The Billionaire's Bought Bride and Instant Mom Chapter 259

Orion

Seeing Aveline's familiar silhouette appear in the doorway, hearing that confident voice cut through the warehouse's oppressive atmosphere, I can't help but let a smile tug at the corner of my mouth despite everything. I know that tone—she's not here as a desperate wife walking into a trap. She's here as a hunter who's already planned every move.

My job now is simple: keep Sera distracted and off-balance.

Sera's rage from moments before seems to evaporate instantly at the sight of Aveline. With a single sharp gesture, she signals four of her men to surround my wife. The professional way they move tells me these aren't amateur thugs—but they're also not the Pakhan's elite soldiers.

"How touching," Sera calls out, her voice dripping with theatrical sweetness. "You actually showed up. But cutting it close, aren't we? Last minute arrival? Please don't tell me you spent this whole time debating whether your husband was worth the risk. That would be so unlike your usual decisive style."

Aveline's response is perfectly calibrated—just the right mix of vulnerability and defiance. "Life and death decisions deserve careful consideration, don't you think? But I'm here now. So how about having your people release him?"

Instead of complying, Sera slowly circles behind my chair. I feel her presence like ice against my spine before her fingers find my deepest wound. She presses down deliberately, sending white-hot agony shooting through my entire torso. I can't suppress the strangled cry that escapes my throat.

"So eager, are we?" Sera laughs, digging her nails deeper into the torn flesh. "Don't you want to comfort your poor husband first? Look at him—he's absolutely riddled with holes. It breaks my heart to see him suffer like this."

The pain is excruciating, but through the haze of agony, I hear something that makes me want to grin despite everything. Aveline's voice, cold as winter steel: "I expected you to make him suffer more than this, honestly. But seeing him in this condition? I have to say, Sera, I think you still have feelings for him. You just can't bring yourself to truly hurt the man you love."

The words hit Sera like a physical blow. Her face flushes deep red, and I feel her entire body tense behind me. Perfect. Aveline knows exactly which buttons to push.

"You think I'm not being ruthless enough?" Sera's voice cracks slightly as she shouts. "You really believe that? You think I'm going soft on him?"

She suddenly stops the recording device in her hands, clutching it like a weapon. "You know what? When we're done here, you can watch every second of how your precious husband was humiliated under my care. Every. Single. Moment."

Aveline's smile is sharp as a blade. "Wonderful. Then release him, and we'll have all the time in the world to review your home movies together."

Sera's composure is cracking now, her carefully planned superiority crumbling under Aveline's psychological assault. "Oh, and don't forget to pay special attention to the part where your husband and I shared that passionate, desperate kiss!"

I feel heat rise in my cheeks—this is not how I wanted that moment described. But before I can say anything, Aveline's laughter rings out like music.

"Is that so? Then why do I see blood on your mouth, darling? Seems like your tongue wasn't quite as appetizing as you imagined. Rather like everything else about you—all flash, no substance."

That does it. Sera snaps completely, storming across the warehouse floor until she's standing inches from Aveline's face. "You know I could kill both of you right now! Right here!"

But Aveline doesn't even blink. "Could you really? Could you actually bring yourself to kill him? The man you've loved obsessively, the one you've never been able to get over?"

"Shut up," Sera hisses, but there's something desperate in her voice now.

"Let me tell you the truth, Sera," Aveline continues, her voice steady and cutting. "He has never, not for a single moment, been interested in you. Not romantically, not physically, not emotionally. Nothing."

Sera's face flushes red. "That's not—"

"Everything you've done, every pathetic attempt to get his attention, has only made him despise you more. This little performance of yours? This elaborate kidnapping scheme? It's just the final proof of how utterly repulsive you are to him."

"You're lying!" Sera's voice cracks.

Aveline's smile is razor-sharp. "Am I? Look at his face right now. Even beaten and bleeding, tied to that chair, the disgust in his eyes when he looks at you is unmistakable. You orchestrated this entire elaborate scheme just to force him to pay attention to you, to create some kind of twisted connection between you two. Don't you see how pathetic that makes you?"

Sera's eyes go wild with rage and something that looks like madness. Her breathing becomes erratic, her hands shaking with fury. "Fine! You want to see pathetic? You think I can't make him want me? You think he feels nothing?"

The unhinged gleam in her eyes tells me she's about to cross a line there's no coming back from. "I'll prove to you just how wrong you are about what he feels for me!"

She signals for her men to keep their weapons trained on Aveline, then strides back toward me with predatory intent. Every instinct I have screams danger as she drops to her knees in front of my chair.

"Sera, don't—" I start, but she's already reaching for my belt with shaking hands.

A cold dread washes over me as I realize what she's planning. I struggle against the restraints, ignoring the way the movement tears at my wounds, but the ropes hold firm. She manages to unfasten my pants, tugging them down despite my desperate attempts to resist.

Her men exchange uncomfortable glances. One of them, clearly the most experienced of the group, steps forward nervously. "Miss Sera, I really think we need to evacuate this position. Our numbers are limited, and conducting operations without the Pakhan's knowledge is extremely dangerous. The longer we stay in one location, the easier it becomes for hostile forces to triangulate our position..."

"Shut up!" Sera snarls without looking away from her twisted task. "We have sentries posted at every entrance. If rescue teams were approaching, we'd hear the gunfire long before they reached us. We'll be gone in minutes anyway, so stop your whining!"

Her hands move with manic determination, and despite every fiber of my being rejecting what's happening, my body begins to respond involuntarily to her touch. The humiliation burns almost as much as my physical wounds.

"See that?" Sera's voice is triumphant, unhinged. "You still think he feels nothing for me?"

But her moment of victory is short-lived.

The first sign of trouble is the sound of bodies hitting the ground outside—our perimeter guards dropping silently in the darkness. The men inside the warehouse hear it too, their heads snapping toward the entrances with weapons raised.

Red laser dots suddenly dance across their foreheads like deadly fireflies.

They don't even have time to run. The suppressed gunfire sounds like whispered death sentences as they crumple to the warehouse floor one by one.

Then the real cavalry arrives.

Figures in tactical gear pour through every opening—windows, side doors, the main entrance—moving with the fluid precision of a well-oiled military machine. Night vision goggles give them an otherworldly appearance as they secure the perimeter in seconds.

At the head of the formation, I recognize Dmitri's distinctive silhouette. Relief floods through me like a drug.

Vivian materializes beside Sera as if she's stepped out of thin air, pressing the barrel of her pistol against the woman's temple. Her grin is absolutely feral. "You actually thought you could threaten Aveline and get away with it? How adorably naive."

Sera's face goes white with terror and fury. "Aveline! You played me! You broke the rules!"

For the first time since entering the warehouse, Aveline's mask of cold confidence slips away. Her expression becomes natural, almost gentle, as she rushes to my side. Her hands shake slightly as she works to untie the ropes binding me to the chair.

"Sera," she says without turning around, her voice carrying a note of genuine pity, "you're the most pathetic creature I've ever encountered. You're going to pay for this in ways you can't even imagine."

She nods to Vivian. "Take her. Make sure she understands the consequences of crossing our family."

As Dmitri helps support my weight while Aveline finishes freeing me from my restraints, I catch sight of Sera being dragged away. The woman who thought she could play games with forces far beyond her understanding is about to learn exactly how outmatched she's always been.

The nightmare is finally over.