All Chapters of Abandoned King Gives No Mercy: Hell Will Burn: Chapter 61
- Chapter 70
120 chapters
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CHAPTER 61; The First Crack in the MirrorThe boardroom felt colder than it should have, even with the morning sunlight spilling across the polished table. The air smelled like coffee, paper, and quiet fear the kind people pretend isn’t there. That was the thing about corporate rooms: they held tension better than secrets.Ethan didn’t sit. He stood at the head of the table, one hand in his pocket, the other holding the report Julian placed in front of him. His jaw was clenched, not visibly, but in that subtle way only people who knew him would notice.I stood by the window, hands clasped behind my back. I wasn’t supposed to be in this meeting, but Ethan didn’t ask me to leave. He didn’t explain that either. He just gave me a look, short and unspoken, that said stay.So I did.Derrick’s voice still echoed in my head from earlier his threats, his desperation masked as arrogance. Something about him looked worse today, like he was hiding a bruise beneath a suit.“He’s escalating,” Julia
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CHAPTER 62; The Line He Wouldn’t Let Them CrossThe second message on Ethan’s phone didn’t look like the first.It wasn’t taunting or vague this time.It was a picture.A blurry, grainy photo taken from a distancebut I knew exactly where it was.Ethan’s penthouse hallway.My heartbeat slammed into my ribs.His eyes hardened as he zoomed in, jaw shifting in a way that meant someone had crossed a boundary he didn’t tolerate.I stepped closer. “Is… is that outside your door?”Ethan didn’t look at me when he answered.“Yes.”My chest tightened. “Who took it?”“We’ll find out.”His voice was calm.Too calm.The calm that came right before something broke inside him.Julian returned from the hallway, breathing fast. “Ethan, the number that sent the picture it’s the same burner device linked to the leak cluster.”My stomach dropped. “So whoever recorded my sister…”“Was also near the penthouse,” Julian finished.My pulse stuttered.Ethan didn’t move for a second.He just stared at the pho
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CHAPTER 63; The Silence After He Walked OutThe door clicked shut behind Ethan, and the sound echoed through the penthouse like something inside the walls had cracked. Something inside me cracked too.Julian stood frozen for a moment, staring at the door as if expecting Ethan to return immediately like he took only a step into the hallway and would come right back.But he didn’t.He was gone.And he didn’t tell me where he was going.I moved toward the nearest chair and sank into it, pressing my palms against my knees to stop them from shaking. My heart felt too loud inside my chest. The room was too quiet without him.It felt wrong.Off.Empty in a way I didn’t want to think about.Julian let out a shaky breath. “I can’t believe he left like that.”“He didn’t leave,” I said softly. “He went to… finish something.”Julian gave me a look that was half worry and half disbelief. “Do you realize what ‘finish something’ means when Ethan says it?”I looked down at my hands. “Yes.”“And you’r
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CHAPTER 64; The Building Went Too QuietJulian kept trying to call Ethan, but the ringing stopped after the fourth attempt. No voicemail. No busy tone. Just sudden silence.That silence scared me more than the threats, the leaks, the hashtags more than anything that had happened today.Julian lowered the phone slowly. “This isn’t normal.”“Try again,” I whispered.“I did. The call didn’t even go through this time.”My stomach twisted. “Meaning…?”“Meaning someone blocked his line,” Julian said.The security guard shifted anxiously. “Ma’am… sir… whoever that group is downstairs, they’re not ordinary people.”“Group?” Julian asked sharply.The guard nodded. “Three of them. All wearing caps, all carrying bags with equipment. One had something that looked like a signal jammer.”My breath hitched.Julian muttered, “Hell…”I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to breathe through the panic building in my chest.“Julian… what if they’re after him?”Julian didn’t answer. Not immediately.And
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CHAPTER 65; Her Voice Broke in the DarkSally’s voice didn’t sound like Sally.Not the woman who destroyed Ethan.Not the woman who smiled while my career burned.This voice was shaking.Afraid.Rushed.Like something was forcing the fear out of her.Julian mouthed silently, hung up, his eyes wide with alarm.I didn’t.“I…I don’t understand,” I whispered into the phone. “What do you mean they’re here for Ethan?”Sally sucked in a sharp, trembling breath. “I tried to warn him. I swear I did.”I blinked. “Warn him about what?”Julian stepped closer, trying to hear the call.Sally’s voice broke on the other end. “Yvonne, he shouldn’t have left the building. They’re not random. They’re not reporters. They’re not after you.”My stomach clenched. “Then who—”Her next words came out choked. “They’re here for him because of Derrick.”Everything in me is still.Julian froze mid-step, his face draining of color.“Derrick?” I whispered. “What does that mean…”Sally continued, talking too fas
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CHAPTER 66; Silent Stairway The safe room was too quiet.Not the comforting quiet of a protected space, this was a suffocating quiet.A quiet that pressed against my skin and made every small sound feel too loud.The faint hum of the air vent.My own shaky breathing.The soft metallic click of the reinforced door settling into place.I pressed my back against the wall, sliding down until I was sitting on the cold floor. The room smelled faintly of steel, dust, and something chemical, maybe the fireproof coating.I wrapped my arms around myself, not to hug anything in, but to keep the trembling from showing.Ethan told me once that fear wasn’t weakness, it was awareness.Right now, I was painfully aware of everything.Every noise outside the door.Every second ticking by.Every heartbeat pounding out of rhythm in my chest.Julian was still out there.Ethan was out there somewhere in the dark.And I was locked in a room that suddenly felt too small for my thoughts.Ethan would come bac
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CHAPTER 67; When the Door Finally GaveThe second gunshot hit the steel harder than the first.The sound ricocheted through the small room, bouncing around my skull until it felt like the walls were closing in.I pressed myself into the corner, one hand clamped over my mouth, the other gripping my phone like it was the last real thing I had left.Ethan’s message burned on the screen.I’m almost there.Don’t open the door.I wanted to believe him.I wanted to cling to it the way drowning people cling to air.But the doorframe was splitting.And Derrick wasn’t stopping.Another strike hammered the lock. The metal creaked, the sound high and sharp, like something about to snap.Julian…The guard…Where were they?Were they caught?Were they fighting?Were they…A loud drag of metal pulled me out of the spiral.Derrick spoke again, voice lowered, calm, almost patient.“Yvonne,” he said. “I know you’re scared. I know you’re shaking.”I squeezed my eyes shut.“Open this door, sweetheart, an
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CHAPTER 68; The Shot That Shook the HallwayThe gunshot tore through the hallway with a crack so violent it felt like the world snapped in half.I screamed.Not because I decided to have the sound ripped out of me before I could think.Ethan staggered forward, his body jolting from the impact.The sound of the bullet embedding into something metal behind him echoed sharply, ringing in the small space.For one horrifying second, I thought the bullet had gone straight through him.“No…no, no..Ethan!”My hands flew toward him, but he stayed upright.Barely.His shoulder jerked, pain carving across his face for just a flash before he forced it away.Forced it down.Forced himself to stand.The man who shot him stepped out of the shadows, heavy boots thudding against the hallway floor. His gun was still raised, smoke curling from the barrel.He aimed at Ethan again.My breath froze.“Get back!” Ethan shouted at me, not at the shooter.I didn’t move. I couldn’t.The shooter snarled somethi
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CHAPTER 69; The Man Who Took Derrick’s PlaceFor a full heartbeat, all I heard was my own pulse.Loud.Off-beat.Panicked.Derrick was dead.Dead.Not threatened.Not missing.Not hiding.Gone.Taken out like a piece in someone else’s game.My breath caught in my throat as the words on my screen burned into my vision, refusing to disappear.“FOUND DEAD.”“FOUL PLAY.”“UNKNOWN SUSPECT.”Ethan slid the shooter’s phone into his pocket, his movements slow, calculated, terrifyingly calm.But his eyes…His eyes were something else entirely.Cold.Sharp.Focused.Like a man who had just confirmed the worst suspicion he’d been carrying quietly.“Ethan,” I whispered. “They killed him.”He didn’t answer at first.He pressed a hand to his injured shoulder only when I stepped closer and even then, it looked more like he was making sure I didn’t touch the blood than acknowledging his own pain.“He was a pawn,” Ethan murmured.My breath trembled. “But..he’s dead.”“Yes.”“Then the danger is over,
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CHAPTER 70; The Hallway That Felt Like a TrapThere were too many footsteps.Too loud.Too fast.Too sure of where they were going.They weren’t searching.They were coming.Straight for us.Ethan lifted the gun with his uninjured arm, eyes locked on the dark stairwell like he’d been waiting for this moment. The blood soaking his shirt had spread further down his side, but he didn’t so much as flinch.His breathing didn’t break.His stance didn’t shift.Even wounded, he looked like someone you didn’t approach without a death wish.“Stay behind me,” he murmured.My hands were shaking too hard to reply. My breath came out sharp, shallow. My body reacted before my mind did. I stepped behind him, fingers curling into the back of his shirt for balance.He didn’t push me away.He didn’t pull me closer either.He just stood there still, ready, terrifyingly calm.The voices in the stairwell grew louder.English mixed with another language I couldn’t identify.Orders.Short commands.Boots hi