All Chapters of The Billionaire Hidden in Plain Sight: Chapter 171
- Chapter 180
200 chapters
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY TWO
Emma did not cry after the woman left. She did not pace around or bang on the door or demand answers from guards who would never give them.Instead, she sat down, deep in thoughts. At first, her thoughts came in waves of fear, confusion and anger , but slowly, something steadier began to take their place. She replayed every word the woman had said. They had not threatened her, hurt her or tried to break her. They had talked to her and that was not how kidnappers behaved. That was how people behaved when they needed something.Emma leaned back against the headboard, her hand resting lightly on her stomach. Her breathing slowed, steady and controlled.If they needed something, then she had value and if she had value, then she had leverage. That realization changed everything. Fear made people react and leverage made people think.She decided she would think. The next time the door opened, she was ready.It was not the same woman who entered this time. It was one of the men who had esco
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY THREE
Liam stopped being a husband at exactly 2:17 a.m. He did not announce it nor say it out loud. No one in the house would have understood it even if he had.Margaret was asleep in one of the rooms, exhausted from crying. Victoria had refused to sleep at all, pacing until her body forced her to rest. George sat downstairs with a glass of untouched whiskey, staring at nothing.They were waiting for news. They were waiting for him but Liam knew something they did not, waiting was not how this would be won.He stood in the nursery doorway for a long time before leaving. The small crib sat near the window, half assembled. One side was still missing screws. Emma had insisted they finish it together. She had laughed when he struggled with the instructions, teasing him for being able to run empires but not assemble furniture.He reached out and touched the smooth wood. His expression did not change, but something inside him hardened into place.Then he turned and walked away. He did not tell an
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY FOUR
Emma stopped measuring time by hours. Hours implied freedom, movement, choice, things captivity had stripped away from her. Time had become something strange in captivity. It lived in the way light shifted across the floor, stretching and shrinking like it was alive, in the quiet routines of the guards, in the rhythm of boots passing her door, in the predictable moments when food arrived and the door opened just long enough to remind her that she was still contained.At first, she had reacted like someone taken against her will. She had been afraid, confused and angry. Those emotions had crashed over her in violent waves, leaving her breathless and raw. She had asked questions that came from instinct rather than intention, questions thrown at walls that refused to answer back, but that version of her did not last long.Fear was useful only when it sharpened the mind. After that, it became a liability. It clouded judgment, slowed reaction time, and made mistakes inevitable. So she let
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY FIVE
Emma did not begin her escape by running, she began it by waiting.Time had become a strange thing inside the room. It did not move the way it used to. She had no clock, no phone, nothing that told her what hour it was, but she had learned to measure time by routine. She paid attention to everything, not because she was bored but because she was preparing.At first, she had been afraid to move too much, afraid hat any sudden change would make them tighten control but she became calm.She sat by the window often, even though it did not open. She rested her hands on her stomach and breathed slowly, steadily, the way she had taught herself to do during the early months of pregnancy when everything felt uncertain. She spoke less and asked fewer questions.And because of that, they relaxed.It was subtle, but she noticed.The guards stopped watching her with constant suspicion. They still watched, but not with the same intensity. They began to see her as predictable. That was their mista
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY SIX
Liam’s POVAt the same hour Emma turned a handle that was never meant to turn, Liam sat at the head of a table in a quiet room.The warehouse that housed it belonged to a chain of shell corporations that had not been active in years, dust coated the outer floor. The office inside was spotless.Five people sat around the table with him. They were former Veridia operatives.Some of them had stayed with the Emperor, some had not.The ones in this room had walked away because they had chosen him.Liam stood, his hands resting lightly on the table, his posture straight but controlled. There was no rage in him.“They took her,” he said.No one asked who, they already knew. Veridia did not make personal moves without intention.One of the men across from him, a former logistics architect named Karim, spoke first. “It was a retrieval, not an attack.”Liam nodded once. “Yes.”Another woman, Sofia, who had once overseen internal containment protocols, leaned back slightly. “They want you to com
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY SEVEN
The central room of Veridia was nothing like the dramatic war rooms. The room was circular and quiet, designed for conversation rather than intimidation. A single long table stood at its center, polished to a crisp. Floor-to-ceiling screens curved along the walls, displaying data.The Emperor stood near the far end of the room.He was older than when Liam had last seen him, but not diminished. His posture remained straight. His expression remained unreadable and he wore nothing that marked him as ruler of anything. In Veridia, authority was not worn, it was shown.For a moment, neither of them spoke.The Emperor studied him carefully, “You came,” the Emperor said at last.Liam walked forward at an even pace and stopped at the opposite side of the table. “You made sure I would.”A faint acknowledgment flickered in the Emperor’s eyes. “You always understood things like this”“And you always used it,” Liam replied. There was no hostility in his tone.The Emperor gestured toward the chair
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY EIGHT
The silence that followed Liam’s refusal did not break the room.The Emperor studied him for several seconds, and if anything, there was a faint acknowledgment in his expression, as though he had expected resistance and respected it.“You have always been consistent,” the Emperor said at last.“I try to be,” Liam replied.The screens along the walls dimmed slightly, the data fading into muted backgrounds. The conversation had reached its conclusion.“You want her to come back,” the Emperor said.“Yes.” He said, not bothering to elaborate. There was no need for that.The Emperor rose from his chair slowly. “Very well.”Liam watched him carefully. It felt less like defeat and more like the next calculated move in a larger design.The Emperor tapped a command into a panel on the table. “Bring her,” he instructed calmly. “Immediately.”The message was transmitted without urgency, and Liam remained still.This was the moment he had walked into the building for. For his wife, Emma.Two oper
CHAPTER HUNDRED AND SEVENTY NINE
By the time Emma reached the outer side of the property, her body was running on adrenaline and fear. The night air felt colder than it should have, as though her skin had grown too sensitive for the world outside the facility. She did not look back, she had promised herself she would not.The landscape beyond Veridia’s empire was uneven and dimly lit. The road she found was not a highway but a service route, likely used for deliveries and maintenance vehicles that had no reason to be seen entering or leaving the compound. It curved gently through some bushes, disappearing into darkness.She stopped at the edge of the road and tried to steady her breathing. The ground felt unstable under her feet, not because it was uneven, but because her legs were trembling from fear. She placed a hand over her stomach instinctively, grounding herself.“You’re still here,” she whispered to the child inside her, though she did not know whether she was speaking to comfort the baby or herself.The sile
CHAPTER HUNDRED AND EIGHTY
“There’s been an incident,” The person that Liam contacted, said. “Local emergency services responded to a collision less than three kilometers from the side gate.”Liam’s attention sharpened instantly.“A woman was transported to St. Catherine’s Medical Center and she matches Emma’s description.”For a fraction of a second, the world narrowed to a single point.“What is the condition of the woman?” Liam asked, his worry building.“She’s alive but currently unconscious at transport.”The Emperor, who had been observing without interruption, turned toward them. He did not need to ask who they were discussing.“This was not our doing,” he said evenly.“I know,” Liam replied. “But you better pray she’s fine.”There was no accusation in his tone.The Emperor studied him carefully. “You understand that once she is in a public institution, this situation leaves our control.”“It was never yours to control. If you hadn’t taken her, this wouldn’t have happened,” Liam said quietly.He did not
ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY ONE
Emma’s eyelids felt impossibly heavy, as if they were stitched together by fear, pain, and exhaustion she had carried over the last twenty-four hours. She tried to move, but her arms felt heavy. It was only when a soft, familiar voice whispered her name that she realized she wasn’t alone.“Emma,” Liam murmured. His voice was low, and quiet, and yet it carried a hint of every hour he had spent worrying while she slept. “You’re awake.”She blinked slowly, trying to focus, and the first thing she saw was him, sitting rigidly at the edge of her hospital bed, hand resting lightly on hers. He hadn’t moved since she’d opened her eyes, his face a mixture of relief and fear, her lips twitched into a tired smile.“I—I’m here,” she whispered, her voice hoarse, almost foreign to her own ears.“I know,” he said, leaning closer just enough for his hand to brush hers with a tenderness that made her chest ache. “You’ve been through a lot. You’re okay now.”Emma’s hand tightened around his instinctive