All Chapters of The CEO Wife On Paper : Chapter 1 - Chapter 6

The bedroom door slammed shut, the sound echoing once before silence swallowed it whole.Clara stood with her back pressed against the door, her chest rising and falling in uneven breaths, her hands shaking so badly she had to clench them into fists just to still them.She squeezed her eyes shut. *Maybe if I count to ten,* some small, foolish part of her thought, *everything I heard downstairs will have unhappened by the time I open them again.* She counted — a childhood habit, useless now — and made it only to three before giving up.She opened her eyes. Nothing had changed.Her family had agreed to marry her to Gregory Blackwood. The debt would disappear. And she was the price they'd paid it with.A broken laugh escaped her. "So this is what I'm worth."Her knees gave out before she reached the bed properly, and she sank onto the edge of the mattress, staring blankly at the floor. The room that had always comforted her suddenly felt like it belonged to someone else.Three slow knock

The house was asleep. Or it pretended to be.Clara stood motionless beside her bedroom window, listening, as the grandfather clock downstairs chimed three times. Three o'clock. She'd been awake for hours already, afraid even a single sound would give her away too soon.Slowly, she zipped her worn backpack shut. Inside were only the things she truly needed: a change of clothes, the little cash she'd quietly saved from tutoring and part-time shifts nobody in this house had ever asked about, her identification card. Nothing else — she'd told herself that for a week now, every time she'd been tempted to pack one more thing she didn't need.She let herself look around the room one last time. Her eyes caught on the water stain near the ceiling, shaped a little like a rabbit if you squinted — the one she used to point out to her mother when she was small, back before this room belonged to anyone else's version of her life.She reached for the framed photograph on her nightstand and traced he

The courthouse buzzed with quiet activity. Couples walked in hand in hand, some smiling nervously, others laughing as they teased each other. Family members waited outside with flowers and cameras, ready to celebrate.Leo Blackwood stood apart from all of it.Dressed in a perfectly tailored black suit, both hands tucked into his trouser pockets, he watched the crowd with the same calm, unreadable gaze he brought to everything.Beside him, Daniel checked his watch. "She should be here any minute, sir."Leo didn't respond.Daniel opened the leather folder one last time, more out of habit than necessity. "Her name is Clara Hart. She confirmed a few minutes ago that she's on her way.""Go," Leo said. "Finalize things with the registrar. We'll proceed once you're back."Daniel gave a short nod and hurried inside, leaving Leo alone at the entrance.Silence settled around him. He watched people pass through the glass doors — some flushed with excitement, some visibly nervous, all of them cha