Chapter 8

Adrian had spent the last forty-eight hours consumed by a single thought. Isabella is alive. He hadn’t slept. He hadn’t eaten. His entire world had shifted the moment she had stood before him in that crimson dress, looking like a dream—and then, in the next breath, like a nightmare. She had erased him. She had smiled, mocked him, and walked away like their marriage had never existed. Like she had never loved him. Now, Adrian was pacing his office, his mind running in a thousand directions at once. His hands curled into fists at his sides, frustration simmering beneath the surface. He had called every contact he had, tried tracing her movements from the night of the gala, but there was nothing. No records, no paper trail. She had covered her tracks well. But Adrian wasn’t a man who gave up. And he sure as hell wasn’t letting her disappear again. Across the city, Aria Laurent moved through her new world as if she had never belonged anywhere else. She sat in the sleek, modern of