Connor stood in the middle of the store, surrounded by people who stared at him like he was a fool walking straight into his own destruction. His calm expression didn’t change one bit. The more composed he looked, the more it seemed to unsettle Mr. Brandon Whitmore.For a brief moment, Brandon hesitated. There was something about Connor’s eyes — that quiet confidence — that made him uneasy. But he quickly shook it off and forced a mocking smirk.Connor broke the silence first. His voice was calm. “Mr. Brandon,” he said quietly, “you’ve said enough already. If I remember correctly, the total cost you’re talking about is three million dollars, right?”Brandon blinked, not expecting that. “What did you just say?”Connor repeated himself calmly. “Three million dollars. That’s the total, isn’t it?”Before Brandon could open his mouth to respond, Connor added, “Alright then. No problem. Send me your account number.”For a few seconds, the entire store was dead silent.Then came a loud, echo

For a long, heavy moment, nobody in the store breathed.The sound of that credit alert still echoed inside everyone’s mind. It was as if time itself had frozen the second Mr. Brandon saw the message on his screen. His eyes remained wide, his lips slightly parted, and his whole body looked like it had forgotten how to move.Connor didn’t speak.He simply stood there, watching.That silence made everything ten times more intense. The entire crowd, which had earlier been laughing and mocking him, was now frozen in shock. Nobody dared whisper. Nobody dared move. They just stared — at Connor, then at Brandon, then at the phone showing the $3,000,000 alert.Brandon finally found his voice, but it didn’t come out strong. It came out broken. “H–How… what… what is this?” he stuttered, staring at the screen as if it was lying to him. “No… no, this can’t be real. How—how did you…? What just happened?!”But Connor didn’t answer.He didn’t owe him an explanation.Instead, Connor looked down and

Morning crept into the room slowly, slipping in through the glass windows. But Connor didn’t wake up gently to that soft glow. He jerked awake as if someone had shaken him by the shoulders. His eyelashes fluttered, and for a moment he stared blankly at the ceiling, unsure of where he was — unsure if the events of the previous day had been a dream or a hallucination brought on by exhaustion.But reality settled quickly. He was in the Winchester mansion. This is his true identity and his father’s legacy. All of it.He dragged a palm down his face and exhaled slowly. His throat felt tight and dry. He pushed himself up to sit and rubbed his eyes, still adjusting to the morning or what he thought was the morning. His gaze drifted lazily to the gigantic golden wall clock hanging just above the polished side cabinet.He stared at it, blinked and stared at it again, harder. He leaned forward as though the clock had played a trick on him.“...Twelve?” he whispered. His eyebrows drew together.

Connor stood there, unmoving, staring at Lena with an expression that didn’t look like anger anymore — it looked like something deeper and more dangerous than the outrage she expected from him. His jaw clenched tightly as the shattered pieces of the picture frame glittered on the stairs behind her.Lena, feeling victorious, lifted her chin slightly and crossed her arms. She mistook his stillness for weakness — just like she always had.She scoffed loudly. “Oh, so now you suddenly can’t talk?” she spat, her voice loud enough for everyone to hear. “You came late, you didn’t follow instructions, and now you want to stand there and act like the victim? You should consider yourself lucky that I even allowed you inside this mansion. If it were up to me, your things would already be outside where they belong.”Her words hit him, but Connor didn’t move. He simply stared at her, his chest rising and falling slowly, as if he were forcing himself to breathe evenly.Lena continued, her voice grow

Connor noticed something shifting along the right side of the room. He saw Montgomery thugs—five of them—beginning to step forward.They weren’t dressed like ordinary security men. They had the heavy, muscular build of men who had spent their adult lives intimidating people for a fee. Their cold expressions showed they were not new to violence. Their eyes locked on Connor with the same disdain their employers held toward him—because to them, he was just another poor man who had married above his class.But it was the objects in their hands that drew the most attention. They all held Baseball bats. Thick, wooden bats.The sound they made as the men tapped them slowly against their palms echoed through the room.One thug, the tallest among them with a scar running across his left eyebrow, stepped forward. He twirled his bat once and pointed it in Connor’s direction.“Boss says sign the documents,” the thug said, his voice low but filled with menace. “Sign it… or we’ll break every bone i