2025-12-27 23:52:51
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CHAPTER 92
Simone spiraled over the next three days. She barely ate and sleeping made guilt gnaw at her from the inside out.She called Damien every few hours with the same questions. Was she being cruel? What if Aisha got hurt in jail? What if this broke their relationship permanently?Damien listened every time. He did not push or lecture. He just stayed on the line while she worked through her fear out loud."I keep thinking about her alone in that cell," Simone said on day two. Her voice was hoarse from crying. "What kind of sister does this?""The kind who loves her enough to let her face consequences," Damien answered. "You are not abandoning her. You are teaching her."But the words felt wrong to Simone. Teaching felt like cruelty when the person you loved was suffering because of your choice.Emma noticed Simone was sad during their usual Tuesday afternoon visit. She had brought cookies she had made with Damien but Simone barely tou
CHAPTER 91
Damien canceled the Philadelphia trip with one phone call. Ashley understood immediately when he explained and her voice was full of concern instead of disappointment.He flew back that same night. The plane felt too slow and every minute stretched into an eternity as he thought about Simone's shaking voice on the phone.Simone met him at the police station just after midnight. Her eyes were swollen and her hands would not stop trembling as she gripped his arm."Thank you for coming back," she whispered. Her voice was barely audible over the noise of the precinct lobby.They sat in hard plastic chairs under fluorescent lights that made everything look sickly and wrong. Simone explained what had happened in broken sentences.Aisha had been arrested during a raid at her boyfriend's apartment. Police found cocaine, cash, and packaging materials indicating distribution scattered throughout the place.Aisha claimed she knew nothing ab
CHAPTER 90
Damien did not wait for Ashley to ask. He called a family meeting three days after Sarah Kim's assessment and the weight of what needed to happen sat heavily on his chest.Marcus joined via video from Germany. His face filled one half of the conference room screen. Ashley sat across from Damien with Sarah Kim beside her. Richard was there too.The room felt formal but the air between them was different now. Less hostile. More like family trying to find their way through complicated truths.Damien spoke first. His voice was steady but his hands shook slightly under the table."Ashley, our mother committed fraud that hurt you. It was not malicious but it was wrong."Ashley watched him carefully. Her expression was guarded but open."She is gone so she cannot make it right but I can try."Damien pulled out a folder and slid it across the table. Financial statements from his CloudTech earnings. Numbers that represented years of careful saving."I am proposing to give you six hundred thous
CHAPTER 89
Damien called Richard from the hotel that night. His hands shook as he dialed and he could barely keep his voice steady."Ashley thinks her attorney is planning something. He knows about my custody case. Details he should not have access to."Richard was quiet for three seconds. "Tell me everything."Damien recounted the conversation. Gerald Hutchinson is pushing for two million dollars. The comments about Emma. The timing of it all."I need you to dig into this guy. Find out who he is and what he is really after.""I will start tonight."Richard worked fast. By morning, he had a file on Gerald Hutchinson that made Damien's stomach turn.They met for breakfast at Damien's hotel. Richard spread documents across the table like evidence at a crime scene."Hutchinson specializes in estate disputes but his methods are questionable at best."Richard pulled out a printout from the Pennsylvania Bar Association
CHAPTER 88
They ordered more coffee and stayed in the café as the afternoon turned to evening. Two strangers connected by a father who had failed them both in different ways.Ashley wrapped her hands around her cup. The warmth seemed to steady her as she began to talk."I grew up knowing I had a father who sent checks but never visited. Never called on my birthday. Never showed up."Damien listened without interrupting. He owed her that much."My mother would tell me stories about him. How charming he was when they met. How he promised to take care of us."Ashley's voice was soft but steady. Years of therapy had probably helped her tell this story without breaking."But the promises stopped when I was still a baby. The checks came every month like clockwork but nothing else. No cards. No phone calls. Nothing."She looked at Damien. "I spent my whole childhood thinking I was not good enough for him to love."The words hit h
CHAPTER 87
Damien spent the next three days in his apartment going through boxes of his mother's old papers. He was searching for answers that might explain why she had done what she did.The boxes smelled like dust and old perfume. Each document he touched felt like he was reaching back through time to a woman he thought he knew.Bank statements from 2008 showed their account balance dropping month by month. Medical bills from neurologists and specialists piled up in neat folders his mother had labeled carefully.There were letters from collection agencies, past due notices from the mortgage company, and credit card statements with minimum payments circled in red pen.His mother had been organized even in her desperation. Everything was filed, dated, and sorted.On the fourth day, Damien found something different. A leather-bound journal was tucked beneath a stack of medical records from his father's Alzheimer's diagnosis.The cover was wo
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