All Chapters of Rise to Power:
The Miraculous Liam Regan.: Chapter 191
- Chapter 200
218 chapters
Chapter 191
The silence that followed Detective Brown's accusation was not the kind that arrives gently. It crashed into the room like something physical, suffocating and absolute, every conversation dying mid-sentence, every glass freezing halfway to someone's lips, every breath caught and held as the gathered guests processed what they had just heard.And then the whispers began.Not quiet whispers. Not the polite murmurs of people trying to maintain decorum in an awkward moment. These were loud, sharp, urgent whispers that moved through the crowd like a contagion, person to person, table to table, each repetition adding a new layer of shock and disbelief and outrage."A murderer?""He came here? To this party?""He killed someone and then just walked in like nothing happened?""He was trying to collect praise. Trying to stand there and be honored while there is a dead body somewhere connected to him.""What kind of monster does that?""What kind of person kills someone and then shows up at a c
Chapter 192
The room watched in heavy silence as Penelope's father stood with the particular stillness of a man who is fighting a battle entirely within himself.He wanted to say more. There was more to say. The words were there, pressing against the inside of his chest, demanding to be released. But the circumstances had cornered him in a way that very few things in his long and distinguished life had ever managed to do. Because this was his party. His home. His guests. And the humiliation of having police officers standing in the middle of his carefully arranged celebration, handcuffs ready, the entire room watching with barely concealed fascination and judgment, was not something he could simply speak his way out of.He believed Liam.That was the thing that sat most firmly in his chest as he stood there, processing the impossibility of the moment. He had looked into the eyes of the man who had saved his life, had spoken with him, had spent enough time in his presence to form a quiet but unsha
Chapter 193
Marcus nodded slowly, his expression carrying the particular satisfaction of someone watching pieces fall into place exactly as they had been arranged to."You have absolutely nothing to worry about," he said, his voice low and certain. "Very soon, he is going to understand the situation he has just found himself in. Very, very soon. And when he does, when reality finally settles in and he realizes that smiling and acting confident is not going to change anything, then we will see how calm he looks." He paused. "You have nothing to worry about."His friend studied him for a moment, his eyes narrowing slightly as something shifted in his expression, something that moved from amusement into genuine curiosity."Why am I sensing that you had a hand in this?" he said, his voice dropping even lower, almost conspiratorial. "Because I am starting to remember what you said to me earlier. You told me not to worry. You said his downfall was coming, that it was already on its way, and that I shou
Chapter 194
Nathaniel's eyes sharpened immediately, fixing on his son with the kind of look that had stopped people mid-sentence in boardrooms for decades."What do you mean leave it to the police?" he said, his voice carrying the quiet intensity of someone who is choosing not to shout because the words themselves are enough. "Leave it to the police?" He repeated it as though the suggestion needed to be examined from every angle before being properly rejected. "That man is innocent. I do not need a CCTV camera to tell me that. I can feel it. A man who walks into a hospital and does what he did for a complete stranger, for someone he had never met, does not turn around and murder the doctor in that same room." He shook his head firmly. "That is not how people are built."He paused, something shifting in his expression, a memory surfacing that he had not thought about until this moment."And your sister," he said, his voice slowing slightly as he worked through the recollection. "Before we left the
Chapter 195
He straightened, and when he spoke, his voice had recovered the full authority that age and experience had built into it over a lifetime."The public can talk," he said simply, looking between his two children with eyes that were considerably sharper than the evening's events might have suggested. "Let them talk. That is what people do, and it has never stopped me from doing what is right." He paused. "That man saved my life. He sat beside my bed when he did not have to. He used whatever gift he has been given to bring me back when I was already halfway out the door." His voice did not waver. "If he is guilty, then the footage will show it and he will face whatever consequences are appropriate. But if he is innocent, and I believe he is, then I will not stand here and do nothing while someone destroys him." He looked at Marcus directly. "I saved myself once, a long time ago, when no one was willing to stand up for me. I remember what that felt like. I will not wish it on someone else.
Chapter 196
Emily, who had finally stopped pacing and was now standing with her hands braced against the back of a chair, looked between the two men with an expression that suggested she had already been thinking several steps ahead."I think I have an idea," she said, her voice steady now, the fury sharpening into something more focused, more dangerous. "I think I know how we can make this happen." She straightened, her eyes bright with the kind of cold calculation that comes from someone who has spent years learning how to move pieces on boards that other people do not even know they are playing on. "I know someone who can push a narrative. Not just push it, but craft it, shape it, make it spread like wildfire until everyone in this city is talking about it and taking sides and demanding answers." She paused. "He is one of the best at what he does. People listen to him. People believe him. And once he sets a story in motion, it does not stop until it has burned through every conversation, every
Chapter 197
Emily's posture sharpened almost imperceptibly."What kind of information?" she said carefully, her eyes sliding briefly toward Benjamin's father and David, both of whom were watching her with the fixed attention of men who understood that something significant was happening even though they could only hear half of the conversation."You know that good-for-nothing Leon?" the voice said, and there was a particular relish in how the name was delivered, the relish of someone who has waited for this moment. "That good-for-nothing bastard. He has been arrested. For murder. They are saying he killed a doctor, a female doctor, right there in the hospital. And they arrested him yesterday." A brief pause. "I am not talking about rumors. I have confirmed this. Multiple sources. It is real. It actually happened. He actually killed somebody and they have taken him in."The room seemed to contract slightly around Emily as the words landed.Her jaw dropped.Not the exaggerated, performative jaw dro
Chapter 198
He paused, making sure he had their full attention."What if we push the narrative that Leon was the mastermind behind the mining site collapse?"The room went very quiet.David continued, his voice steady and building in conviction."Think about it. He has not been officially dismissed from his position yet. That is a fact. Which means that on paper, on record, his responsibilities at that site were still active on the day it collapsed. Now, what if we push the story that he had been systematically stealing equipment from the site for months? Quietly. Incrementally. The kind of theft that is designed not to be noticed immediately, pulling pieces here and there, selling them, replacing critical components with inferior substitutes, and that by the time that day arrived, the structural integrity of that entire operation had been compromised by his theft, by his negligence, by his deliberate decision to prioritize his own gain over the safety of every single person working there?" He st
Chapter 199
The silence that followed his departure was different from the silence that had existed before he entered. It was lighter somehow, and at the same time more intimate, the specific quality of a room that has contracted to hold only two people who know each other in ways that cannot be fully explained to anyone else.David looked at Emily.For a moment he said nothing, simply watching her with the careful attention of someone who has learned to read a person not from what they say but from the small, unguarded spaces between their words."Things are moving," he said finally, his voice low and easy. "Smoothly. Better than I expected, honestly." He moved slightly closer, his tone shifting into something that existed just between the two of them. "And once this is finished, once we close out this narrative and win this case and take back the company and everything that belongs to this family, we go straight to the original plan." He held her gaze. "You know that, right? Everything we discu
Chapter 200
Nathaniel nodded slowly."So what," he said, his voice dropping into something harder, "are they holding him with?"The question sat in the air between them."Nothing that this footage supports," Penelope said. "Nothing at all." She shook her head slowly. "If you show this footage to any reasonable person, any person who is willing to look at it without a predetermined conclusion already in place, they are going to ask the same question we are asking. The doctor was alive when everyone left that room. So where does Liam's culpability begin? On what basis did they put handcuffs on him in front of an entire room of people?" Her voice tightened slightly despite her effort to keep it even. "Unless the answer is simply that he is an E-level citizen who laid his hands on someone in that room, and certain people decided that was enough of a reason to build a case around him."Nathaniel's jaw tightened."That is exactly what I think happened," he said, and the words came out with the particul