Not This Time, Don Cassian Chapter 08

Not This Time, Don Cassian Chapter 08

Three in the morning, a frantic knock woke me from a dead sleep.

“Aurora! It’s me!”

I opened the door. Mr. Rodriguez stood there, his white hair a mess, his eyes red.

“It’s Martha…” his voice shook. “She had a heart attack tonight. They took her to the hospital. The bill is fifty thousand dollars, but the bank said her pension account is frozen because of a problem with the

joint signature…”

I grabbed my coat and a file folder. “Let’s go.”

For the next four hours, I operated like a machine.

I found the joint authorization form Martha had signed three years ago. I called the bank’s emergency line manager, faxing over legal documents one by one.

At five a.m., I paid the first twenty-thousand-dollar deposit from my own account.

At seven a.m., the account was finally unfrozen.

At eight a.m., the surgeon came out of the OR. Martha was out of danger.

Mr. Rodriguez held my ink-stained hands, crying too hard to speak.

“Aurora, you saved her life.”

I looked at the seventy-year-old man, a feeling of satisfaction washing over me that I had never felt

before.

For nine years, these hands had washed blood money.

Today, for the first time, they had pulled an old woman back from the brink.

Ten p.m. that night, I had just gotten out of the shower when there was another knock on the door.

This one was soft, controlled.

I opened it. Cassian was standing in the hallway.

He looked even worse than the night before, his eyes bloodshot, the stubble on his jaw darker.

“I heard about Martha,” he said, his voice hoarse. “As always… you make the impossible possible.”

“So what?” I didn’t let him in.

“You were like that at the estate, too.” He was trying to find common ground. “Remember the IRS raid three years ago? You cleaned up all the books in one night-”

“At the estate, I had no choice,” I cut him off. “Here, I do it because I want to.”

That silenced him for a long moment.

“What’s the difference?”

“The difference is, here I’m Aurora.”

“There, I was just the Don’s tool.”

“Aurora…”

“Spit it out,” I said, leaning against the doorframe. “What do you want this time?”

He took a deep breath, like he was steeling himself.

“The Elders have ordered me to bring you back,” he said, his voice tight with urgency. “The family needs

you, Aurora.”

I looked at him, and for the first time in a long time, I laughed.

The sound made him take an involuntary step back.

“The family needs me,” I repeated his words. “Cassian, do you hear yourself?”

“I need you!” he finally broke, shouting the words. “Not the family, not the Elders, me! I need you to come

back!”

He was breathing hard, his eyes filled with desperation.

“I can’t sleep at night. I go to your study, I read the ledgers you left behind. I read every note you ever

wrote, over and over…”

“Enough.” I looked at him, my heart a silent, still lake.

“I know I hurt you, I know I don’t deserve it…” His voice grew hoarser. “But please, give me one chance.

Let me prove-”

“Prove what?” I asked calmly. “Prove that you finally realized I’m useful? Prove that now that your empire

is about to crumble, you remember me?”

“To prove that I love you!” he roared.

The words hung in the air, electric.

Hope flared in his eyes.

The exact same look he gave me at the altar, right before he said, “I do.”

The day before he plunged a knife into my chest.

“Cassian,” I said softly. “Once, I needed your love.”

“But,” I looked him straight in the eye, saying each word clearly, “I don’t need you anymore.”

The color drained from his face.

“What?” he whispered, his voice trembling.

“I don’t need you,” I repeated, my voice like steel. “Not your love. Not your regret. And certainly not your

promises.”

“As for the IRS problem-“I paused. “Tell Antonio to contact David Chen at Kellerman & Associates. He’s a former senior IRS investigator. Tell him to follow the flowchart I left under the second layer of your desk mat. He can cut the charity and Lakeshore clean in 48 hours.”

“The cost will be sacrificing the art investment line. The loss will be about six million.”

“That is the last thing I will ever do for the Vitelli family.”

He stood there, stunned.

“No!” Cassian grabbed the edge of the door. “I don’t want a solution! I want you!”

I looked him straight in the eye. “That’s your problem. Not mine.”

The door slowly closed, shutting out his desperate face.

I could hear him pounding on the door, shouting my name.

But inside, I felt nothing but peace.

Everyone has to pay for their choices.

In my last life, I paid. In this one, it was his turn.