Chapter 238 Would she even give me that chance?
Aria’s POV
The night had grown deep by the time I stepped off the private jet back in the capital.
I couldn’t risk Damian leaving the city—enemies still lurking in the shadows.So I’d become something of a commuter, flying back and forth to handle business at V&A Group in person.
I hadn’t told him I was coming back tonight. I wanted to surprise him. And maybe, just maybe, check that he’d actually kept his promise to stay home and rest properly.
But the moment I pushed open his room door, I was greeted by silence and darkness.
The entire space was pitch black. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows that ran the length of the living room, the city lights filtered in—a pale, ghostly illumination that did nothing to dispel the emptiness of the room.
It felt like no one was home at all.
"Damian?" I called out softly.
Something uneasy stirred in my chest. My voice came out quieter than I’d intended, instinctively gentle—as if I was afraid of disturbing something fragile.
I walked further into the living room, and that’s when I saw him.
He was curled up in the corner of the massive sofa, a thin blanket draped over his frame.
His eyes were closed, his breathing slow and even. The sight of him like that—so still, so vulnerable—sent an unexpected ache through my heart.
"Damian," I whispered, dropping my bag immediately and crouching down beside the sofa.
I called his name twice more, gently checking his forehead and hands for fever, terrified something might be wrong.
"You’re back."
His voice was deep and sleep-rough as his eyes opened slowly, long lashes fluttering. When his gaze found mine, it was impossibly soft.
"That was fast," he murmured. "I thought you’d be longer."
"Why are you sitting in the dark? Are you tired? If you were tired, you should have gone to bed. Does something hurt?" The questions tumbled out of me in rapid succession.
Before I could finish—or worse, get up to fetch something—Damian reached out and pulled me down onto his lap in one smooth motion, wrapping his arms around me.
"I was a little tired," he admitted quietly, his breath warm against my ear. "It wasn’t this dark when I sat down. I was thinking about some things and... accidentally fell asleep."
I tried to push his face back slightly with one hand, reaching up to compare our foreheads again. "Damian, something’s wrong. You’re warmer than me—are you running a fever?"
"I’m not," he said simply.
"We’re taking your temperature," I insisted, already pulling away from his embrace.
This time I wasn’t giving him a choice. I quickly freed myself from his arms and went straight for the medical kit. When I returned with the thermometer, he tilted his head back obediently and let me check.
The soft electronic beep made my face fall.
"Ninety-nine degrees. You are running a fever."
"It’s barely elevated," Damian said dismissively. "The doctor said it’s normal—just residual inflammation that hasn’t completely gone down yet."
He started to change the subject, but I was already pulling out my phone to call the doctor.
---
Damian’s POV
From the sofa, I watched her pace back and forth with the phone pressed to her ear, her voice polite and measured, anxiety threading through every question anyway.
If time could just stop right here, I found myself thinking. If it never moved forward from this moment... would I be happier?
The phone screen beside me had long since gone dark.
I’d already replied to Vanessa’s message this morning. Just one short sentence:
[I’m no longer the man you once knew. I wish you happiness. —Damian]
I understood exactly what she wanted. Meeting her would accomplish nothing. That single reply was the last courtesy I could offer—a final acknowledgment of the bond our families once shared.
Vanessa had to know I wouldn’t be swayed by threats. Sending that message at all was reckless; it could easily bring trouble down on the Crane family. But she was clinging to old illusions and had stopped caring about consequences.
The Cranes had shown me kindness once. I had no desire to retaliate against her personally.
Besides... even if I silenced her, could I really keep my secrets buried forever?
I wasn’t confident I could.
And more than that—I didn’t want to deceive Aria.
Vanessa’s message had reminded me that no matter how perfectly I tried to control everything, there would always be vulnerabilities.
Moments where the truth could slip through. Even if I was certain Aria wouldn’t leave me... how could I bear to put her at risk like that?
I’d spent the entire day bracing for the possibility that Vanessa would tell her everything. It felt like waiting for a verdict to be handed down.
But when Aria came home, there was nothing unusual in her demeanor at all.
Vanessa probably hadn’t reached out to her yet.
*Aria needs to hear all of it from you first—the basement, the hospital, the report. All of it.*My wolf growled.
*I know.* I replied. *But I’m terrified, wolf. Terrified that the moment she knows... she’ll walk away and never come back.*
*And how will you ever know,*my wolf said,* if you don’t give her the chance?*
Would she even give me that chance?