies weren’t going to keep her in his bed, he would use the one language he had mastered perfectly.

Damien stood up.

"You aren’t packing anything."

The voice wasn’t a desperate plea. It was a flat, icy command that carried flawlessly over the sound of the rain.

Aria stopped walking. She slowly turned around, her brow furrowing in confusion at the sudden, chilling shift in his tone.

"Excuse me?" Aria asked.

Damien closed the distance between them once more with slow strides. He stopped exactly two feet away, looking down at her with unyielding authority.

"You are not moving into Zoe Chen’s apartment," Damien stated coldly. "You are returning to Sinclair Tower."

"You don’t get to tell me where I sleep, Damien!" Aria snapped, her fury instantly reigniting at his sudden audacity. "I just told you I need space!"

"And I am telling you that you are legally bound to that penthouse," Damien countered smoothly.

Aria blinked, staring at him as if he had lost his mind. "What?"

"Article Four, Section C of our marriage agreement," Damien recited flawlessly, his voice devoid of any emotion. "The wife shall maintain primary and continuous residency at the Sinclair Penthouse for a minimum duration of twelve consecutive months. Vacating the premises without my explicit, written consent constitutes a material breach of contract."

The rain poured down around them.

Aria’s jaw literally dropped.

"Are you..." Aria gasped, baffled. "Are you seriously quoting our marriage contract to me right now?"

"It is a legally binding document, Aria," Damien said, tilting his head slightly, his expression blank. "And I enforce my contracts."

"Damien, what the hell?!" Aria shrieked, throwing her hands in the air. "The contract is void! You said it yourself!"

"I said the contract was burned," Damien corrected, a dark edge creeping into his tone. "I never signed a formal rescission. The terms still apply."

Aria stared at him. She genuinely could not comprehend how someone could be this insane. He was actually trying to legally trap her.

"And if I pack my bags anyway?" Aria challenged, her emerald eyes narrowing into slits. "What are you going to do, Damien? Call the cops?"

"If you breach the contract, I will execute the penalty clauses," Damien stated, stepping closer until he was looming over her. "I will immediately freeze every asset you own. I will tie your personal bank accounts up in endless litigation so thoroughly you won’t be able to buy a cup of coffee. And as for Zoe, I will personally ensure she is permanently blacklisted from every talent agency and studio in the entertainment industry. I will bury her in so many frivolous lawsuits she’ll be forced to file for personal bankruptcy just for opening her door to you."

Aria’s breath caught in her throat.

"You will not leave me," Damien whispered, his golden eyes flashing with terrifying possessiveness. "You are staying with me."

Aria stared at the man she had married. He wasn’t bluffing. She knew he wasn’t bluffing. He was willing to become the ultimate villain, willing to destroy her best friend’s life and hold her financial freedom hostage, just to keep her from sleeping in another bed.

He was the biggest red flag she had ever seen.

"You are a manipulative asshole," Aria spat, her voice trembling with rage.

Damien accepted the title without an ounce of remorse. If being a manipulative asshole kept her safe and under his roof, then fine...that’s exactly who he was.

He stared down at her in the pouring rain, his jaw locked, his stance unyielding.

"Get in the car."