All Chapters of HUMILIATED
SON-IN-LAW, INVINCIBLE SYSTEM: Chapter 91
- Chapter 100
146 chapters
CHAPTER 91
The CaregiverI don’t leave his side.They tell me I should—soft voices, careful words—but I shake my head every time. Someone brings me a chair, then a blanket. I don’t notice until hours later when my legs finally stop trembling and the room smells faintly of antiseptic and ozone from overheated machines.Leon lies still on the bed, monitors humming around him like a quiet chorus. His chest rises and falls in shallow, measured breaths. Each one feels borrowed.The Silent King of Shadowline. Reduced to silence for real.I sit close enough to hear him breathe, close enough to see the faint line between his brows even in sleep. He looks younger like this. Less carved from steel. More like a man who has been carrying too much for too long.I roll the bandage between my fingers, hands steadier than I expect them to be. The medic showed me how—gentle pressure, clean wrap, no hesitation. I do exactly as instructed, even though my chest aches with every movement.“This might sting,” I mur
CHAPTER 92
The New AllianceEmily’s POVI never imagined the first people I would trust outside of Leon would be his shadows.Not the faceless enforcers who bowed and vanished at his command, not the cold-eyed operatives who treated the city like a chessboard—but two agents who looked at me like a human being, not a liability.It started quietly. Carefully. The way all dangerous things do.Leon was still unconscious when I made the decision.Machines hummed softly around his hospital bed, the steady rise and fall of his chest the only proof that the man who ruled Shadowline was still here. Still breathing. Still holding the city together by sheer will.And I knew—deep in my bones—that if I waited for him to wake up and take control again, whatever was coming would already be too late.The hacker ring was moving faster now. Smarter. Bolder. They weren’t just watching Shadowline.They were inside it.The first agent found me near the private elevators, pretending to scroll through my phone while a
CHAPTER 93
Leon’s WarningEmily’s POVLeon didn’t raise his voice.That was what frightened me most.The penthouse was quiet in the way only expensive places ever were—thick walls, muted lights, the city reduced to a distant glow beyond glass. I stood by the window, pretending to watch traffic bleed through the streets below, while my pulse hammered so loud I was sure he could hear it.He could always hear things others missed.“Emily.”Just my name. Soft. Controlled.I turned slowly. Leon stood near the doorway of his office, jacket discarded, sleeves rolled to his forearms. He looked calm, but I knew the signs now—the stillness, the way his eyes tracked me without blinking, the tension coiled tight beneath his skin like a weapon waiting to be drawn.“You’ve been quiet,” he said.“I’m tired,” I replied too quickly.His gaze sharpened, not angry—assessing. “You’re not tired. You’re hiding.”My throat closed. I forced myself to breathe, to keep my face smooth. “I don’t know what you want me to sa
CHAPTER 94
Emily’s DecisionThe night was quiet, too quiet, the kind of silence that stretched out and wrapped around you like a shroud. I sat at my desk in the dim light of my apartment, the letter in front of me, trembling fingers hovering over the pen. I’d rewritten these words a dozen times, each version heavier than the last, but none could capture the turmoil raging inside me.What do you say when you’re about to walk into a storm that might never end? What words could possibly prepare someone for the unknown? I had no idea if I’d come back, if the meeting with my father would shatter everything or finally piece it together.But I owed it to myself. To Leon. To the fragments of trust I still clung to. I had to know the truth.I picked up the pen and began writing again, my hand steady now.Leon,If you’re reading this, it means I’m about to make a choice—one that could change everything between us. I don’t know what my father will tell me, or what kind of danger I’m stepping into, but I
CHAPTER 95
The Meeting Emily POVThe abandoned train station smells like rust, oil, and ghosts.Every step I take echoes too loudly, my boots striking cracked concrete where crowds once rushed toward destinations that mattered. Now the place is hollowed out—broken benches, dead screens, graffiti bleeding down the walls like old wounds. The overhead lights flicker weakly, casting long shadows that stretch and twist, as if the darkness itself is watching me arrive.I shouldn’t be here.Leon’s voice still lives in the back of my head—low, controlled, dangerous even when he’s calm. Don’t go alone.But my father’s message had been precise. One hour after midnight. Platform Four. Alone.So here I am.Platform Four yawns open ahead of me, the tracks swallowed by darkness. Wind rushes through the open ends of the station, whistling like a warning. My hand curls instinctively around my phone, though I know it won’t help me here. Shadowline can’t track this place. Leon taught me that himself—how dead
CHAPTER 96
Leon Arrives Emily POVThe train station smells like rust, oil, and old rain.Every breath I take feels too loud in the cavernous space, like the air itself is listening. The fluorescent lights overhead flicker in slow, uneven pulses, illuminating cracked tiles and abandoned tracks that disappear into darkness. My father stands a few feet away from me, half swallowed by shadow, his coat collar turned up like he’s afraid the past might recognize him.My fingers are still numb from the file he handed me.Not the papers themselves—I haven’t opened them yet—but the weight of what he said before pushing them into my hands.Once you read this, you’ll run from him.From Leon.I swallow hard, forcing myself not to look down at the folder. If I do, I’m afraid it will become real in a way I’m not ready for. Right now, doubt is a fog. I can still pretend it’s just cold air.“Emily,” my father says quietly. “You need to understand something before you decide who to trust.” “I trusted you once
CHAPTER 97
The UltimatumEmily’s POVI don’t remember deciding to move.One second, Leon and my father are locked in a stare that feels older than both of them—heavy with history, resentment, blood. Next, my body is already reacting, stepping forward, placing itself squarely in the line between two men who could destroy each other.Again.The platform feels smaller now, like the walls have leaned in to watch. The flickering lights overhead buzz faintly, casting long, fractured shadows across the cracked concrete. Somewhere down the tunnel, water drips in a slow, maddening rhythm.Leon’s gaze snaps to me.“Emily,” he says, low and sharp. “Move.”I shake my head before my fear can catch up to me. My hands are trembling, but my feet stay planted. If I move now, if I choose one side, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to undo it.“No,” I say. “Not like this.”My father exhales behind me, the sound edged with bitter relief. “You see?” he says quietly. “She still chooses compassion. That’s the differ
CHAPTER 98
The Fall EmilyThe sound comes before the pain.A deafening crack splits the air, sharp and violent, echoing through the abandoned station like the world itself has fractured. For a single frozen heartbeat, nothing makes sense—no faces, no loyalties, no past or future. Just noise.Then Leon moves.I don’t see him decide. I don’t hear him shout. He’s simply there—suddenly, impossibly—his body slamming into mine with brutal force. I’m thrown backward, my spine colliding with cold concrete as his weight crashes over me, shielding me completely.Another gunshot roars.And then I feel it.Warmth spills across my hands.Too much warmth.Leon grunts—a sound I have never heard from him before. Not pain exactly. Something worse. Something restrained.“No—” The word rips out of my throat raw and broken. “Leon!”His body stiffens above me. I feel it in the way his muscles lock, in the way his breath shudders once, sharply, against my ear.The gun clatters to the ground somewhere nearby.My fath
CHAPTER 99
The Hospital RoomThe hospital room smells like antiseptic and quiet despair.Machines hum softly around Leon’s bed, a steady rhythm that has become the metronome of my existence. Heart monitor. IV drip. Oxygen. Proof that he’s still here. Proof that I didn’t lose him in that cold, broken station.I sit beside him, unmoving.Hours blur together—night bleeding into morning, morning folding back into night. Nurses come and go. Doctors speak in careful tones, their words clipped and professional, but I hear the truth beneath them.He’s stable—for now.The bullet missed vital organs—barely.He lost a lot of blood.Every sentence ends with the same unspoken warning: Don’t relax.I refuse to leave his side.I don’t eat. I don’t sleep. I didn't check my phone again after that message. It stays face down in my bag like a live wire, humming with threat. Whatever waits there can wait. Leon is breathing. That is all that matters.His hand lies limp on the white sheets, fingers long and scarred—
CHAPTER 100
Cracks in the MaskEmilyThe safehouse is quiet in a way that feels unnatural, like the city itself is holding its breath. Thick concrete walls swallow sound. Reinforced windows look out over nothing but darkness and a thin ribbon of rain, the kind that never quite falls, just hovers in the air like a warning.Leon sits across from me on the edge of the bed, his jacket discarded, his white shirt darkened where blood had soaked through hours earlier. The wound has been cleaned and stitched by a Shadowline medic who didn’t ask questions and didn’t meet my eyes. Now it’s just us.For the first time since I’ve known him, Leon Black looks… tired.Not wounded. Not angry.Tired.His shoulders are slumped slightly, like the weight he carries has finally pressed down hard enough to bend steel. His hands rest on his knees, fingers loosely clasped, no weapon within reach. That alone feels wrong. Leon is never unarmed. Never unprepared.I sit beside him, close enough to feel the heat of his bod