Mated to My Fiancé’s Alpha King Brother

68 Chapter 68

68 Chapter 68

Damien’s POV 1

The silence in the car stretched between us like a taut wire, heavy with implications I wasn’t ready to fully acknowledge. My hands clenched and unclenched on my knees as I struggled to process what Caleb had just told me. Anna hadn’t been my mystery woman- she’d been a desperate hotel cleaning lady trying to sell stolen goods.

“Tell me more about what she looked like that morning,” I said, my voice hoarse with barely controlled emotion. “Her hair color, her build

-anything you can remember.”

Caleb’s brow furrowed in concentration as he stared out at the passing streetlights. “Her hair… it was definitely blonde, just like it is now.

That awful brassy blonde that screams ‘cheap dye job. As for her build…” He shrugged apologetically. “I’m sorry, but I honestly can’t say

for certain. That cleaning uniform was so baggy and shapeless, and she was hunched over, clutching that pendant like her life depended

on it.”

My heart sank even as a terrible hope began to bloom in my chest. Blonde hair. Anna had always been blonde, even five years ago. But

the woman from that night…

Caleb was staring at me with undisguised confusion, his brow furrowed as he tried to piece together what he’d witnessed tonight.

“Damien, I have to ask,” he said carefully, “why would you hire someone like Anna as your assistant? I mean, from what I saw tonight, she

doesn’t exactly seem… qualified for a position in a major corporation.”

I ran a hand through my hair, suddenly feeling the weight of my mistakes pressing down on me. “You’re right. Under normal

circumstances, I wouldn’t let Anna within a hundred feet of my company, let alone give her access to sensitive corporate information.”

Then why did you?”

The question hung in the air between us, and I found myself staring out at the passing city lights as I struggled to find the words to

explain five years of desperate searching and mounting frustration.

“Because she had something that belonged to me,” I said finally. “That pendant.”

I leaned back against the seat, the familiar ache of longing settling into my chest. “A few weeks ago, Anna showed up at my office lobby,

screaming about being my lover and waving my pendant around like some kind of trophy. She claimed she was the woman from that

looking

“And you believed her?”

in Caleb’s voice made me wince. “I wanted to believe her. God help

you doubt

said with bitter honesty. “Her story kept changing. The details she gave about that night didn’t match my memories. And her scent…” I shuddered slightly. “Anna smells like cheap perfume and desperation. The woman from that night smelled

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was with had dark hair,” I said quietly, more to myself than to Caleb.

between my fingers.”

mystery woman,” Caleb said with certainty. “Trust

for natural

Anna definitely wasn’t your mystery woman,” Caleb said with

blonde for natural

wrong. For weeks, I’d believed Anna was the woman from that magical night, my potential mate.

I’d even consciously decided to call Lucas. The

sleep.

any idea what

said without preamble,

you to get someone to recover the security footage from the Moonlight Grand

fifteenth, specifically.”

he came fully awake. “Damien, that’s from five years ago. You have checked

that long, and

about the difficulties,” I interrupted, my grip tightening on the phone. “Use

favors we have. I need that footage, Lucas. All of it—lobby,

is about the pendant again, isn’t

any pretense. “I think I’ve

we

intact and useful are-”

said

against the leather seat. Beside me, Caleb was watching me with a mixture of

you’ve been looking for,” Caleb said carefully, “what was she actually like? What

myself drift back to that night for what felt like the thousandth time. But now, instead of the bitter disappointment that usually accompanied these memories, I felt something

a whisper. “The most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. She had these incredible emerald green eyes-not just green, but this deep, vibrant shade that reminded me of forests

dim

Caleb

subject despite the ache in my chest. “Delicate,

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