Chapter 8 Maybe he knew and simply didn't care.

Elara's POV

"Fine." I didn't lose my temper, didn't demand answers, didn't even let a ripple of emotion touch my voice.

I turned and walked straight toward the dressing room, leaving him standing there alone.

Damian clearly hadn't expected me to agree so easily.

As I closed the dressing room door, I caught a glimpse of him in my peripheral vision—standing frozen in place, brows drawn together, a rare flicker of confusion crossing his face.

Half an hour later, we left.

A convoy of black Maybachs rolled out of the estate in formation, speeding along the coastline.

I sat in the rear vehicle, watching the bulletproof lead car ahead.

Damian, Vivian, and Caleb were inside.

They were the real family.

We arrived at Emerald Bay just as the sun hit its peak.

The entire private beach had been cleared by Montgomery security.

Dozens of men in black suits and sunglasses stood at intervals, the outlines of shoulder holsters visible beneath their jackets.

Vivian sat in a custom beach wheelchair, draped in Damian's dark overcoat.

She wore a wide-brimmed straw hat, her face pale but her eyes bright with happiness.

"Damian, the ocean is beautiful here." She tilted her head up at the man standing beside her.

Damian had one hand in his pocket, looking down at her.

Those ice-blue eyes—the ones that struck terror into anyone who crossed him—were filled with a tenderness I'd never seen directed at me.

"If you like it, we'll come often," he said quietly.

"Daddy! Mommy Vivian! Look what I found!" Caleb ran across the sand barefoot, holding up a pink shell and throwing himself into Vivian's arms.

Vivian smiled, touching his head. "Caleb, you're so clever. That shell is beautiful."

"I want to give it to Mommy Vivian!" Caleb announced proudly.

Damian stood watching them, the corner of his mouth lifting in the faintest smile.

I stood ten meters away beneath a beach umbrella, like a ghost that didn't belong.

The wind was cold, cutting through my thin knit sweater, but I felt nothing.

I just watched.

Watched them together by the ocean.

Watched my son call another woman mother.

Watched my husband make promises to someone else.

My emotions were complicated.

No tearing jealousy, no hysterical anger.

Just a deep exhaustion and a sense of absurdity.

I looked at Damian's tall figure, at his hair blown loose by the wind, at the sharp line of his jaw in profile.

He still believed that five years ago in that Las Vegas casino was the first time we met.

He thought he'd been my savior, buying me from those drug dealers for thirty million dollars and the title of Mrs. Montgomery.

He assumed I'd spent these five years being compliant out of gratitude and fear.

But Damian didn't know.

Maybe he'd never know.

Long before that chaotic night in Vegas, I'd already known him.

Back then, he wasn't yet the untouchable mafia don.

Back then, I'd already carved this man deep into my bones.

I'd been naive enough to believe that if I just stayed by his side, if I loved him with everything I had, eventually the ice would melt.

I thought it was mutual salvation.

It turned out to be premeditated murder.

The waves crashed against the rocks with a deafening roar.

Vivian seemed cold, coughing lightly.

Damian immediately bent down, pulling the coat tighter around her.

Then he turned his head, his gaze locking onto me across the sand—cold and commanding.

"Elara." He raised his voice, the tone brooking no argument. "Come here. Push Vivian somewhere out of the wind."

I looked at him, the ocean wind fragmenting his words.

I pulled my wandering thoughts back, shoved my hands in my pockets, and walked toward them with no expression on my face.

One step, two steps.

Each footfall in the soft sand buried the old Elara—the foolish, pathetic one—a little deeper in my mind.

It's fine now.

I looked at Damian's cold face and told myself silently.

Soon, you won't need my care anymore.

And I won't need you.

I reached the wheelchair and gripped the cold metal handles.

Damian stood beside me, his gaze sweeping over my hands. "Push carefully. Avoid the rocks and uneven spots."

I said nothing, just pressed the unlock button and began pushing Vivian toward the sheltered area near the rock formations.

The wind blew Vivian's hair against my hands, carrying the scent of expensive perfume.

My gaze drifted past her head to the rolling gray-blue waves in the distance.

The same coastline.

The same sound of waves.

Five years ago, on another California beach, I'd made the decision that changed my life.

Back then, I knew nothing about the Montgomery family or what a mafia don meant.

I was just a newcomer making a name for myself in Los Angeles gemology circles.

It was the most hopeful period of my life—I'd landed a position at a top appraisal house and started working with clients who owned Beverly Hills mansions.

I thought I'd finally escaped my toxic family and could have my own life.

Reality delivered a fatal blow soon enough.

My biological parents had racked up massive gambling debts at an underground Vegas casino.

When the loan sharks showed up at my door with the IOUs, I realized what kind of hell I'd been dragged into.

I emptied my bank accounts, even sold my car, and paid off their debt.

I thought that was the end.

It was just the beginning of a bottomless pit.

Within months, a second debt appeared, then a third.

When I refused to keep paying for their greed, they did something that shattered me completely.

They tracked down my biggest client and caused a scene at the appraisal house, rolling around on the floor and accusing me of stealing jewelry to sell.

My career was destroyed.

The appraisal house fired me.

The industry blacklisted me.

Everything I'd worked so hard to build vanished in a single day.

Exhausted and hopeless—that was how I felt about the world five years ago.

I walked along the coastline for hours, until the water reached my knees, then my waist.

I thought if I just took a few more steps and let the cold ocean swallow me, it would all be over.

Just as I was about to close my eyes, a wave pushed something dark against my legs.

A man.

He wore a torn black shirt, half his body submerged in water, his chest and abdomen covered in horrifying gunshot wounds.

Blood had turned the surrounding water dark red.

His eyes were closed, his face paper-white, his breathing barely detectable.

That was Damian, dying.

I stood there in waist-deep water, looking at this stranger on death's doorstep, and felt a strange kinship.

We were both abandoned by the world, both hovering at the edge of death.

I don't know where I found the strength, but I grabbed his shoulders and dragged him toward shore.

He was heavy, all solid muscle.

I used every ounce of strength I had to pull him onto dry sand.

I knelt beside him, pressing my hands against his blood-soaked chest, giving him CPR.

"If you can survive, then I'll keep living too," I promised myself as I worked.

It was my last chance at life.

If someone this close to hell could be pulled back, then maybe I could survive in this rotten world too.

Fortunately, his breathing returned.

He survived.

I called an ambulance from a payphone and left the beach before it arrived.

Afterward, I never followed up on what happened to him.

But I kept my promise.

I didn't try to die again.

I moved to a new city, found an ordinary office job, and tried to bury the past and start over.

The Vegas creditors didn't let me go.

A few months later, they cornered me in an alley after work.

They dragged me to the casino.

Tattooed men with knives tried to pay off the debt.

I struggled desperately, certain this was the end.

That's when Damian appeared.

He wore an impeccably tailored black suit, followed by dozens of armed guards.

He looked like death incarnate—one look from him had those vicious dealers trembling on their knees.

That was the first time he showed me the absolute power of the Montgomery patriarch.

He had his men break the creditors' legs and dump them outside California like garbage.

Then he walked up to me and draped his coat over my shoulders—it smelled like cedar.

"Elara, I've come for you," he said, his ice-blue eyes focused on me with an intensity I'd never seen before.

Later, he cleared the entire thirty-million-dollar mess my parents had left behind.

He brought me to the estate, gave me access to the best medical team to recover my health, treated me with consideration, even knelt to propose.

I was stupidly naive back then.

I thought he remembered the beach.

I thought mafia men had obsessive codes about repaying debts.

I thought all his kindness, all his gentleness, came from gratitude that I'd pulled him back from death.

I thought he loved me.

Because of that assumption, I willingly accepted his proposal and wore the ring marking me as Mrs. Montgomery.

I willingly gave up the chance to rebuild my career and trapped myself in this estate, cooking his meals and bearing his child.

I thought it was mutual salvation.

Until I saw that compatibility report and heard him admit he'd only married me for my heart, I didn't realize this had always been premeditated murder.

He didn't love me.

He probably didn't even know I was the one who saved him on that beach five years ago.

Or maybe he knew and simply didn't care.

To him, my only value was that my heart was a perfect match for Vivian.

A gust of wind hit my collar, making me shiver involuntarily.

My thoughts snapped back to the present.

The wheelchair's wheels crunched over shells in the sand.

I looked down at Vivian, wrapped in Damian's coat, examining the pink shell Caleb had given her.