After Rebirth, I Became My Ex's Aunt-in-Law-Chapter 160: God Clearly Plays Favorites with the Gene Pool
Two days had passed and Aria was still asleep in ICU Room 1.
Damien had officially tripled the security detail. There were now six armed contractors stationed in the hallway, two inside the room, and a cyber-security sweep running every hour.
He wasn’t taking any chances.
With the room secure, Damien had returned to the Sinclair Penthouse for the first time in nine days to shower, change, and prepare for the Vanity Fair exclusive.
Zoe stood in the private, climate-controlled underground parking garage of Sinclair Tower, sipping an iced matcha and tapping her foot anxiously. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂
The private elevator pinged. The brushed steel doors slid open.
Damien stepped out, and Zoe dropped her matcha.
He looked flawless.
He was wearing a custom-tailored, midnight-blue Tom Ford suit that fit his broad shoulders with lethal precision. His silver hair, freshly washed, was swept back flawlessly. His jaw was sharply shaven. And the deep, bruised, hollow exhaustion that had haunted his golden eyes just yesterday? Completely gone.
"I genuinely hate your DNA," Zoe blurted out as he approached his Aston Martin.
Damien paused, raising a single, perfectly arched eyebrow. "Excuse me?"
"You lived on an uncomfortable hospital chair for over a week!" Zoe gestured wildly at his face. "You subsisted on stress and stale coffee! I slept in a real bed last night, did a ten-step Korean skincare routine, and I still look like a stressed ferret! You washed your face once and your dark circles vanished! God clearly plays favorites, and it’s deeply offensive to the rest of us!"
Damien unlocked the car, the headlights flashing. "It’s good genetics. Get in the car, Ms. Chen. We have a schedule."
"Oh! Zoe? Mr. Sinclair?"
Zoe jumped. Damien’s entire body went rigid.
Emerging from behind a parked Range Rover two spots down was Jade. Leo’s sister was dressed in her usual sensible, slightly oversized aesthetic, carrying a brown paper grocery bag from an expensive organic market.
"Hi!" Jade called out, walking over with a bright smile. "I thought that was you guys! Sorry, I just got back from doing a grocery run for Leo. How are you holding up, Zoe?"
"Oh, hey Jade!" Zoe smiled. "I’m surviving on caffeine and spite, as usual."
"I can imagine," Jade sighed, shaking her head sympathetically. "I’ve been following on social media. It is so ridiculous right now. The TikTok conspiracies? People have way too much time on their hands. It must be so frustrating for you guys."
"It’s a nightmare," Zoe agreed wholeheartedly before going on to tattle what they were going to do to sort things out.
Damien was silent. He stood by the driver’s side door, his golden eyes scanning Jade. He noted the placement of her hands, the grip on the paper bag, the slight, almost imperceptible shift in her posture as she faced him.
Jade turned her attention to the billionaire, her smile softening into something shy and admiring. "It’s really brave of you to do this interview, Mr. Sinclair. I’m sure it will clear everything up."
Damien didn’t say anything. He stared at her with the cold, detached intensity of a sniper looking through a scope.
"Ms. Chen," Damien said, his voice a flat, deadpan command. "Get in the car."
Zoe rolled her eyes at the sheer hostility of his tone. She leaned slightly toward Jade, cupping a hand around her mouth in a stage whisper.
"Ignore Mr. Grumpy," Zoe joked. "He hasn’t had his second espresso yet."
Jade let out a breathy, delicate laugh. Her eyes, however, stayed locked on Damien’s sharp jawline for a fraction of a second too long. "Good luck with the interview!"
"Thanks!" Zoe waved, sliding into the passenger seat of the Aston Martin.
Damien dropped into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut. The engine roared to life with a guttural purr, and he pulled out of the parking spot with aggressive, neck-snapping speed.
The interior of the car was completely silent as they navigated out of the garage and into the afternoon traffic. It wasn’t an awkward silence; it was just heavy.
"You need to be careful of that girl," Damien stated suddenly, not taking his eyes off the road.
Zoe looked up from her phone, blinking. "Jade? Why? She’s super sweet."
"There is something off about her," Damien said, his grip tightening on the leather steering wheel. "She is always exactly where we are."
Zoe scoffed, waving a dismissive hand. "Mr. Sinclair, no offense, but you’re being paranoid."
Damien didn’t argue. He trusted his instincts, and his instincts told him that Leo’s sister was wearing a mask.
The remainder of the ride settled back into silence. Zoe opened her phone, pulling up Instagram to check the battlefield before they arrived at the interview.
She tapped over to TMZ.
Zoe’s blood ran completely cold.
"No fucking way," Zoe whispered, sitting up straight in the leather bucket seat.
"What?" Damien asked sharply.
"Lydia Laurent," Zoe gritted out, her hands shaking as she read the red headline. "She just dropped an absolute nuke."
Zoe read the article aloud, her voice dripping with disgust.
"Socialite Lydia Laurent announces she is officially filing for divorce from disgraced, critically-ill entertainment mogul Raymond Vale. In an exclusive statement, Laurent claims she is stepping away from the ’toxicity’ of the Vale family to ’focus on her own personal growth and healing.’ This shocking split comes just twenty-four hours after the IRS dropped their high-profile fraud investigation into Laurent, citing a sudden ’lack of evidence’ and immediately unfreezing all of her domestic and offshore assets."
Zoe threw her phone onto the dashboard.
"Lack of evidence?!" Zoe shrieked. "She was caught red-handed setting up shell companies! How the hell do you get the federal government to just drop a multi-million dollar fraud case overnight?!"
Zoe slumped back into her seat, feeling sick. While Aria was lying unconscious in a hospital bed, the villains were rebranding themselves as strong, independent victims. The unfairness of it made Zoe want to scream.
The Aston Martin pulled up to the curb outside L’Étoile.
It was the most exclusive, high-end celebrity cafe in the city. The kind of place where a latte cost forty dollars and the waitstaff had non-disclosure agreements written into their contracts.
Outside, a small army of paparazzi had already gathered behind velvet ropes, tipped off about the Vanity Fair sit-down. Flashbulbs erupted the second Damien stepped out of the car.
They stepped through the heavy brass doors, leaving the noise behind.
Inside, L’Étoile was a dimly lit sanctuary of emerald velvet booths and mirrored ceilings. Zoe glanced around, immediately spotting a Marvel actor sipping espresso in a corner booth, and a multi-platinum pop star picking at a salad near the bar.
Zoe forced her jaw shut, channeling her inner PR shark, acting like she belonged in a room whose combined net worth was higher than a small European country.
A maître d’ in a white tuxedo glided up to them instantly.
"Mr. Sinclair. Ms. Chen," he bowed slightly. "The journalist from Vanity Fair is waiting for you in the private VIP suite. Right this way."
Zoe took a deep breath, smoothing her skirt as she followed Damien toward the back of the cafe.
It was time to fight back.
