Damien's POV —
She walked in like a reckoning.
Blood on her hem. Lace torn at the seams. Eyes wild—not with fear, but fury.
I'd seen desperate women. Vengeful women.
But Nyra Callahan?
She was something else entirely.
She wasn't begging.
She wasn't bluffing.
She was burning.
And she wanted to set fire to the man I've spent a decade trying to destroy.
Nolan Hayes.
The golden boy. The polished devil.
The man who smiled too much and lost nothing… until now.
The second I saw her, I knew.
He'd made a mistake.
And now, that mistake was mine to play with.
"Help me Call off this wedding," she said. "And I'll help you destroy Nolan Hayes."
Just like that.
Like vengeance was a business transaction.
But it wasn't the offer that intrigued me.
It was the look in her eyes when she said it—steady, cracked down the middle with hurt she didn't bother hiding.
A woman like that?
She was either the most dangerous kind of liability…
Or the most valuable weapon I could ask for.
And she had just walked straight into my den.
Wearing her grief like war paint.
She said she'd offer herself.
Not her body—though every inch of her radiated that same electricity most women tried to fake.
No.
It was her silence between words.
Her breath right before she met my stare.
The challenge in her spine, straight even when she trembled.
She didn't know it, but she'd already won the first round.
Because I was intrigued.
And I don't do intrigued.
Not since my father died with Nolan's name on his last breath.
Not since every deal, every merger, every late-night boardroom war became just another step toward dismantling the Hayes legacy.
But Nyra?
She made me pause.
Not because she was beautiful.
But because she walked into my world knowing it could chew her up—and dared it to try.
I watched her walk out of my office, escorted to her new suite like a queen being taken to her throne.
And I knew.
Whether she becomes my weapon, my ruin, or my greatest regret…
The game had changed.
And Nyra Callahan?
She just became the most dangerous piece on the board.
......................Back at Nolan Suite...........................
The day of the wedding — the day he thought he had everything under control.
The suite door slammed behind them with a soft click.
Ava was already pulling him toward the bedroom, fingers tugging at his collar with practiced ease. Nolan didn't resist. Her lips found his, and the kiss was impatient—desperate in all the ways he liked. Nolan didn't speak.
He didn't have to.
Ava was already on him—hands in his hair, dress sliding from her shoulders as his mouth crushed hers again in a kiss that tasted like hunger and secrets.
She moaned into him, pulling him back toward the bed they'd shared only hours before her best friend's wedding.
Nolan didn't hesitate.
Buttons flew. The headboard thudded. He tore her straps down like he had a right to, like this was his world and everyone else was just living in it.
She wrapped her legs around him, breathless.
"You'll marry her in two hours," Ava gasped against his throat, nails clawing his back. "And still, you come to me."
He laughed, low and dangerous. "I always come to you."
Ava, "That true but you know You'll be married in two hour you will give her promise that you have to fulfill life time you know what I mean," she whispered against his mouth.
He laughed, a cold sound muffled by her skin. "Promise haha... By the way aren't you going to give me a wedding gift.
Ava, "Maybe I will."
He pulled her and whispered, "Then give me something worth remembering."
Clothes hit the floor. The air grew thick—hot, electric, dangerous.
Nolan's grip on her waist was possessive. Ava's nails dragged down his spine. The sex wasn't love; it was war waged in silk sheets and stolen time. A high-stakes addiction built on secrets they never planned to confess.
Their bodies collided in rhythm—fast, rough, like the guilt never existed. Like they hadn't just betrayed the woman who still wore his ring.
Because to them, it wasn't betrayal.
It was inevitable.
Twenty minutes later, tangled in silk sheets and post-coital silence, Nolan sat up and checked his phone.
Nothing from Nyra.
He frowned.
"Ava," he muttered, grabbing his shirt. "Where is she?"
Ava stretched lazily, brushing dark curls from her flushed face. "She said she needed some time. Cold feet. I didn't want to push."
"You didn't think to follow her?"
Ava's smile faded. "She's always emotional before big things. You know her."
Nolan didn't answer.
After, she lay back against the pillows, again.
"You still want to go through with it?" Ava asked lazily, watching him from beneath long lashes. "The vows, the big show, the pretty little bride?"
Nolan buttoned his shirt, checking the mirror with the ease of a man who owned every room he walked into.
"I need Nyra on my arm," he said simply. "She's beautiful. Obedient. Smart enough to play the game, but too soft to ever win it."
His phone buzzed.
He glanced at the screen. No messages.
He frowned.
"Where is she?"
Something felt… off.
He stood, pacing to the balcony, eyes scanning the city skyline like it could give him answers.
Thirty minutes passed.
Then an hour.
The stylists waited. The guests were arriving.
But still—no sign of her.
And finally the wedding coordinator knocked—pale, sweating, stammering—he already knew.
"Mr. Hayes… she's not here. We've looked everywhere. Her bridal suite is empty."
He froze.
"What do you mean, empty?"
"No one saw her leave. But… the front gate logs show she checked herself out. Alone."
Nolan's grip tightened on his phone.
This wasn't like her.
This wasn't Nyra.
The next call came moments later.
"Sir… it's about Miss Callahan."
His blood iced.
"What?"
"She just walked into Blackwood Tower."
Nolan's blood ran cold.
He asked "Who?"
"Miss Callahan, sir. Wearing her wedding dress. She's with Damien Blackwood now."
"She entered Blackwood Tower. She… made it to Damien Blackwood's office."
Nolan's jaw locked.
The air thinned. His grip crushed the glass in his hand, blood mixing with whiskey on the marble floor.
"She what?"
"She's with him, sir. We tried to stop her. We failed."
That name—Blackwood—was like a blade in his chest.
Why him?
Why there?