The Billionaire’s Secret Witness

Chapter Two: Terms for Survival.

By the time the car stopped, I had stopped crying. Not because the pain had eased.

But for some reasons it had hardened inside me. My throat burned, my chest ached, and every thought in my head circled back to my little Alora.

The car door opened abruptly before I could steady myself. Rough hands grabbed my arm and pulled me out. I stumbled forward, barely catching my footing as they dragged me through a building with large polished hallway. Marble floors reflected the dim lights overhead. Tall walls towered around me. Everything here looked expensive, and lifeless in a certain kind of way.

This wasn’t a home. It was the kind of place people obeyed. I nearly fell once, but the men holding me didn’t slow down. They didn’t care if I broke my face against the floor. They pushed open massive double doors and shoved me forward.

I hit the marble hard, pain shooting through my palms.

“Mr Wolfe,” one of the men behind me said. “We found him. And the girl was with him.”

My breath caught, Mr Wolfe” that name was. I lifted my head slowly.

The room was enormous, dimly lit with warm gold light that somehow still felt cold. A scent of leather, whiskey, and something masculine lingered in the air. Then my eyes landed on him. The injured man from the storage lot.

He was stretched across a leather couch now, unconscious, his white shirt cut open while blood stained the bandages wrapped around his side. His chest rose and fell slowly. He was still alive. Relief flickered through me for exactly one second before my gaze shifted farther ahead.

And landed on the man behind the desk.

Kaiden Wolfe.

Everyone in Velrane knew that name. A billionaire, Philanthropist and bussiness tycoon. The man whose companies practically ran the city. He was always on magazinea and giant screens downtown looking untouchable.

But the man sitting in front of me looked nothing like those polished photographs. He looked dangerous. Lord save me! he was dropdead handsome.

Tall even while seated, broad shoulders hidden beneath a black shirt with the sleeves rolled slightly upward. Dark hair fell carelessly over his forehead, like he had run his fingers through it one too many times. But it was his eyes that froze me completely. Cold blue eyeds the exact same shade as the injured man’s. Except where the other man’s eyes had held warmth beneath the pain, Kaiden’s held nothing soft at all. He looked at me the way powerful men looked at problems.

Slowly, he rose from his chair and began walking toward me.

Each step echoed through the room. I swallowed hard and pushed myself upright onto my knees.

“Please,” I whispered, hating how shaky my voice sounded. “Please tell your men to let me go. My sister they took her.. I didn’t do anything, I swear!! please tell your men to help go find my sister”

He stopped just in front of me. I could feel the pressure of his gaze against my skin.

“That’s two requests,” he said quietly. “And you’ve been here less than a minute.”

My breath caught.

“Alyssa.”

The sound of my name snapped through me instantly. I looked up at him sharply.

“How do you know my.. ”

The question died in my throat before I finished it. Of course he knew. Men like him always know everything.

Kaiden turned away from me before I could speak again. He walked back toward his desk calmly, like I wasn’t kneeling on the floor breaking apart in front of him. He picked up a pen and began writing something without urgency.

“I don’t grant favours without cause,” he said evenly. “And you have put yourself into my affairs.”

“I didn’t!” I rushed out. “My sister ran into that place. I only went after her, I swear I didn’t see anything!”

“My enemies,” he interrupted smoothly, “currently have something of yours.”

I froze.

“Which,” he continued casually, “is not my concern.”

Something inside me cracked at that.

“No…” My voice broke. “Please… she’s just a child.”

Still no reaction.

“She’s all I have,” I whispered desperately. “Please don’t let them hurt her…”

He finally slid a document across the desk toward me.

“Sign it.”

I stared at the paper numbly.

“What…?”

“A contract.”

My fingers trembled as I picked it up.

Then my eyes widened. Marriage Contract.

I looked up at him immediately.

“What?” My voice came out breathless. “No… no, how can i..”

Now he looked at me fully, something flickering in his eyes like interest.

“You were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. “You saw men who do not leave witnesses behind. You saw me.” His gaze sharpened slightly. “And now they have your sister.”

I gripped the paper tighter.

“If you leave this house tonight,” he continued calmly, “you will not survive long enough to see morning.” Fear slid down my spine.

“The city knows me as a man of clean hands,” he said. “A respectable man and that illusion remains intact because I am careful.”

His eyes locked onto mine fully.

“You are not.”

A kind of heavy, suffocating silence filled the room

“You want your sister back,” he said finally.

“Yes.” I rushed out

“Then become useful to me.”

I stared at him.

“You will sign that contract,” he continued, “and become my wife publicly.” His voice lowered slightly. “For as long as I decide.”

Marriage to him? Nothing about this felt real.

“I can’t…” I whispered.

“And in return,” he said, “I will bring your sister back to you.”

My thoughts spiralled violently. How can I sign a marriage contract to a man like him, a total stranger, a man feared by an entire city. Nothing was making sense to me but then I saw Alora’s face in my mind crying, terrified, calling my name.

My fingers tightened around the pen.

“If I refuse?” I asked quietly.

Kaiden held my gaze without blinking.

“Then she disappears,” he said simply. “And eventually so do you.”

He didn’t raise his voice and that was the terrifying part. It sounded less like a threat and more like certainty.

Tears blurred my vision as I looked back down at the paper. My name stared back at me.

Alyssa Vale. It seemed so small and Insignificant compared to the life I was about to lose.

But Alora mattered more. She always would. My hand moved before my mind could stop it.

I signed. The scratch of ink against paper sounded deafening in the silent room.

When I finished, my chest rose unevenly as I lowered the pen.

Kaiden picked up the document and glanced at it briefly before setting it aside.

“Good,” he said.

Then, almost lazily “Mrs Wolfe.”

The name hit me like a physical blow. I couldn’t even react. Everything was happening too fast.

“I’ll have my men begin searching immediately,” he added, already turning away from me. “No one takes something from me without consequences.” Something from him?

My brows furrowed faintly.

Then his voice came again quieter this time.

“I’ll tear this city apart if I have to,” he said coldly. “And I will bring my sister-in-law back.”

Sister-in-law. The word settled strangely in my chest.

I remained seated on the cold marble floor long after nobody spoke again, my hands trembling in my lap while my mind struggled to catch up with my reality. In the span of minutes, my entire life had changed.