Billionaire's Betrayal a contracted revenge (Aurelia) novel Chapter 89

Chapter 89

Chapter 89

Aurelia’s POV

I knew his name before the detective ever asked.

It was Dawson.

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I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, turning the truth over in my mind like a stone I didn’t want to touch but couldn’t put down.

The mask on the man in the warehouse had slipped once, just for a second, and I had seen enough of his jaw, his voice, the way he moved, to know.

Dawson had sent him. Dawson had let a stranger tie me to a chair and press metal against my skin, all for a drive that didn’t even work anymore.

He had drugged my vitamins for two years, taken my best friend to his bed, and now he had tried to break me for information I never had.

Some stupid part inside me, one that used to bend for him no matter what, had finally snapped clean in two.

I wouldn’t tell Rieck. Not yet. Not the detective either.

If they knew, they would move loud, and Dawson would slip through some crack the way he always did, clean hands, clean name, some lawyer smiling in front of cameras.

No. I wanted to build this slowly, the way I had built the scotch, the way I had built every small thing that made him suffer in public.

This one would be worse. This one would be personal, and it would be mine.

I thought of the girl I used to be, the one who used to cry in the bathroom after Dawson forgot her birthday, the one who thought love meant staying quiet and small so nothing would break. That girl was gone now and I didn’t miss her.

I thought of Charlotte too, of her hand on her belly at that gala, of the sweet voice she used when she called me “Ri” like we were still friends. She had picked her side a long time ago. She would learn what that cost.

I got out of bed and looked at myself in the mirror. My face was calm. My hands were steady. Whatever Dawson thought he had broken in that warehouse, he hadn’t broken this.

The detective came just after noon. He sat across from me at the kitchen table with a small notepad, the same lean grey man from before, eyes sharp even when his voice stayed soft.

“Can you describe any of the men who held you?” he asked.

“They wore masks. I never saw their faces.” That much was true.

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16:21 Mon, Aug 3

Chapter 89

“Any voices you recognized? Anything familiar?”

I held his gaze. “No. Nothing

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“Do you have any idea who might want to hurt you, Mrs. Valerius? Any enemies, any conflicts recently?”

“No. None that I know of

He studied me a moment longer than felt comfortable, the kind of look that made me wonder if he could see straight through the calm I had built on my face. Then he nodded and closed his notepad. “If anything comes back to you, anything at all, you call me first.

“Of course.” I said, and smiled the smile I had learned from years of sitting across from men like Dawson, easy and warm and empty.

He paused at the door, one hand on the frame, and looked back at me. ‘One more thing. Your husband says he wants extra security on this house. Cameras, a second guard rotation. That is a lot of protection for a random attack. Mrs. Valerius

“He worries.” I said. “He is not wrong to.”

“No” the detective said slowly. “He is not. Whoever did this to you knew the building, knew your schedule. knew exactly when the guard would step away. That is not random. That is planned.”

I kept my face still. “I wouldn’t know about that.”

“Mm” He didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t push either. He tapped his notepad against his palm once, twice, then tucked it into his coat. “People who plan things that carefully usually have a reason. A grudge. Something owed. If you think of anything, even something small, it might matter more than you think.”

“I will keep that in mind.”

When he left. I stood at the window and watched his car pull away from the building.

Not even the police would get to touch this. Dawson was mine to unravel, thread by thread, and Charlotte right along with him. She had known. She had to have known.

Rieck didn’t go to work the next morning.

I noticed it first because the penthouse stayed too quiet, no sound of him leaving before dawn the way he always did, no click of the front door. He sat at the kitchen counter instead, coffee in hand, still in the soft grey shirt he slept in.

“You are still here.” I said.

“I am.”

“You never miss work.”

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16:21 Mon, Aug 3

Chapter 89

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