The Wife He Never Meant to Love (Lila and Damon) novel Chapter 123

Chapter 123

Chapter 123

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Lila adjusted her clothes, her gaze lingering on Damon longer than she intended. No matter how much time had passed, she couldn’t deny it-

He was still dangerously attractive.

As if sensing her stare, Damon smirked, his eyes locking onto hers.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he said lazily. “Or I won’t hold back.”

A faint blush crept onto Lila’s cheeks, and she quickly looked away.

“By the way… can I see Damian now?” she asked, composing herself.

“Not yet,” Damon replied without hesitation.

Her brows furrowed. “Why?”

“Because the chaos isn’t over yet,” he said simply.

Before she could press further, Damon straightened and gestured toward the table.

“Come here. I have something to show you.”

Lila followed as he guided her closer.

Spread across the table were photographs-faces of different people, arranged with deliberate precision. Her eyes scanned them quickly until two stood out.

Vivian.

Jasper.

Both had large red crosses slashed across their faces.

Lila’s expression hardened.

“They eliminated Jasper,” Damon said, picking up the photo between his fingers. “Simply because he no longer has leverage. He’s not an asset anymore.”

He tilted his head slightly, his gaze shifting to Lila.

“Do you understand what that means?”

Lila met his eyes without hesitation.

“He’s a liability.”

A slow smile spread across Damon’s lips.

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Chapter 123

“Yes… exactly.”

He tightened his grip on Jasper’s photo slightly-just enough to crumple the edge.

Damon’s gaze lingered on her, sharp and unyielding.

“Now tell me, Lila,” he said quietly. “What did you learn while you were escaping with Jasper?”

Lila held his stare, her expression unreadable.

“I can’t remember exactly what it was.”

For a moment, silence stretched between them.

Then Damon exhaled softly, almost amused.

“And that,” he said, stepping closer, “is exactly why they’re after you.”

Lila’s brows drew together.

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“They don’t chase ghosts without a reason,” Damon continued. “You saw something. Heard something. Maybe you didn’t realize its value at the time… but they did.”

He slid a photograph toward her.

A port. Night. Containers stacked under dim lights.

“Look at it,” he said.

Lila’s fingers hovered before finally touching the photo. Her eyes scanned it-slowly, carefully.

At first, nothing.

Then-

A flicker.

Metal clashing. Voices. A number echoing faintly in her mind.

Her breath hitched.

“Wait…”

Damon didn’t interrupt.

“Container… 17-C…” she whispered. “No… not the container…”

Her hand pressed against the table.

“The label… it was wrong,” she said, frustration creeping in. “The numbers didn’t match the manifest…”

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Damon’s expression sharpened. “Keep going.”

Lila shut her eyes tightly.

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“It wasn’t just a shipment,” she continued. “There were numbers… codes… written somewhere-hidden in the records…“

Damon immediately reached for a thin ledger and opened it in front of her.

“Like this?” he asked.

Lila’s eyes snapped open.

Rows of entries stared back at her-dates, figures, routing codes.

Her breathing slowed.

“Yes… this…”

She flipped through the pages, faster now, her mind catching up.

“These aren’t normal transactions,” she said. “They’re structured… but inconsistent.”

Damon nodded. “Ledger masking.”

Lila stopped at one entry.

Her finger trembled slightly as it traced the numbers.

“17-C…” she whispered again. “It’s here-but not as a container.”

“It’s embedded,” Damon said. “Disguised as a routing number.”

Lila looked up, realization hitting.

“Illegal shipments,” she said. “Off-record cargo tied to financial trails.”

“Exactly.”

She turned another page. ‘

“These numbers… they’re not just payments,” she added. “They’re tracking movement-containers, schedules… even clearance overrides.”

Damon’s lips curved slightly.

“Every illegal activity… written in plain sight.”

A slow, dangerous clarity settled over Lila.

“They’re not just hiding cargo,” she said. “They’re hiding an entire operation inside these ledgers.”

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Chester 123

“And you noticed the discrepancy.” Damon replied. “Even if you didn’t realize it at the time.”

Lila closed the ledger carefully

“They don’t just want me dead,” she said. “They want this memory gone.”

Damon stepped closer, his voice lowering.

“Then we use it.”

Lila met his gaze, unflinching.

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“We go to the port,” she said. “We find the shipment tied to this code. And we follow the numbers.”

Damon smiled-sharp, approving.

“Because once we trace that ledger…”

Lila finished, her voice steady and cold-

“We expose everyone behind it.”

A brief silence followed.

Then Lila spoke again.

“Someone sent me a picture,” she said.

Damon’s expression didn’t change-but his eyes darkened slightly.

“A woman,” Lila continued. “Beside you. While you were unconscious.”

Silence tightened between them.

“And?” Damon asked.

“Nothing,” Lila said calmly. “Just thought you should know your enemies are getting bold.”

A faint chuckle escaped him.

“Or desperate.”

Lila didn’t smile.

Because now-

Between the hidden ledgers, the illegal cargo, and the enemies closing in-

This was no longer just a game.

It was a war.

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Chapter 123

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Miles away in South City, beneath a sky choked with smoke and neon, Maddy stood frozen before the flickering newsfeed. Belair City burned across the screen-sirens, chaos, her past unraveling in real time. Her fingers trembled around the phone, knuckles pale, breath shallow.

Then-force.

Eric’s hand snapped around her wrist, yanking the device away. The screen went dark.

“Focus on me,” Eric demanded, his voice low, sharp-danger wrapped in silk.

Before she could recoil, he dipped his head and claimed her lips. It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t love. It was possession. Control.

Maddy’s eyes stayed open.

Unblinking. Burning.

Not at him.

At the ghost in her mind-Lila.

Hatred coiled deep in her chest, alive and venomous. Even here, even now, Lila haunted her.

She remembered running-no, escaping. The authorities closing in, Belair City turning into a cage. She had slipped through its cracks, desperate and hunted, only to fall deeper into darkness. The black market swallowed her whole-its shadows thick, its promises hollow.

A man found her there.

Not as a savior.

As prey.

He didn’t ask questions. Didn’t care about her past. To him, she was just another desperate girl in the wrong place-someone to be bought, owned, used.

He took her.

Dragged her across the line into South City, where names didn’t matter and souls were currency. And there, stripped of everything she once was, Maddy became nothing more than a body to feed his hunger.

A slave.

But even as Eric’s grip tightened, even as the world tried to crush her into something small and broken-

Maddy did not close her eyes.

Because hatred, unlike hope, refused to die.

And somewhere beneath the ruin of her, something was still waiting.

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Chapter 123

Watching.

Ready.

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“Be a good girl, okay?” Eric murmured, his voice soft now, almost tender-like the storm had never happened.

Hours of passion had left the room thick with heat and silence. Maddy lay still beneath the dim light, her body heavy, her soul hollow. If there was anything left inside her, anything that still *mattered*, it was the hatred burning deep in her chest-steady, unrelenting.

It was the only thing keeping her alive.

Revenge.

That single word echoed louder than her own heartbeat.

She turned slightly, forcing her arms around Eric’s waist, pressing herself close as if she belonged there. As if she needed him.

“Will you come back tonight?” she asked, her voice quiet, almost fragile.

A lie.

Everything about her was a lie now.

Eric exhaled, running a hand through his hair as he pulled away just enough to look at her. “No. My mother- in-law’s in the hospital,” he said flatly, already half-dressed, already leaving.

Of course.

There was always somewhere else he had to be. Someone else he had to return to. A real life-one Maddy was never meant to touch.

Her grip tightened for a second longer… then loosened.

“I see…” she whispered.

He didn’t notice the change in her eyes.

Didn’t see how the softness drained away, replaced by something colder. Sharper.

Something dangerous.

“Rest,” he added, as if it were kindness. As if she had a choice.

Then he was gone.

The door clicked shut.

And silence swallowed the room whole.

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Chapter 123

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Maddy lay there for a long moment, staring at the ceiling. Listening. Waiting until even the echo of his presence disappeared.

Slowly… she sat up.

The sheets fell from her body, but she didn’t care. Her reflection stared back at her from the cracked mirror across the room-a stranger with empty eyes and a fire buried deep within.

“They all think I’m broken…” she whispered to herself.

Her fingers curled into fists.

“They’re wrong.”

The hatred inside her didn’t weaken her.

It was feeding her.

Sharpening her.

Keeping her alive long enough to remember every face…. every voice… every hand that had ever dragged her down into this hell.

Lila.

The man who took her.

Eric.

All of them.

A slow, chilling smile formed on her lips-one that didn’t reach her eyes.

“Tonight… you won’t come back,” she murmured into the empty room.

Her gaze hardened.

“But someday…”

Her voice dropped into something darker. Something certain.

“I won’t have to ask.”

And for the first time in a long while, Maddy didn’t look like a victim.

She looked like a storm waiting to break.

The room was still.

Too still.

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Chapter 123

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Maddy moved quietly, every motion deliberate, controlled-like she was relearning how to exist in her own body. The softness she had worn moments ago was gone, peeled away like a mask discarded on the floor.

She crossed to the cracked mirror again.

For a long time, she just stared.

At the hollow cheeks. The bruised lips. The eyes that no longer belonged to the girl she used to be.

“Good girl…” she whispered, testing the words on her tongue.

Her reflection didn’t flinch.

A slow, bitter laugh slipped from her throat.

“No,” she said, firmer this time. “Not anymore.”

She turned away and began to dress, each piece of clothing feeling less like protection and more like armor. The fabric clung to her skin, but now it didn’t feel like shame-it felt like preparation.

Because tonight, for the first time since she was dragged into South City…

She wasn’t waiting.

She moved toward the small window, pushing it open just enough to let the distant noise of the city bleed in -sirens, engines, laughter, cries. South City never slept. It just *fed*.

Somewhere out there, the man who first took her still breathed.

Somewhere, Lila still existed-untouched, unbroken.

And Eric…

Maddy’s jaw tightened.

Eric thought she was something he could walk away from. Something temporary. Disposable.

That was his mistake.

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Her fingers brushed along the edge of the table until they found something small-metal, cold. She picked it up, turning it in the faint light.

A blade.

Not large. Not impressive.

But enough.

A beginning.

Her grip tightened around it as her mind began to sharpen, piece by piece. Not reckless. Not emotional.

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Chapter 123

Calculated.

“If I want out…” she murmured, “I don’t run.”

Running had led her here.

Running had made her prey.

Her eyes darkened.

“I hunt.”

The word settled into the room like a promise.

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A plan was already forming-not fully, not perfectly-but enough to take the first step. She knew his patterns. The guards. The routines. The doors that stayed locked… and the ones that didn’t.

All the things they never thought she was paying attention to.

All the things they assumed she was too broken to notice.

Another mistake.

Maddy slipped the blade into the lining of her clothes, hiding it carefully. Then she moved back to the bed, sitting down as if nothing had changed-as if she were still the same girl who had asked a man to come back tonight.

But her eyes…

Her eyes stayed fixed on the door.

Waiting.

Not for Eric.

For opportunity.

And when it came-

South City wouldn’t just have another missing girl.

It would have a reckoning.

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