Benjamin Wayne's Rise to Power

Benjamin stared at his phone as the caller spoke in an over-excited tone. “We’ve finally found you, young master.”

For a brief moment, he was stunned.

Young master? Him? Was there even the slightest—no. The whole thing seemed a bit too shallow, and he immediately sensed what it was.

“Sorry man, but you hit the wrong target today,” he replied before hanging up.

Benjamin? A young master? He scoffed at the thought. The lengths people went to these days just to rip others off their hard-earned cash.

“Scammers,” he muttered, slipping the phone into the pocket of the Walmart uniform he was putting on.

His gaze shifted back to the red gift box he had been holding all along, and he smiled. Some months ago, Rose had talked about getting this exact handbag, but because of the $23,000 price tag attached to it, he hadn’t been able to afford it at the time.

Today was Valentine’s Day, and what better way to make her happy than to surprise her with it?

The box wasn’t too large, but it still felt heavy with meaning. Three months of late-night shifts, skipped meals, and double shifts at the warehouse had gone into it. He had hidden the bag carefully in the staff locker all week, counting down the hours. Rose had even told him he didn’t need to bother doing anything for her this year, that he should focus on his classes and save money—but that only made him want to do more.

He stood outside her apartment, his fingers curling around the satin ribbon tied neatly around the red box. For a second, he pictured her face—wide eyes, that half-smile she gave when she was genuinely surprised, her arms slipping around his neck in a quick, grateful hug. The thought made his chest warm.

He brushed his hair back, steadied his breath, and pressed down on the door handle.

The door creaked open and he stepped inside before he could second-guess himself.

Her laugh hit first—soft but unmistakable—followed by a deeper voice that froze the air in his lungs.

Rose and Ryan.

His girlfriend and his younger brother.

They were tangled together on the living room couch, Rose’s blouse half-open and Ryan’s hand tracing her bare shoulder.

The red gift box slid from Benjamin’s hand, crashing against the floor with a dull thud.

For a moment, he couldn’t move. His vision blurred, and everything around him slowed, like he had slipped out of his own body.

“Ben?” Rose called as her head snapped around. “What are you—what are you doing here? I thought you had the night shift!”

The words barely reached him.

“I… took the night off,” he managed, his voice quieter than he expected. “I wanted to surprise you. I’ve been saving up for months just to buy this for you.” His gaze dropped to the broken ribbon and the expensive bag now half-sliding out of the box.

“Rose… I even helped you with rent.” He looked back up at her, hurt rising in his throat. “This is how you repay me?”

She blinked rapidly, embarrassment flashing across her face. “You came into my house without my permission,” she snapped. “Do you even realize what you just did, Benjamin? You invaded my privacy!”

“Privacy?” His voice rose, cracking slightly. “You’re cheating on me—with my brother—and you’re talking about privacy?”

Her lips curved into a cold, humorless smile. “Cheating?” she echoed. “Ben, you two are from the same family. Sleeping with one or the other—what difference does it make?”

The air drained from his chest the moment she said that. He just stood there, dumbfounded. Those words were too cruel to be real.

“Adopted, Rosy. He’s adopted,” Ryan chipped in, and Benjamin shifted his gaze to him.

Ryan leaned back on the couch, his arm still lazily draped around her shoulders. “Besides, man, you’re overreacting,” he said smugly.

Overreacting? The word hit Benjamin like a punch to the face. His girlfriend was with his brother—and he was overreacting?

“So what if I stole your girl? I mean… you should’ve known she’d eventually want someone who could give her more than cheap gifts.”

Benjamin’s stomach twisted. That was the height of it. “Ryan,” he said through clenched teeth, “that’s enough.”

Ryan laughed. “What? You’re gonna report to my parents? Oh, so you seriously think you’re one of us? You really don’t get it, do you?” He stood up, brushing imaginary dust from his shirt, looking down at Benjamin like he was a stranger. “Let me make this clearer for you then.”

He walked up to him.

“You… were… adopted, Ben.” He poked his index finger against Benjamin’s chest three times—one for each word. “An orphan we took in because my parents thought they couldn’t have kids. You were just a placeholder until the real son came along. Me.”

In that moment, everything went silent—everything except Ryan.

“You should be thanking us, Benjamin,” he continued. “If it weren’t for my parents’ pity, you’d still be rotting in some group home.”

“Ryan—” Benjamin began, but his voice trailed off.

“You don’t belong in our family, Benjamin. You never did.”

Ryan reached over to the table and grabbed a sleek Hermès bag, flaunting it like a trophy. “This? I bought this for her today. It’s real luxury, Ben. Not something you scrape together with months of minimum wage. That’s what women like her deserve.”

Rose smirked, sliding her hand along the bag’s leather strap before turning to Benjamin. “Just leave the box and go, Ben.”

Benjamin had been awfully quiet for several seconds, but when she said those words, something cracked inside him. He stared at her for a long moment. The woman he thought he loved looked like a stranger.

“You don’t deserve it,” he said quietly.

Her face hardened, and in that split second, Ryan lunged at him. “What did you just say to her?”

Before Benjamin could react, Ryan’s fist swung toward his face. The blow glanced off his jaw, sharp and clumsy. Everything snapped back into motion. Benjamin grabbed Ryan’s wrist, twisted it, and shoved him backward. Ryan stumbled, knocking over a vase.

But Benjamin didn’t stop. The anger he had swallowed for years—the insults, the humiliation—everything surged at once.

His fist connected with Ryan’s face. Once. Then again. And again. And again—until Ryan hit the floor with a groan.

Rose screamed, rushing to Ryan’s side.

Benjamin just stood there, chest heaving. His knuckles burned, but he didn’t care. He was done being spat on, being looked down on.

“You can both go to hell,” he said finally, his voice low, almost calm.

Then he turned and walked out before she could say another word.

The cold night air slapped against his face as he stepped onto the street. For a moment, he simply stood there, staring at the traffic lights flickering red and green over the empty crosswalk. His breath came out in shallow bursts. His hands shook. Everything he had built, every effort to make things right, to belong somewhere, felt like it had collapsed in a single evening.

He pressed a hand to his forehead and laughed bitterly.

“One day,” he muttered under his breath, “I’ll have the power to get back at every one of you.”

Just then, his phone vibrated.

He frowned and pulled it from his pocket. It was the same number as before. He almost ignored it, but something made him swipe to answer.

“Listen,” he started, voice tight. “I told you earlier, I’m not—”

Before he could finish, the man’s voice came through again, calm and clear this time. “Young master, I understand your doubts,” the man said. “So I’ve sent something to your account to prove to you that I’m not lying.”

“What?” Benjamin asked.

“Check your balance,” the man replied simply before hanging up.

Benjamin hesitated before opening his mobile banking app. But when he did, his fingers froze midair.

One hundred million dollars.

The number blinked up at him like a hallucination, long strings of zeros beneath his name. His throat tightened.

“What the hell?”

The phone rang again before he could process it. He pressed it to his ear slowly, heart pounding.

“Now you believe me, young master?” the man said, his tone even more formal than before. “I am your family’s butler, and we’ve been searching for you for years.”

“Searching?” Benjamin asked, confused. Everything felt like a dream—like one of those stories on some w******l platform.

“You are the rightful heir of the Wayne Family,” the man replied.

Benjamin couldn’t breathe. The world—everything—felt unreal.

The Wayne Family?

Weren’t the Waynes the most powerful oligarch family in the country?