Damian Wolfe
I couldn't wait any longer.
I stepped forward, my voice cutting through the silence like a blade.
"You shouldn't be here."
Aria's eyes snapped to mine, hard as steel, piercing through the darkness. She didn't flinch. Not once. Kira stood at her side, hand near her weapon, but the tension between us was all about Aria. It always had been.
She didn't move. Just stared at me, those damned eyes reading me like an open book.
"Did you think I wouldn't find out?" Her voice was low, but it vibrated with a quiet rage I didn't miss. She was holding something back. Control. But not for long.
I didn't answer right away. I couldn't. Because part of me knew—she was smarter than I gave her credit for. More dangerous than I ever wanted her to be.
And I had made the mistake of letting her get too close.
"You're not who you think you are, Damian," she continued, stepping forward, her posture stiff with determination. She was trying to shake me. Trying to get under my skin like she always did. "This place, your father—Monarch... It's all lies."
I stepped into the room, my eyes narrowing as I walked toward her. Every step was deliberate. Calculated. "You know nothing about what you're talking about, Aria."
Kira tensed, but Aria held up a hand, signaling her to stand down. She was looking at me with a kind of disgust, as if the very air between us had turned to poison.
"You're right," she said slowly, her lips curling into something almost like pity. "I don't know everything about you, Damian. But I'm getting there."
"And when you do? What then?" I asked, my voice dropping, dangerously low. "What's your plan, Aria? You really think you can burn it all down? Everything you've worked for, everything your father built, *everything* that I've built?"
Aria took a deep breath, her eyes still fixed on mine. She didn't falter.
"I'm not here to burn it down," she said, her voice colder than the room. "I'm here to expose it. To show you, Damian, what you really are. What you really inherited."
I stepped closer, the space between us shrinking like a noose. "You think you can bring me down? After everything I've done to keep this empire intact? You think your little crusade against me is enough to take it all away?"
She didn't back down.
"I think you are the one who doesn't know what's coming next," she retorted. "I'm not just going after you, Damian. I'm going after everything. Every piece of Monarch. Every lie you've told, every shadow you've hidden in."
The air crackled with the weight of her words, like an electric storm about to explode. But I wasn't going to let her have the last word. Not here. Not now.
I moved forward, closing the distance between us. Aria didn't budge. Her defiance—it sparked something in me. Something dangerous.
"You think you can destroy me, Aria?" I said, my voice a quiet growl. "You think you can expose me for what I am?"
Aria's eyes darkened. "No, Damian. I think you'll expose yourself."
And then, just as I thought I had her cornered—just as I was about to speak again—the room seemed to shift. Kira moved, eyes darting toward the door, alert.
"I don't care if you think you have me trapped, Aria." My voice dropped to a whisper. "You're not the only one with a plan."
Before Aria could respond, I turned toward the door, "Let's see who plays the game better."
---
Aria Vale
I stood there, my heart racing as Damian's words rang in my ears. You're not the only one with a plan.
His presence, so overwhelming, had filled the room, suffocating everything in its path. I watched him retreat, his back a silhouette against the dim glow of the vault. His confidence was a wall I couldn't breach—not yet.
Kira stood beside me, still tense, her eyes flicking toward the door as if she expected him to turn back. But I knew better. Damian never did anything without purpose. If he had left the way he did, it was a message. A warning.
And I wasn't about to fall for it.
"What now?" Kira asked, her voice soft but sharp. She was watching me, gauging my next move.
I didn't answer immediately. My mind was still processing everything Damian had said—and everything he hadn't. The vault, the lies, the name that still haunted me—Sebastian Ward. There was something bigger at play here, something even more dangerous than I had realized.
"I'll tell you what's next," I said, finally breaking the silence. My voice was steady, even though my pulse thrummed with urgency. "We finish what we started."
Kira's eyes met mine, understanding flickering in them. She knew what that meant. "The vault?"
I nodded, already reaching for the controls to the vault's systems. "Yes. But we're not just exposing Damian. We're taking everything. The files, the connections, everything. I need to know who's been pulling the strings behind the scenes. Who's still operating under Monarch's shadow."
The hum of the vault came to life as the encrypted systems unlocked. The soft whir of data beginning to transfer sounded like the beginning of a storm. It was all falling into place—everything we'd worked for, everything I'd sacrificed, every piece of me that I'd given up to get here.
But even as I focused on the screen, my thoughts kept drifting back to Damian. The confrontation had shaken me more than I wanted to admit. He wasn't just a monster. Not anymore. He was a man who had been molded by this empire, this cage of power that I was trying to burn down.
But what if—what if I was wrong? What if he wasn't the enemy I thought he was?
"Aria," Kira's voice cut through my thoughts. "This is it. We're in."
I didn't take my eyes off the screen, but I felt it. The final step. The point of no return. "I know," I said quietly.
The file appeared in front of me, and for a moment, I felt the weight of it all. My fingers hovered over the keyboard, and I paused. There was no turning back from this. No erasing what was about to happen. If I exposed everything in this vault, if I pulled every string, Damian would never let me walk away. Not now.
But what choice did I have?
I took a breath. "Kira… Get the last piece ready. It's time to show the world what we've been hiding."
She nodded, her face hardening with resolve. She'd never question me, never hesitate. But even she knew the cost of this.
I glanced at her one last time before pulling the file open. "We expose him for who he really is. No more games. No more shadows. Just the truth."
The room filled with the sound of data being transferred—every shred of evidence, every key piece of Monarch's secret history flowing into the open. And I couldn't help but wonder if Damian Wolfe had underestimated me.
Because this time, there would be no escape.