Chapter 136: Broken image

NOAH

The silence in the sterile, fluorescent-lit bathroom was heavy, vibrating with the unspoken.

The woman’s eyes didn’t just look at me; they searched me, her pupils blown wide with a jagged, crystalline terror that made my own denial feel like a childish toy I’d outgrown.

She didn’t need to speak. The truth was written in the purple flowering of the bruises on her cheek and the way she flinched when the pipes in the wall groaned.

My breath hitched. The image of the “Good Alex”… the man who had bought me a suit, who had been patient on the dance floor, who had spoken of building communities… shattered like glass under a hammer.

The woman finally spoke, her voice a serrated blade of bitterness. “Even if I told you the whole story, how would you be able to help?” she asked, her gaze dropping to my shaking hands.

“Look at you. You’re terrified of your own shadow. Alex is powerful. No one can touch him.”

A rush of goosebumps cascaded across my skin, a physical manifestation of the cold dread settling in the pit of my stomach. I felt nauseated. The charming façade I had trusted was nothing more than a mask for a monster.

“The allegations,” I whispered, my voice cracking. “What you said at the site… about the safety violations. Is it true?”

She let out a short, hysterical bark of a laugh and gestured to her battered face. “Look at me right now. I’m being hunted through a gala by men in five-thousand-dollar suits. That only happens if I have something that can hurt his precious image.” Her voice broke then, her eyes swimming with sudden, hot tears.

“One of the victims was my best friend. She was an intern at Hendrix Corp. She killed herself a month ago.”

It felt like a bucket of Ice water had been poured over my head. My world tilted. The nausea rose until I had to swallow hard to keep from retching. Alex wasn’t just a corrupt businessman; he was a predator.

I forced my hands to stop shaking, gripping the edge of the marble sink until my knuckles turned white. I had to do something. I couldn’t be the victim here, and I couldn’t let her be one either.

“I know someone who can help,” I said, my voice gaining a desperate strength. “Someone who might be the only person in this city powerful enough… and mean enough… to defeat Alex.”

The woman looked at me with deep skepticism. “Who? Another billionaire with a savior complex?”

I didn’t answer. I pulled out my phone, my thumb scrolling frantically through my contacts until I found the name that felt like both a lifeline and a curse: Cassian Wolfe.

I hit call. My heart hammered against my ribs in sync with the dial tone. Pick up. Please, Cassian, pick up. It rang. And rang. Then, the cold, mechanical click of voicemail.

I remembered Cassian leaving the hall with that ominous man, Marchetti. A new layer of dread settled over me. Was he even okay? Had he walked into a trap of his own? I tried again. Voicemail. A third time. Nothing.

I stared at the screen, feeling a stinging sense of abandonment. We were “done.” He had made that clear. To him, I was probably just a liability he’d successfully offloaded onto a rival. But I swallowed my pride. This was bigger than our drama. This was life and death.

The woman watched me, her hope evaporating as the silence of the phone stretched on. “You’re lying,” she whispered, backing away toward the bathroom door. “You’re just like the rest of them. Unreliable. You’re going to wait until they find me, and then you’ll tell them you were just ’holding me’ for them.”

“No!” I lunged forward, grabbing her arm. “Wait! It’s dangerous out there alone!”

She pulled away with surprising force, her eyes wild. “More dangerous than staying here with a man who works for the person who did this to me?”

“I know this building,” I pleaded, my voice hushed but intense. “I wandered earlier when I was… trying to clear my head. I know the service corridors. I can get you out. Please. Let me help. I owe you that much for… for being with him. For believing him.”

The woman searched my face. She saw the genuine desperation, the raw guilt, and the fact that I was just as scared as she was. She hesitated, then gave a singular, sharp nod. “Lead the way.”

We moved like ghosts through the guts of the building. I led her through a heavy steel door that looked like a utility closet but actually opened into a narrow service hallway.

We avoided the main thoroughfares, sticking to back staircases and dimly lit passages where the smell of expensive perfume was replaced by the scent of floor wax and old stone.

We had multiple close calls. Once, we had to dive behind a massive supply cart filled with dirty linens as two guards marched past, their radios crackling with static.

Another time, we ducked into a dark storage room, our breaths held until our lungs burned, as a flashlight beam swept through the crack under the door.

“My name is Maya Reeves,” she whispered as we crouched behind a stack of crates. “What’s yours?”

“Noah. Noah Bennett.”

She paused, her eyes narrowing. “Oh. So you’re Noah.”

I blinked, confused. “Have you heard my name before?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice dripping with a fresh layer of disgust. “Earlier, when he was… when he was threatening me. He eventually left the room earlier than he wanted to. He said he didn’t want to keep his date waiting. He mentioned your name.”

My stomach twisted into a sickening knot. I felt physically ill, a cold sweat breaking out on my forehead. Maya asked if we were dating, and I denied it so fast I almost tripped over my words. I told her the truth: I was a liaison. Alex was the one pursuing me.

As we moved, she told me fragments of her story… of the girls Alex had “sponsored,” of the NDA’s signed under duress, and of the way he used his charm like a sedative. Each word was a lash of guilt across my back.

Finally, we reached a heavy oak door at the end of a long, dark corridor. This was it. I remembered it from my wandering… it led to the exterior gardens near the private parking area.

I looked through the small, reinforced glass pane. Outside, the garden was beautiful and treacherous, lit by decorative fairy lights that cast long, distorted shadows. Beyond the hedges, I could see the rows of high-end cars. Freedom was less than fifty yards away.

I reached for the door handle, but my hand froze.

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