Ethan did not move when Aria recoiled from him. He simply turned the phone face down on the seat, as if hiding the name could erase what she had seen.
“You know her,” Aria whispered.
The SUV behind them flashed its headlights twice. The driver’s eyes flicked to the mirror. “Sir, they’re signaling us.”
Aria’s hand found the door handle, but Ethan caught her wrist before she could pull it. He did not squeeze hard. He did not hurt her. Somehow, that made it worse.
“If you jump now, they will have you in thirty seconds,” he said.
“And if I stay with you?”
For the first time, his calm expression cracked. “Then you might survive long enough to hear why your stepmother has been calling me all week.”
Aria stared at him, rain streaking down the tinted glass beside her face. The road curved sharply into a line of old warehouses, far from the city, far from witnesses.
Ethan opened a small compartment between the seats and took out a sealed brown envelope. Her name was written on it: Aria Montgomery.
Her breath stopped. “What is that?”
Ethan looked at the envelope as if it weighed more than money, more than secrets, more than guilt. “Something your father left before he died.”
Aria shook her head. “My father died with nothing.”
“That’s what Victoria needed you to believe.”
The SUV rammed closer, nearly kissing their bumper. Ethan’s driver cursed under his breath and swerved beneath a broken streetlamp.
The envelope slid into Aria’s lap. Inside it, beneath an old photograph, was a document stamped with the name of her father’s company. And on the last page, where Aria expected to see Victoria’s signature, she saw a name that made her body go completely numb—Ethan Cross, listed as the sole trustee and legal guardian of her family’s entire hidden fortune.
Part 3: The Confrontation
The SUV slammed into our bumper again, the violent jolt rattling the luxury sedan. Aria gripped the document, her eyes wide with terror and betrayal as she stared at the name on the page.
“You,” she whispered, her voice trembling violently. “You’re his trustee. You’re the one who helped him hide everything. You’re working with Victoria.”
“If I were working with Victoria, I would have stopped this car five minutes ago,” Ethan said, his voice dropping into a low, deadly calm. He pressed a button on the armrest, communicating directly with his driver. “Marcus, disable the speed limiter. Take us into the shipping yard.”
“Sir, the rain is creating a blind spot—”
“Do it.”
The sedan surged forward, the sudden burst of acceleration throwing Aria back into the leather seat. Behind us, the SUV struggled to keep up as Marcus tore through the rusted iron gates of an abandoned industrial shipping facility. The labyrinth of stacked steel containers offered a maze of shadows in the torrential downpour.
Marcus cut the headlights, drifting the massive car into a dark gap between two towering crates. A second later, the SUV roared past our hiding spot, its high beams cutting blindly through the rain before speeding toward the docks.
Silence fell over the interior of the car, broken only by the steady drumming of the storm on the roof.
“Your father didn’t hide his fortune from you, Aria,” Ethan said, turning his gaze back to her. “He hid it from her. He knew Victoria married him for Montgomery Enterprises, and he knew she would drain it the moment he passed. He created a blind trust, worth eighty million dollars, and made me the executor. The condition was absolute: Victoria could not know it existed, and you would inherit everything the moment you turned twenty-five.”
Aria looked down at the paper. “I turn twenty-five next week.”
“Exactly. Which is why Victoria is desperate,” Ethan explained, pointing to his darkened phone. “She discovered the trust’s existence four days ago. She has been calling me, offering me percentages, trying to buy me out or forge your release signature. Tonight wasn’t just a business deal with Vance—it was her final attempt to compromise you, to force you into a position where she could control you permanently before the legal deadline.”
Aria felt the blood rush back into her face, the heat of sudden, burning anger replacing her fear. The bruise on her cheek throbbed, a brutal reminder of the woman who had spent years trying to diminish her worth.
