Page 24 of The Enemy of My Enemy Is… My Fake Boyfriend?

And what was Aria doing about it? Her family name was extremely rich and powerful, her dad one of the biggest lawyers in the city, her mom the definition of old money. They had all this power at their fingertips, the best and brightest people that could help them, and yet they'd let Aria go down with barely a fight.

One article defending her and that was it. One denial. Theyhadto do better than this.

I could text her, I could call her or find her anytime I wanted, but I wanted her to come to me. I'd already offered to helptwice,fucking twice, and been turned down. Not just turned down but turned down with scorn in her voice, in her stance, in her haughty attitude.

Even wearing a beat-up, old hoodie when I'd seen her last at the Midnight Café, she'd exuded arrogance and condescension toward me. I wasn't sure why I even bothered, to be honest.

I whirled my chair around, away from my desk, and looked out the windows at the view of Manhattan spread out before me. Normally, the scenery gave me immense satisfaction. My corner office, being at the helm of my own company... I'd come a long way from being the poor orphan kid that nobody wanted.

But today? It did nothing except make me madder.

Because it was a constant reminder. I mean, for fuck's sake, I could see her dad's building from my desk, where her mom also housed her event planning business, Aria's sometime place of employment... although I knew she'd also inherited a huge sum from her grandparents, making her the typical trust fund baby that I'd always despised.

Yeah, I hadn't taken a deep dive into everything Aria Stratton lately. I'd never do something as stalkerish as that.

There was a knock on my closed door and David poked his head in. "Don't forget you have that meeting on penetration testing in ten."

"Right. Thanks."

Fucking meetings. When I'd started this business, I'd vowed to never have any meetings of any kind. They were useless and annoying as hell. But then, I'd had to make an exception. And then another. Until I had to abandon my vow altogether. At least, I tried to keep them to a minimum.

He stared at me like he had something more to say.

"What?" I prodded. It wasn't like David to be so hesitant. He was my right-hand man, always blunt with me, and that's why I liked him. "What is it?"

"So this morning on my way to work, I was walking down Lexington and spotted Chase Harrington coming out of a coffee shop."

"Okay." There had to be more to this story, judging by David's halting speech. "And?"

"He was with someone."

And there it was. "A woman, I take it?"

"Yep, a woman."

"Who was it?"

"I think it was that assistant girl he cheated with."

Gesturing for David to step closer, I opened my laptop and pulled up a photo of Hannah Baxter. "Was this her?" I asked, angling my computer toward him to avoid any glare.

He leaned forward and studied the picture, his brows drawn together in a frown. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's her. But she looks different somehow."

I checked out the photo as well, examining her innocent smile. "Well, she's joined forces with the devil now so..."

David chuckled wryly, my one confidant to the whole sordid story. "True. That would change anyone."

"The picture's from her work bio on the Empire Shithole website, so it's probably from when she first moved here a few years ago."

We never actually called Chase's company by its real name. He didn't deserve that or even a modicum of respect, especially not now after what he'd done to Aria and was still doing. How the world was still fooled by him was beyond me.

Facing David, I gestured for him to have a seat. "I need to know every detail about what you saw. Were they acting like a boyfriend and girlfriend or more like a boss and employee?"

"Oh, they were definitely boyfriend and girlfriend. He held the door open for her and he smacked her ass as she walked past."

So fucking typical.

"She laughed, and then they held hands walking down the street. So yeah. They're for sure togetherpubliclynow."

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