Ava had stopped crying.
But that didn't make her calm.
It made her dangerous.
She sat across from Damian in the back of the black town car as it cut through the city's glowing streets. Rain slicked the windows, blurring lights into streaks of red and gold.
The silence between them was sharp, almost cruel.
"She's not safe," Ava finally said.
Damian didn't respond.
"I know my sister. She's not stable. She took her to punish me."
Still, no reply.
"You said you'd help me."
He glanced at her. "And I meant it."
"Then help me for real," she said, her voice tightening. "Not as your wife. Not as some PR trophy in a penthouse cage. Help me as someone who can actually do something."
Damian's eyes narrowed slightly. "What are you asking?"
"I want full access," she said. "To your team. Your investigators. I want resources, no red tape."
"You think I'm going to just hand you that kind of power?"
"You gave me your name," Ava said coolly. "Why not the truth?"
The car stopped outside Blackwood Tower.
Neither moved.
Then she dropped the real weight.
"If you don't help me find her—really help me—then the marriage ends. I'll walk away from everything. The contract, the press, the fake smiles. All of it."
Damian blinked.
Slowly.
"You'd destroy the whole arrangement? Everything we've built? Over a child?"
"She's not just a child," Ava whispered. "She's the only reason I agreed to marry a man I hated."
Silence cracked open between them like lightning.
Then, something shifted in Damian's eyes.
It wasn't anger.
It was realization.
That Ava was done being passive. Done letting other people make the moves.
"You think you can threaten me?" he said, voice like steel.
"No," she said. "I'm offering you a choice."
The rain hit harder now, drumming against the roof like war drums.
Damian leaned back, studying her.
"Fine," he said at last. "You want access? You'll get it. Full team, no limits. But there's one condition."
"What?"
"You don't lie to me again," he said softly. "About anything."
Ava hesitated.
And then nodded. "Deal."
But deep in her chest, something twisted.
Because there were still lies she hadn't told him.
And one of them could shatter him.