My Wife Killed Me, Now I’m the Apocalypse Billionaire

Chapter 8: Fortress

Three days passed after Jessica's message demanding five hundred million dollars, and Sean never replied. Not a single word. The message sat there on her screen with its little "delivered" tag mocking her every time she checked, unread receipts that never turned into a response.

Jessica sat on the edge of her bed in her parents' house, staring at the silent thread, her thumb hovering uselessly over the keyboard. She had imagined this moment so many times.

The wire transfer notification. The lawyer's polite email confirming the settlement. The new apartment in Positano she had already started browsing online, the shopping trips, the life of a woman who never had to worry about money again.

None of it was coming.

"He's not answering." Jessica's voice cracked slightly as she looked up at Zach, who was lounging in the armchair by the window scrolling through his own phone.

"He'll cave. Give it time." Zach didn't even look up.

"It's been three days, Zach. Three days and nothing. Not even an angry response. Nothing." Jessica threw her phone onto the mattress, her hands trembling with a mix of fury and something close to panic.

"Maybe he's scared and doesn't know what to say." Zach finally glanced over, but his tone lacked conviction.

"Or maybe he genuinely doesn't care." The words left Jessica's mouth before she could stop them, and once they were out, they hung heavy in the air.

Zach set his phone down slowly. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means the videos aren't working the way you promised they would! You said the internet would force his hand. You said he'd be begging to settle within a week. It's been longer than that, and he hasn't even sent a single message back." Jessica's voice rose, sharp and accusing.

"So this is my fault now?" Zach stood up, his easy charm evaporating into something colder. "I told you to post the videos. I didn't tell you to expect a guaranteed payout on some made up schedule you invented in your head."

"You promised me this would work!"

"I promised you it would put pressure on him. And it has! Look at the comments, look at the views, everyone in this city knows his name now. That's pressure, Jessica. What happens after that is up to him." Zach's jaw tightened, and for the first time, the warmth in his eyes had gone completely cold.

Jessica pressed her palms against her face, breathing hard. "I've spent eighty thousand dollars on loans I now have to pay back. Eighty thousand dollars, Zach. And for what? A pile of angry comments and a man who won't even bother to tell me no?"

"Then stop spending money you don't have chasing a number that keeps getting bigger in your head. Two hundred million wasn't enough, so you jumped to five hundred. What's next, a billion? You're not negotiating anymore, you're fantasizing." Zach's voice had an edge now that Jessica had never heard directed at her before.

"How dare you." Jessica's eyes filled with tears, but this time they weren't performance tears. They were real, hot, and furious. "I am doing this for us. For Jack. For our future."

"Our future doesn't depend on squeezing blood out of a man who clearly doesn't need your approval anymore." Zach grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair.

"Where are you going?"

"Out. I need air." Zach walked toward the door, then paused and looked back at her, his expression unreadable. "Figure out what you actually want, Jessica. Because right now you're chasing a fantasy that's costing us real money."

The door shut behind him, and Jessica sat alone on the edge of the bed, staring at her silent phone, the number 500,000,000 still sitting unanswered in the message thread like a taunt.

Across the city, at the Ridgewood estate, Sean had no idea about the argument unfolding in the Jones household, and even if he had known, it wouldn't have changed a single item on his schedule. He stood in the villa's spacious kitchen with a clipboard in hand, surrounded by three men in work uniforms from Ferretti Costruzioni, the contracting firm he had hired the week before.

"Mr. Miles, we've got the reinforced steel shutters ready for installation on all ground floor windows starting tomorrow. Blast rated, same grade used in embassy buildings." The lead contractor, a stocky man named Marco Ferretti, tapped a sample panel leaning against the counter.

"Good. I also want the basement entrance reinforced with a blast resistant door. Steel core, minimum three inch thickness." Sean flipped a page on his clipboard.

"That's a heavy installation. Might need to widen the frame." Marco frowned slightly, running his hand along the wall.

"Widen it. I don't care about the cost." Sean's tone left no room for negotiation.

"Understood." Marco made a note.

A second worker approached carrying a rolled up blueprint. "Signor Miles, the rainwater collection system you requested. We're proposing a twenty thousand liter tank buried behind the east wing, connected through a gravity fed filtration line into the kitchen and basement taps."

"Increase the tank to forty thousand liters. And I want a secondary filtration backup in case the primary system fails." Sean pointed at a section on the blueprint.

"That'll require additional excavation. Extra week on the timeline." The worker glanced at Marco for confirmation.

"Fine. Just make sure it's done right." Sean moved to the next item on his list.

Marco cleared his throat and lowered his voice slightly. "Mr. Miles, if I may ask, this is quite an extensive renovation for a residential property. Bulletproof glass, blast doors, water storage this size. May I ask what this is for?"

Sean looked up from his clipboard and met Marco's eyes with a calm, unreadable expression. "I value my privacy and my safety. That's all you need to know."

"Of course. My apologies for asking." Marco nodded quickly, understanding the boundary that had just been drawn.

"I also want the construction crews staggered. No more than four workers on site at any given time, rotating shifts throughout the week. I don't want a large visible crew drawing attention from the neighbors." Sean tapped his pen against the clipboard.

"We can arrange that. It'll extend the completion timeline, but it's doable." Marco was already recalculating the schedule in his head.

"And every worker signs a confidentiality agreement before setting foot on this property. No photos, no discussion of the renovations outside these walls. My attorney will provide the paperwork." Sean handed Marco a folder.

"Understood, Mr. Miles. We take discretion seriously." Marco accepted the folder with a firm nod.

Once the contractors left for the day, Sean sat alone at the kitchen table with a fresh legal pad, writing out categories in neat, deliberate handwriting. Food storage. Medical supplies. Fuel reserves. Weapons and ammunition. Insulation materials. Backup generators. Water purification tablets. Long term seed storage for a future garden inside the basement's climate controlled section.

Seventy four days left. The list keeps growing, but so does the time I have to fill it.