Ella sat on the cold chapel bench, fingers trembling as they turned the yellowed pages of Leon's journal.
The little girl had fallen asleep beside her, curled against her arm.
But sleep was now a luxury she could no longer afford.
Because with every line, every scratch of ink—
The man she thought she knew unraveled into someone far darker… and far more devastating.
Her chest tightened with every confession.
Leon hadn't just fallen for her.
He had orchestrated everything.
Their first meeting.Her career's rise.Her fall.The cage.
All of it.
It wasn't fate.
It was design.
Because years before they ever met—
She had unknowingly ruined his life.
A name leapt from the page like a scream:
Hart vs. Shen Pharmaceuticals Lawsuit, 18 years ago.
Her father had destroyed his family.
And he… had vowed revenge.
Until revenge turned into obsession.
And obsession into love.
A twisted, coiled, venomous kind of love that neither of them had ever been able to escape.
The truth hit her like stepping on a landmine she'd been dancing around her entire life.
All this time, she'd thought they were two storms that collided by chance.
But she was the hurricane.
And he had walked into her wind on purpose—just to let it tear him apart.
The final page wasn't a confession.
It was a map.
One she'd never seen before.
Coordinates.
A name scribbled at the top:
"Project E: The Reset."
Below that:
"If you're reading this, I'm probably already gone. But they're not done with her. Or you."
Ella looked down at the sleeping child beside her.
The lights flickered.
Outside, engines rumbled.
Not the press. Not random thugs.
These were professionals.
The kind that didn't miss.
And the kind he had been running from all along.