2025-07-17 23:46:12
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CHAPTER 764
The dialogue remained light for hours, drifting from Thomas’s failed attempts at gardening to Marek’s stories of the city’s changing skyline. The horrors of the basement and the Crossroad Men were kept at bay, locked away by the sheer force of their collective happiness.Eventually, the table fell into a comfortable lull. Millicent set her fork down and leaned back, watching the young couple at the other end. She watched the way Persis tilted her head to laugh at a whisper, and the way Tedmond looked at her, not with the predatory hunger of his father, but with a protective, profound adoration."You two," Millicent said softly, her voice cutting through the chatter with gentle authority.Tedmond and Persis both looked up, caught in the light of their own world. "Yes, Mother?" Tedmond asked.Millicent’s eyes sparkled with a hint of the girl she had been before the highway. "I’ve spent a lifetime waiting for things to be right. I’ve watched the moon through cellar bars and prayed fo
CHAPTER 763
The fury was there, sharp and cold, but as he looked back at the courthouse, he saw a small, frail figure standing by the pillars.It was Millicent. She looked exhausted, her shoulders finally sagging after hours of maintaining her monumental poise.Tedmond took a slow, grounding breath and folded the paper, tucking it deep into his pocket. The darkness in his eyes didn't vanish, but it receded, replaced by a weary tenderness."Not tonight, Persis," Tedmond said, his voice softening. "The docks can wait. Malachai Vire isn't going anywhere. They’ve lived in peace for twenty years; they can survive one more night of ignorance."Persis blinked, surprised. "You’re calling it off? Just like that?""Not calling it off," Tedmond corrected. "Just delaying. My mother has spent her whole life being a ghost or a servant. Today, she became a free woman. She shouldn't have to spend her first evening of freedom wondering if her son is out spilling blood.”“We’re going home. I want to sit at a tab
CHAPTER 762
The city had never seen a trial like the one that unfolded in the hallowed, marble halls of the High Court. It wasn't just a legal proceeding; it was an autopsy of an era. The Griffin Scandal had leaked into the press like oil on water, shimmering with the iridescent filth of the elite, and it was high time for Evelyn to be brought to justice.The courtroom was packed to the rafters. Reporters sat shoulder-to-shoulder with the very socialites who had once sipped champagne in the Griffin solarium. At the center of it all sat Millicent, dressed in a simple, high-necked charcoal dress.She didn't look like a victim; she looked like a monument.Across the aisle, Evelyn Griffin sat alone. Her children were not beside her. Her husband was dead. She was a woman stripped of her armor, yet she clung to a jagged, pathetic defiance.***The lead prosecutor, a man who had built his career on the very laws Harold Griffin once manipulated, called the first witness. Sarah, the younger maid wh
CHAPTER 761
Max turned to his sister, his gaze hardening with sharp resolve. "Maxine, go. Pack only what belongs to you—nothing bought with Griffin blood money. We’re moving. Tonight."Evelyn let out a sharp, choked sob. "Moving? To where? You have nothing out there! You are Griffins! You don't know how to survive without me!""We'll learn," Maxine said, her voice trembling but certain. She stepped back from her mother’s reaching hand as if it were a contagion. "I’m not staying here another hour. I can't breathe in this house anymore. Every corner feels like it’s hiding a ghost.""Maxine, please!" Evelyn pleaded, crawling forward on her knees, her poise shattered. "You’re a lady! You’ve never worked a day in your life!"Maxine looked down at her mother, a sad, bitter smile touching her lips. "Then it’s time I started. I’m going to find a job, Mother. A real one. I’d rather scrub floors like Millicent did than sit in this drawing room pretending I’m better than the people we stepped on to get
CHAPTER 760
Everyone turned to the corner. Maxine, a silent shadow throughout the night, finally stepped into the light. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her face stripped of its usual arrogance. She looked at Tedmond, then Millicent, and finally at her mother with pure horror."I had no idea," Maxine whispered, her voice gaining a hard edge. "You told me Tedmond’s mother was a thief. You told me she was a monster trying to break us apart. I believed you because a daughter is supposed to believe her mother."She stepped beside Max, her small frame shaking. "But he was just a baby. None of it was his fault."Maxine turned on Evelyn, her expression a mirror of Max’s defiance. "You’re a terrible person, Mother. You and Father weren't pillars of the city; you were predators in silk. If Max testifies, I’ll be right there beside him. I’ll tell them about the letters I found. I’ll tell them how you taught us to hate a brother who had done nothing but exist."Evelyn gasped, clutching the back of her chair as
CHAPTER 759
Max stayed on his knees, the cold floor biting into his skin, but the physical discomfort was nothing compared to the violent reconstruction occurring within his mind. Every memory, every time he had mocked Tedmond’s lowly blood, every time he had sabotaged his brother to protect the legacy, replayed like a series of crimes.‘I was the hero,’ he thought, a bitter, hysterical laugh bubbling in his chest. ‘I thought I was the white knight protecting my mother from a gold-digger. I was just the attack dog for a monster.’He looked up at Tedmond. For years, he had seen a rival, a threat, a bastard reaching for what was rightfully theirs. Now, for the first time, he saw a survivor. He saw a man shaped by the very fires that had tried to consume his mother."All those years," Max rasped, his voice cracking. "I followed Father's lead. I thought his coldness toward you was a sign of your unworthiness.”“I thought his discipline was a necessity. I didn't see that he was just beating the tru
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