After Rebirth, I Became My Ex's Aunt-in-Law-Chapter 149: Unsubscribing via Freefall

The air inside the speeding luxury van felt suffocatingly tight. For a long, agonizing moment, the only sound was the hum of the tires on the asphalt and the heavy, shuddering sigh of the woman sitting beside her.

Then, the woman spoke. Her French was soft, laced with that same haunting, aristocratic sorrow.

"Je suis quelqu’un que tu ne devrais pas connaître," the woman murmured gently, her manicured fingers resting lightly on Aria’s shoulder. "Quelqu’un que tu n’aurais jamais dû rencontrer."

From the front passenger seat, the deadpan translator delivered the English with robotic precision.

"She says she is someone you should not know, and never should have met."

Aria’s chest heaved. Her tied hands twisted uselessly in the plastic zip-ties. "That doesn’t answer my question!"

The woman continued, her tone dipping into a regretful whisper. "C’est notre erreur. Nous aurions dû mieux nettoyer la mort de ta mère."

"It is our mistake," the translator droned, his lack of inflection making the words sound even more chilling. "For not tidying your mother’s death better."

Aria froze.

’Tidying?’ Her brain, already swimming in adrenaline and confusion, scrambled to decipher the riddle. ’Tidying the death? Did she mean hiding the evidence for Lydia? Is this woman a cleaner?’

Before Aria could demand another answer, the entire roof of the van vibrated.

Thwup-thwup-thwup-thwup.

It was a heavy, rhythmic, deafening roar that vibrated through Aria’s bones.

Choppers.

"Madame!" the driver shouted from the front seat, his voice cracking with sudden, unadulterated panic. "Trois voitures noires nous rattrapent! Et ils ont un hélicoptère!"

(Madam! Three black cars are gaining on us! And they have a helicopter!)

Aria couldn’t understand the French, but she understood the sheer terror in the driver’s tone. Damien. He had actually mobilized an army. He was tearing the city apart just like she knew he would.

The woman beside Aria, however, didn’t panic. Her voice remained eerily, terrifyingly calm.

"Combien de temps avant le pont ?" the woman asked smoothly.

(How much time until the bridge?)

"Une minute, Madame!" the driver yelled over the sound of the helicopter blades shaking the chassis. "Ils vont nous percuter!"

(One minute, Madam! They are going to ram us!)

The woman patted Aria’s head, her touch lingering affectionately on her messy hair.

"Nous n’avons plus le temps," the woman said softly.

"She says we are out of time," the translator relayed to Aria. "Your husband caught up to us a lot sooner than she expected."

"Damien won’t let you go," Aria threatened blindly, her voice trembling but defiant.

"Les Vipers sont un danger que toi et Damien ne pouvez pas affronter," the woman continued, ignoring the threat entirely. "Son pouvoir, son argent... n’ont aucune valeur dans la mafia française."

"The Vipers are a danger that you and Damien cannot handle," the translator recited. "His power is of no strength in the French mafia."

"Stop talking in riddles!" Aria yelled over the deafening roar of the helicopter above them.

The woman leaned in very close. The smell of midnight jasmine filled Aria’s senses.

"Débarrasse-toi de la clé," the woman ordered, her voice finally hardening into absolute command.

"She says," the translator yelled to be heard over the noise, "you should get rid of the key."

"What key?!" Aria shrieked, thrashing against her restraints. "What are you talking about?!"

The woman didn’t answer.

Instead, the automatic lock of the van clicked.

The heavy sliding door of the van wrenched open.

Aria gasped as the freezing, violent night wind whipped into the cabin. The smell of exhaust was instantly overpowered by the sharp, damp scent of deep river water. The roaring of the helicopter above was deafening now, the spotlight from the chopper sweeping wildly over the open door.

Two strong hands grabbed Aria by the shoulders. She was hauled upward, her feet scrambling for purchase as she was dragged right to the precipice of the open door.

"No! No, wait!" Aria screamed, her heart seizing in pure terror. She was blindfolded. Her hands were tied behind her back. She could feel the terrifying, empty void of the rushing air just inches from her face.

They were on a bridge. There was no railing.

The woman came up close behind her.

"Live, Aria," the woman whispered directly into her ear, her English thick with a heavy French accent.

And then, she shoved her.

It was a firm, unrelenting push right in the center of her back.

Aria plummeted backward out of the speeding van.

She screamed, the sound tearing raw and ragged from her throat as the terrifying sensation of weightlessness consumed her. The rushing wind whipped her hair violently around her face, the blindfold secure over her eyes as she fell toward the dark, rushing water below.

Inside the van, the woman watched her fall into the darkness.

She hit a button on the console. The heavy sliding door slammed shut, cutting off the roaring wind and the spotlight of Damien’s helicopter.

"Allez," the woman commanded the driver. (Go.)

The van’s engine screamed, the driver flooring the accelerator. With Aria tossed over the edge, the three black SUVs and the chopper would be forced to immediately halt their pursuit to launch a rescue operation in the freezing river, effectively letting the van vanish into the night. It was a brutal, flawless distraction.

In the front passenger seat, the translator turned his head slightly to look at the elegant woman sitting in the shadows of the back cabin.

"Pensez-vous qu’elle va écouter, Madame ?" the translator asked, his robotic tone finally breaking into genuine curiosity. (Do you think she will listen, Madam?)

The woman stared straight ahead at the road, her eyes cold and calculating.

"Je l’espère," she responded, her voice dropping to a lethal whisper. "Mais si elle ne le fait pas... la famille Orpheus est prête à sortir de l’ombre et à se battre pour les siens."

(I hope she will. But if she doesn’t... the Orpheus family is prepared to come out of the shadows and fight for their own.)