Walters looked toward the Chief Lawyer of Austagon with a mocking smile. Without saying anything at first, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his lawyer's license.He held it up for everyone in the courtroom to see.“This is my license,” Walters said calmly. “I don't know what the defense attorney is talking about.”A few people in the courtroom exchanged confused looks.Walters could not resist throwing in a jab.“Perhaps the defense attorneys are simply afraid of me and my lawyers. That is why they are throwing tantrums before the case has even started.”A few people laughed.The Chief Lawyer's face darkened.What he did not know was that the situation had changed completely the previous day. Walters' debts had been cleared in full, and the license that had been seized had already been returned to him.Neither the Austagon lawyers nor most of the people in the courtroom knew any of this.The Chief Lawyer pointed at the license Walters was holding.“Stop saying nonsense, you a

The defense attorney looked away from Walters and pretended not to understand what he was talking about. “I don’t know what you are talking about,” he said, trying to sound calm. “Let us not waste any more time. We are all here for the case, so why don’t we simply begin?”Walters stared at him for a moment before shaking his head. “Since you are pretending not to know what I am talking about, allow me to remind you.” He pointed at the defense attorney. “You challenged my license in this court. You said that if my license was genuine, you would leave this courtroom. I accepted your challenge, and you agreed to it in front of everyone.”The defense attorney immediately became uncomfortable. “Oh, concerning that. I… I wasn't serious. I was only joking about the whole thing.”Walters gave him a cold smile. “There is no joke in a court of law. You made a statement, and everyone here heard you. The judge heard you. You cannot make a statement in front of a judge and suddenly call it a jok

The ride back home from the court was unusually quiet.Darren sat in the back seat with his grandfather, while Jeff sat in the front. Nobody seemed interested in talking. The events of the day had left all three of them with a lot to think about.The case had not gone badly, but it had not been decided either. The judge had postponed the final verdict for another two days, giving both sides more time before he made his decision.Yet that was not what occupied Darren’s mind.It was Joseph.Joseph had stood outside the courtroom with the confidence of a man who already believed he had won. His words had not sounded like an empty threat. He had made it clear that he intended to use the next three days to change the situation in his favor.Darren knew Joseph too well to dismiss those words.The man had already bought Austagon Chamber, forcing the lawyers who had been representing the Hiltons to abandon the case. He had also used his wealth and influence to put himself in a powerful positi

Although Darren did not let it show on his face, his mind was in turmoil.It was not that he was afraid of Edward Blake. Nor was he afraid of the police. If it came to that, Darren could take on all the officers in the city by himself without breaking a sweat.What he was afraid of was the truth reaching his grandfather.If Derek ever found out that his grandson was the one who had thrown Henry out of a window and burned twelve people alive, the old man's heart would break. Worse, he would look at Darren with disappointment, and Darren did not think he could bear that.No matter what happened, nobody should find out the truth about the incident.At Murphy Group of Companies where he had thrown Henry out of the window, he had been careful. He had ordered the system to hack into the security network and wipe out everything from one hour before to hour after Henry's fall. Nothing there could point to him.But he had not been so careful at the underground basement where he had burnt the c

Just as Jack reached for the car door, a taxi pulled up beside the row of patrol cars.The door opened, and Darren stepped out.He had traded his usual clothes for a plain jacket, a face cap pulled low over his eyes, and a hospital mask covering the lower half of his face. He walked straight past the yellow tape toward the entrance of the burnt building, ignoring the officers scattered around the scene as though they were not even there.His eyes moved slowly across the surrounding structures, scanning window by window, rooftop by rooftop."Hey! You can't be here!" one of the officers called out, jogging toward him. "This is a crime scene, move away!"Darren did not so much as glance at him.He needed to find the camera. There had to be one somewhere along this street, some angle that had caught him the. His eyes swept past shopfronts, streetlights, and the corners of buildings, filtering through every surface until finally, they landed on it.There. A small camera was mounted above