After I Finally Became His Perfect Donna Chapter 11

After I Finally Became His Perfect Donna Chapter 11

Dorian watched every single recording, punishing himself with each one.

In the videos, Lyra was pinned to the ground and force-fed shrimp that sent her into allergic convulsions.

An instructor leered over her, his tone dripping with mockery.

“Donna, we’re helping you desensitize. That way you’ll learn not to be a burden to the Don.”

“Be a good girl, understand?”

He watched Lyra go from screaming and begging for help to complete numbness.

By the last video, he finally understood the look in her eyes that day. The fear. The hope.

She had been hoping he was pleased with her.

He shoved the laptop away, staggered to the bathroom, and threw up until the room spun. The only thing in

his head was that sentence.

“Do you want to go back to the Academy? Is that what you want?”

It was him. He’d killed her with his own hands.

At the same time, his assistant had uncovered Mireille’s messages with a friend. Even the wound on her arm

had been self-inflicted.

Dorian drove alone, tearing through the streets to Mireille’s apartment.

When he pushed open the door, Mireille’s face went white with panic.

She’d heard the rumors. She was already packing, transferring assets, planning to take Mike and flee the

country.

Seeing Dorian, the bag slipped from her hands. Jewelry scattered across the floor. She stammered.

“Dorian, what are you doing here? I was just about to take Mike on a little trip…”

“A trip? Or did you hear the walls closing in and decide to grab what you could and run?”

Dorian stepped inside and locked the door behind him.

Mireille forced a smile. “Dorian, what are you talking about? I don’t understand…”

Dorian pulled out the stack of investigation reports and hurled them in her face. “This is what you called a school that was just a little strict?

“You wanted her gone, so you lied to me. Told me it was a place that taught manners. And to make sure you’d keep your seat as Donna, you paid off the instructors to torture her around the clock.”

He closed his hand around her throat, the disgust and hatred no longer hidden behind anything.

“Mireille, you make me sick.”

“Help help me…”

Mireille clawed at his hand, her eyes wild with terror.

“Relax. I’m not going to kill you. That would be too easy.”

Dorian’s eyes held nothing but bone-deep cold.

“You like playing the victim, don’t you? I’ll send you to the same place you picked out for Lyra. You can stay

there and put on your little performance for as long as you like.”

Mireille crumpled to the floor. Watching him walk away, she screamed after him.

“Dorian, you’re the stupid one! You’re the one who didn’t trust her!”

“Yes, I lied to you. But you’re the one who shoved the person you loved most into that hellhole. You lost her

all by yourself!”

“Lyra is dead! She will never forgive you! You’re the one who deserves to die!”

Dorian’s stride locked mid-step.

She was right. The one who deserved to die most was him.

Just then, his phone rang. It was his assistant.

“Don, your wife may still be alive. Our people found a lead in another state!”

The assistant’s voice was shaking with an excitement Dorian had never heard before. “She cut her hair short,

but the profile, it’s a ninety percent match.”

In that moment, Dorian couldn’t even feel himself breathing.

He stared at the blurry photo on his screen. The woman in it had her head down, busy with something. Even

through the pixelated image, he recognized her instantly.

“Lyra… you’re not dead after all.”

He didn’t waste a single second. He grabbed his keys. “Book the fastest flight. Now. Right now.”

Traffic blurred past. Dorian didn’t stop, racing toward the airport.

In his mind, he repeated the same prayer over and over: Lyra, please. Give me one more chance.

The afternoon sun slanted through the lecture hall windows. I sat in the last row, in the corner, my cap pulled

low over my eyes.

Julian had insisted on bringing me to sit in on one of his classes. I hadn’t wanted to come.

“You need to learn to go outside.” He’d been standing at the seafood stall, helping me clean up. “You don’t

have to hide from anyone. Nobody here knows who you are.”

I came in the end. He’d stood up for me against those thugs. lowed him. I couldn’t say no.

The classroom was full of young faces, chattering and laughing, their smiles so bright they almost hurt to

look at.

I pulled my gaze back and stared at the open notebook in front of me.

When I was eighteen, I’d almost made it to college.

But I was too poor. So, so poor.

Poverty is a disease. It made me miss class over and over during the three years that mattered most, shuttling between school and the food stall.

And when I saw the tuition bill, I chose to walk away without a second thought.

I couldn’t blame anyone else. I just wasn’t a genius.

Class started. Julian stood at the front, his expression open and relaxed. “Today, we’re going to discuss The

Count of Monte Cristo.”

He wrote a few words on the board. His handwriting was beautiful, clean and structured, like the man

himself.

I lifted my head without realizing it.

He told them about Edmond Dantes, imprisoned in the Chateau d’If. The merciless sea on all sides. How he would pace his tiny cell, press his ear against the cold stone walls, and wait for any sound from the outside

world.

But no one came.

He waited fourteen years, until he’d nearly forgotten what he was waiting for.

My eyes burned. I knew that feeling too well.

“Professor Rivers,” a girl in the front row raised her hand, “did he ever get out? Did he find what he’d been waiting for?”

Julian paused, his gaze drifting. When he spoke, his voice was so low it was almost inaudible. “He did. But by then… he’d become a ghost of the man who went in.”

The classroom was silent for a few seconds. I lowered my head, letting the brim of my cap hide my eyes.

So what if you finally made it out. It was already too late for everything.