Chapter 225: The Devil’s Gets An Invitation

?Damian’s brow twitched. "You are not stepping into Sterling Global today. Vivian is on the street. The cameras outside the lobby will be three deep."

?"Which is precisely why I have to be there," Ana countered, tilting her chin up. "If I hide behind your private militia, the press will call it terror. The board will panic, the stock will bleed, and Vivian gets her victory before she even speaks a word. I am not running."

?"She’s right, Damian," Jullian chimed in, leaning over the espresso machine. "If the Chairman’s girl hides under a duvet the morning after Vivian’s release, Wall Street reads it as weakness. You play the board better than anyone... you know optics dictate leverage."

?Damian folded his arms, his lethal frame blocking out half the morning light spilling from the terrace windows. For five agonizing seconds, the silence stretched, thick with unspoken friction.

?"You walk into that building through the underground bay," Damian finally rumbled, his voice low and absolute. "Henry controls the floor. Every elevator is locked to biometric clearance, and my personal detail stays on your floor. You step out of that perimeter, Anastasia, and I carry you out myself. Understood?"

?Ana set her mug down with a measured click. "Fine."

?Before the uneasy truce could settle, Jullian jerked his chin toward the private study. "Damian. A word."

?Damian followed Jullian down the short corridor, the heavy frosted door sealing out the noise of the kitchen.

?Inside, the playful arrogance vanished from Jullian’s face. He pulled up an encrypted feed on his desk monitor.

?"We ran surveillance on the courthouse exits," Jullian said, his voice dropping into hard, urgent gravity. "She stepped into a plain black town car at seven-fifteen. No security escort, no convoy, no contact with any of her family’s known legal associates. Our trackers lost the tail three blocks past the Manhattan Bridge. Damian... she didn’t run to an airport, she didn’t check into a hotel, and she hasn’t made a single encrypted transmission."

?Damian’s eyes darkened into black ice. "She vanished in broad daylight."

?"Completely," Jullian said grimly. "She’s a phantom right now. We have no idea what her play is, where she’s sleeping, or who is bankrolling her."

?A sharp knock broke the tension.

?Henry opened the door, his face pale as he held out a vibrating tablet. "Sir. It’s Mrs. Sterling. On the priority line."

?Damian took the device, bringing it to his ear without preamble. "Mother."

?Victoria’s voice came through, crystalline, aristocratic, and sharp over the encrypted connection.

?"I trust you have finished playing rescue ranger in lower Manhattan, Damian," Victoria spoke, cutting straight through the morning chaos. "Catherine Dupont and Helen Belmont have already called three times this morning. The city is waiting for our family to respond."

?"Let them wait," Damian said coldly.

?"No," Victoria commanded with absolute authority. "We do not cower in shadows, and we do not let a pariah dictate our market narrative. The Metropolitan Autumn Gala is tomorrow evening. Sterling Global is the primary patron. You and Anastasia will walk in together, arm in arm, looking utterly untouched by this sordid circus."

?Damian’s fingers tightened on the tablet. "Anastasia is not a display piece for your socialite circle."

?"She is the woman of Sterling Global’s chairman, and you need to understand her role in your life is important," Victoria retorted, her tone leaving no room for defiance. "If you wish to crush Vivian Stark, you do it under the blinding lights where she cannot hide. Present an unbroken front, Damian. Or watch the vultures tear your firm apart."

?The line severed.

?Damian lowered the tablet, staring blankly ahead as the sheer scale of the chessboard unfolded before him.

?Vivian was in the wind. The city was watching. And tomorrow night, they would have to step directly into the lion’s den.

**********

The armored Maybach cut through the rain-slicked morning traffic of Manhattan, flanked by two black SUVs carrying Sterling’s elite security detail.

?Inside the quiet, leather-lined cabin, the silence was suffocating.

?Clara sat up front beside the driver, her eyes glued nervously to the passing skyscrapers, while Ana and Damian sat in the back. Damian hadn’t touched his tablet since they left Jullian’s penthouse. His broad shoulders were stiff against the seat, his jaw tight as he stared out into the grey drizzle.

?"My mother called," Damian broke the silence, his low baritone cutting through the hum of the engine.

?Ana turned her head, meeting his dark profile. "Is everything okay with her and what does your mother want?"

?"The Metropolitan Autumn Gala is tomorrow evening," Damian said, turning to look directly at her. "Sterling Global is the headline patron. She expects us to arrive together. Side by side."

?Ana scoffed, folding her arms over her chest as bitterness crept into her hazel eyes. "Of course. Vivian walks free, the city smells blood, and Victoria wants to put on a society circus to prove we aren’t shaken."

?"It isn’t about what my mother wants what what we require now," Damian rumbled, his voice dropping into an unyielding, protective gravity. "It’s about control. As you said, the moment the market thinks you’re cowering, they move in. But listen to me, Anastasia. You don’t have to entertain the vultures. If you don’t want to mingle with anyone, you won’t need to. You don’t smile for the cameras, and you don’t answer a single reporter’s question. But you stay by my side. Every second. No drifting off. No exceptions."

?Ana held his gaze, reading the raw, uncompromising possessiveness beneath the command... the sheer refusal to let the world touch her. She didn’t offer a sweet agreement, but she gave a single, firm nod. "Fine. I know your mother is wise. We will attend it together."

?Ten minutes later, the convoy descended into the private, reinforced subterranean bay beneath the Sterling Global tower.

?Security guards instantly cordoned off the perimeter, escorting them straight into the private executive lift.

?Ding.

?The doors slid open on the sixty-fourth floor... and the illusion of order vanished.

?The executive corridor outside the boardroom was a chaotic swarm. Several senior board members, key institutional investors, and department heads were pacing the polished marble, speaking frantically into phones and cornering legal counsel. The moment Damian and Anastasia stepped out, the noise died down, every anxious face whipping toward them.

"Damian! Thank god," Raymond Caldwell, a senior board director and key institutional trustee, pushed forward, clutching a stack of morning trading printouts. "The Asian markets were rattling all morning, and now London is hammering our industrial futures! Vivian Stark’s exoneration is all over the financial wires, and rumors are spreading that she’s already liquidating private assets to partner with Dante Sullivan’s investment fund to short Sterling Global stock!"

?"The institutional shareholders are spooked," another director chimed in, sweat glistening at his temples. "Sullivan has unlimited capital, and if Stark aligns with him to challenge our shipping routes while holding legal immunity, we could see an aggressive market raid by Friday. What is the contingency plan?"

Damian’s jaw tightened. Vivian and her games... Deliberately targeting my business to gain my attention.