All Chapters of From Illegitimate To A Zillionaire Heir: Chapter 811
- Chapter 820
881 chapters
CHAPTER 809
Persis stepped out of the gallery, the gold train of her gown hissing against the marble like a serpent. As she reached the top of the grand staircase, she spotted Tedmond emerging from the library below. He looked up, his blue eyes locking onto hers. Even from thirty feet away, she could feel the vibration of his fury, a cold, controlled hum that mirrored the blade hidden against her skin.He didn’t wait for her at the bottom. He stood like a monolith, forcing the Moretti elders to flank him like nervous courtiers."The logs are finished," Tedmond murmured as she reached his side, his voice so low it was felt rather than heard. "Albert has the transit codes. The Mediterranean is ours. Now, we see what they’re trying to sell back to us."His gaze didn't break from hers as she stepped onto the final marble tile. Despite the victory of the codes, his body remained coiled, a predator sensing a threat to its mate. He ignored the elders hovering at his shoulders, his focus narrowing e
CHAPTER 810
As they reached the entrance to the viewing room, one of Juliette’s cousins, a woman with hair the color of rusted iron and eyes full of venom, stepped into their path. She lacked Juliette’s restraint and the elders' caution; her chest heaved with suppressed rage at how the Moretti name had been handled all evening."You really think you can just walk in here and treat us like subjects in a deposition?" she hissed, her voice trembling. "After everything your family has done to the trade lines? After the way your husband has been hunting our kin?"She stepped closer, her face inches from Persis’s, ignoring the way Tedmond’s hand shifted toward his jacket."Tell me the truth, Damon," she spat, using Persis's maiden name like a slur. "Are you actually pissed? Or is this all just a performance for the man holding your leash?"Persis stopped. She didn't flinch, nor did she look to Tedmond for protection. She simply turned her head, locking onto the woman with a gaze of such cold, absolut
CHAPTER 811
Tedmond didn’t even look in Lorenzo’s direction. He sat perfectly still, blue eyes fixed on the draped daisies, his hands resting on the arms of his chair with the terrifying calm of a man waiting for the tide to come in."Ignore them, Persis," Tedmond murmured. His voice was a low, resonant baritone that bypassed the elder entirely, as if Lorenzo were nothing more than background noise. "They’re small men with small voices. They think that if they keep talking, they can convince us they still exist."He reached over, his hand briefly covering hers on the armrest, his thumb tracing a steady, grounding line across her knuckles. "Don’t give them the breath it takes to acknowledge them," he added, his gaze turning to flint. "We aren’t here for the company. We’re here for the wreckage."Persis felt the tension in her shoulders dissipate, replaced by a cold, sharp focus. She turned her gaze forward, her profile as motionless as a statue’s. Lorenzo’s smile faltered, his face flushing
CHAPTER 812
“They’re baiting you,” Persis whispered, pressing her shoulder into his to lend him her strength. “They want to see you break. They want the room to see the Washington lion lose his composure over a piece of iron.”Tedmond’s chest rose and fell in a slow, jagged rhythm. He scanned the room again. This time, he didn't see peers; he saw the hunger. The Van den Bergs were leaning forward, eyes wide and glassy. The Sokolovs were already huddled with their financial advisors.The Morettis had turned their trauma into a commodity, and they were inviting the world to bid on the wreckage.“Look at them,” Tedmond hissed. His voice was a low, guttural rasp that barely sounded human. “They’re sitting here like it’s a theater performance. They have his things, Persis. They have the tools he used to... to curate.”His hand trembled against hers for a fraction of a second before he forced it still. The tension in him was so volatile it felt as if the very air might ignite.“I’m not going to
CHAPTER 813
“No,” Tedmond said. The word carried the weight of a mountain.“No?” Lorenzo stammered, his glass pausing halfway to his lips. “But... it’s the key, Tedmond. It’s the Architect. Your white whale. Surely you aren't going to let it slip away for a pittance?”Tedmond’s head snapped toward Lorenzo, his eyes narrowing into razor-thin slits of ice. The temperature in the front row seemed to plummet as he leaned in, his shadow looming over the elder like a shroud.“It is Mr. Washington to you,” Tedmond corrected, his voice a low, vibrating growl that cut through the gallery's murmurs. “I don’t recall giving a man who sells his own secrets the right to use my first name. You would do well to remember exactly who you are speaking to before you open your mouth again.”The silence that followed was absolute. Juliette, Marcella, and the rest of the Moretti women froze, their expressions shifting from mocking triumph to stunned disbelief. No one spoke to a Moretti elder that way, not in this h
CHAPTER 814
In an instant, the ghostly silence of the house was replaced by the heavy, synchronized thud of boots. From behind silk tapestries and the dark corners of the gallery, a phalanx of men in matte-black tactical gear swarmed the exit. They moved with predatory efficiency, faces obscured by balaclavas, forming a human wall of carbon fiber and steel that blocked Tedmond and Persis’s path.“Return to your seats,” Lorenzo commanded, his voice shaking with a newfound, jagged authority. He stepped forward, his hawk-like face twisting into a mocking grin as he looked at the couple, then at the empty spaced them.“You came here alone, Tedmond,” Lorenzo sneered, finally dropping the 'Mr. Washington, as he gestured to the wall of guards. “You showed up with nothing but a gold-clad wife and a sense of entitlement. Did you really think we would let you insult the Moretti blood and walk out into the night?”One of the younger Moretti men stepped forward, leaning in with a chuckle. “Look at them.
CHAPTER 815
It started as a rhythmic, mocking sound that grew in volume, echoing through the Atrium like a funeral march for the Moretti reputation.“Oh, bravo!” Juliette sneered, her face twisting as she joined the clapping with violent, sarcastic energy.“The Washington woman has a speech! She’s so smart, so calculated! Tell me, Persis, does that intelligence help when the lights go out, and the doors won't open?”But the mockery of the Moretti women was drowned out by the sheer terror of the other guests. The families weren't clapping for the drama; they were realizing Persis was right.The Sokolov heirs were already backing toward the shadows, their faces ashen.The tension reached a breaking point. Suddenly, the heavy oak doors at the far end of the Atrium, the service entrance, burst open. It wasn't the guards. It was the sound of the mansion's internal alarm systems being shredded by a remote override."The doors," Lorenzo whispered, his face turning pale.Seeing the cold murder in Ted
CHAPTER 816
A collective flinch rippled through the Moretti line.Lorenzo’s eyes darted to the floor; Marcella’s stoic mask finally fractured. Even Juliette looked away, the long cigarette holder trembling in her grip. They hadn't rehearsed a lie for this. They were staring at a man who had unearthed the one secret they couldn't bury with a checkbook.The reaction was momentary, a hairline crack in a dam before the flood of denial rushed back.Lorenzo recovered first. He smoothed his silvered hair with a hand that had found its way from shaking to a rigid, unnatural stillness."Delusional," Lorenzo breathed, the word escaping as a soft, pitying huff. He glanced at the other elders, a hollow, mocking chuckle passing between them. "Mr. Washington, I knew you were grieving a legacy you barely understood, but I didn't realize you had drifted so far from reality."He stepped forward, spreading his hands wide as if appealing to the very stones of the Atrium. "Think about what you are suggesting!
CHAPTER 817
"Fake," Marcella spat, her voice ringing with sharp, artificial clarity. "You come into our home, Mr. Washington, with digital 'receipts' provided by a technician hiding in a van, and you expect us to bow?"Her gaze turned serious."Do you have any idea how many times the Moretti crest has been forged in the last century? We are the architects of Mediterranean trade. Our stamps, our digital signatures, our very seal… they are the most impersonated symbols in the underworld."She took a step closer to Tedmond, her eyes wide with manic, rehearsed conviction."Any amateur with a high-end server could mirror our frequency. Any rival looking to push the Washingtons against the Morettis could have planted those logs.""There are fakes out there, Tedmond, and you've swallowed one whole because you're so desperate for a target that you've lost the ability to distinguish a signature from a shadow."Tedmond's expression didn't shift. He didn't glance at the data on his watch.He just looked at
CHAPTER 818
Lorenzo leaned in closer, his voice a frantic, wet wheeze. "We want to see the look on your face when you realize that Thomas wasn't the only one who watched your grandfather beg. We want to be the ones who finally put the Washington name in the sold column!"Tedmond didn't respond with anger. He didn't even stand up.Instead, he leaned back, closed his eyes for a brief second, and exhaled a long, weary sigh. It was the sound of a man who had finally heard enough."Unhinged," Tedmond murmured to the ceiling. "You’ve spent so much time in the dark that you’ve started eating your own lies."*****Three hundred yards away, the air inside the surveillance van vibrated with the hum of high-end servers. Albert sat with his headset pressed tight to his ears, fingers hovering over a glowing red override key. The audio from the necklace was coming through with crystal clarity; Lorenzo’s frantic ranting filled the monitors."He's lost it," Albert muttered, eyes tracking a cluster of green d