All Chapters of Fate’s Billionaire: Chapter 11
- Chapter 16
16 chapters
Every Step is a Trap
Vincent didn’t sleep that night.He didn’t need to. Sleep meant vulnerability. And right now, vulnerability would be exploited.The city had changed. Every alley, every street, every shadow felt wrong. Traffic lights blinked as if hesitating. Pedestrians lingered too long at crosswalks, as if time itself had stalled for inspection. Vincent could feel the system probing, testing, learning… and recalculating.Lara leaned against the wall of their safe house, coffee in hand, pale from exhaustion.“They’re moving fast,” she said quietly. “All over the city.”Vincent didn’t respond immediately. His eyes were scanning every reflection in the room. Glass. Metal. Even the quiet hum of the refrigerator could be listening.“They’ve sent someone,” he finally said. “Someone who can see… like I can.”Lara froze.“What do you mean?” she whispered.“The system doesn’t play fair anymore,” Vincent said. “It sent a human enforcer. One who can anticipate endings. One who can adapt.”“Adapt how?” she ask
Last Updated : 2026-01-22
Shadows That Kill
Vincent didn’t sleep.Not because he wanted to be awake. He slept so little because the city itself had become a trap. Every street corner, every passing car, every flickering light could be a signal that the enforcer, or the system itself was watching.Lara had been restless all night.“They’re escalating,” she whispered as Vincent checked the rooftops from their new safehouse. “I tracked three accidents already this morning. Not random, targeted.”Vincent didn’t answer immediately. He was scanning the streets below, reading probabilities in people’s movements like a second sight. A child crossing too close to a parked van. A delivery bike weaving recklessly. None of it was coincidence.“They’re using the city against us,” he said finally. “Every movement, every choice, they’re turning it into a weapon.”Lara swallowed. “And us?”Vincent’s jaw tightened. “Especially us.”The first attack came shortly after sunrise.A pedestrian bridge near a crowded market collapsed, not entirely, bu
Last Updated : 2026-01-22
The Trap Tightens
Vincent had always known the system would escalate.He just didn’t think it would strike this close.The call came at 3:02 a.m.Not a message. Not a vision. Real-time, physical proof that the hunt had begun in earnest.Lara’s apartment, completely destroyed.Shards of glass sparkled under the pale streetlights. Furniture overturned. Flames licked a corner from a knocked-over lamp. The smell of smoke and terror hung in the air.Vincent’s heart skipped.He sprinted.Lara was gone. Not kidnapped. Not left behind. But gone. A note lay on the charred counter.If you want her alive, come alone. No tricks. No witnesses. Time is running out.The handwriting… precise. Mechanical. Cold.He didn’t hesitate.The rendezvous point was an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city.Rain poured as Vincent arrived, every puddle reflecting the neon glow of flickering streetlights. He felt the enforcer’s presence before he saw him. Calm. Patient. Like a shadow that never slept.Lara was tied to a
Last Updated : 2026-01-22
When the City Becomes the Weapon
Vincent knew the city was about to turn on him before the first siren sounded.Not from a vision.From the silence.Traffic slowed without reason. Streetlights stayed red too long. Phones around him vibrated at the same time, then stopped. The air felt tight, like the moment before lightning splits the sky.Lara felt it too.“Something is wrong,” she whispered.Vincent nodded. “They stopped hiding.”They were standing on the roof of an unfinished building, high enough to see the city stretch endlessly in all directions. Normally, Vincent would see thousands of endings overlapping, messy, alive. Now, he saw alignment.Too clean.Too organized.“They’re deploying more enforcers,” Vincent said. “Not one. Several.”Lara’s throat tightened. “How many?”Vincent closed his eyes for half a second.“Enough to make this look like coincidence.”Across the city, accidents began.A city bus lost control and slammed into a barrier, injuring dozens but killing none. A power substation exploded, plun
Last Updated : 2026-01-22
The Price of Standing Still
Vincent’s surrender broke the city.Not with noise.With confusion.People stood frozen in the intersection, staring at the man who had just offered himself to save strangers. Phones trembled in hands. Cameras zoomed in. The air felt thick, like the city itself was holding its breath.Lara stood a few steps behind him, heart hammering so hard she could barely hear the sirens anymore.“Vincent,” she whispered.He did not turn.He kept his hands open, empty, visible.“I am here,” he said again, voice steady. “You want control. Take me.”The enforcers did not move.They were not programmed for surrender.Their calculations relied on resistance, on motion, on optimization through conflict. Vincent had removed every variable by refusing to run.Deep beneath the city, in a room that had never seen daylight, the system stalled.Probability trees collapsed into dead ends. Risk models contradicted themselves. Every simulation where Vincent lived required mass death. Every simulation where mass
Last Updated : 2026-01-22
The Truth Bleeds
Vincent did not sleep.Sleep was a luxury for people who believed tomorrow was guaranteed.He sat at the small wooden table, laptop open, phone beside it, lights off except for the glow of the screen. The city outside was quieter than usual, like it sensed something was coming.Lara watched him from the doorway.“You do not have to do this tonight,” she said softly.Vincent did not look up.“If I wait,” he replied, “he controls the narrative.”She stepped closer, wrapping her arms around herself.“And if you speak now?”“They will try to destroy me,” Vincent said. “Completely.”Lara swallowed.“They already are.”Vincent finally turned to her.“That is the difference,” he said. “Right now, I am a rumor. After tonight, I become a fact.”Silence stretched between them.Then Lara nodded.“Then do not lie,” she said. “Do not soften it. Do not protect them.”Vincent’s jaw tightened.“I will not,” he promised.Across the city, Darius Vell rehearsed his lies in front of a mirror.“You acted
Last Updated : 2026-01-22