2026-03-10 23:43:50At Ephraim's taunt, the atmosphere in the ballroom had shifted from bored opulence to electrified tension.
This wasn't just an auction anymore; it was a blood sport.
"Thirty-one million," the auctioneer repeated, sweating slightly under the lights.
Saul didn't hesitate. "Forty million."
The crowd murmured.
Forty million dollars for a ring? It was insanity.
Ephraim leaned back in his chair, a smug grin plastering his face. He leaned over to Daniella. "Watch this. I’m going to ruin him."
"Ephraim, stop," Daniella whispered, clutching his arm. Her face was pale. "You don't understand. This is Haruno’s auction. You know the rule."
"Oh but I know the rules," Ephraim replied, his eyes gleaming as he explained. "The bidder is the payer. No proxies. No corporate accounts unless authorized by the owner present. If Saul bids and can't pay from his own verified funds... Haruno’s security will take him to the basement."
"They’ll break his legs," Daniella said, her voice trembling. "Or worse."
"Exactly," Ephraim chuckled. "He thinks Hale can bail him out. But Mr. Haruno doesn't care about banks. He cares about respect. If Saul disrupts this auction with a fake bid, he’s a dead man walking."
Grinning, the socialite raised his paddle as high as he could. "Forty-one million!"
He looked at Saul. "Come on, big shot. Is that all you got?"
Saul sat like a statue, not even paying attention to the man. "Fifty million."
"Fifty-one!" Ephraim shouted instantly.
"Sixty million," Saul countered.
The rhythm was hypnotic. Every time Saul spoke, the price jumped.
Daniella couldn't take it anymore. She stood up, ignoring decorum.
"Saul! Stop!" she cried out, her voice echoing in the hall. "You don't know what you’re doing! This isn't a game! The host will kill you if you can't pay! Stop relying on that fake card and sit down!"
The room fell silent. Everyone looked at Daniella, then at Saul.
Saul turned his head slowly. His expression wasn't angry; it was worse. Saul looked at her with pity in his gaze.
She felt her face flush in humiliation.
"Sit down, Daniella," he said softly. "You’re making a scene."
"I’m trying to save your life!" she shrieked. "You stubborn idiot! You have nothing! Stop pretending!"
"Sixty million going once..." the auctioneer stammered, trying to regain control.
"Sixty-one million!" Ephraim yelled, standing up again. "I can do this all night, Saul! I have the Moore family fortune behind me. What do you have? A shovel and a hard hat?"
Beside Saul, Veronica let out a soft chuckle.
She leaned over to Saul. "He’s trying to trap you. He wants to drive the price up and drop it on you, thinking you'll default."
"I know," Saul said, his eyes dark. "Let him."
"Seventy million," Saul said.
"Seventy-one!" Ephraim roared.
"Eighty"
"Eighty-one million dollars!" Ephraim slammed his hand on the table. "Top that, you loser!"
The crowd was hyperventilating. Eighty-one million. It was an astronomical sum.
Ephraim was sweating now. Eighty-one million was pushing his own limit. If Saul stopped now, Ephraim would be stuck with the bill, and his father would disown him. He needed Saul to make one more bid. Just one more.
"Come on," Ephraim taunted, his voice cracking. "Are you scared? Is the director out of cash?"
Saul looked at Ephraim. He saw the fear behind the arrogance. He saw the trap. And he decided to smash it.
Saul stood up and adjusted his cufflinks calmly.
"One hundred million," Saul declared.
.
The silence that followed was absolute. It was the silence of a bomb having gone off, with the shockwave yet to hit.
The auctioneer dropped his gavel. It clattered onto the podium.
"O-one hundred...?" the auctioneer squeaked.
Ephraim’s jaw unhinged.
One hundred million. It was an impossible number. It was more than the net worth of half the people in the room combined.
"He’s crazy," Ephraim whispered, his face draining of blood. "He’s actually insane."
Then, a slow, malicious smile spread across Ephraim’s face.
"He hung himself," Ephraim laughed breathlessly. "He actually did it. There is no way—no goddamn way—he has one hundred million dollars."
Ephraim shot up from his seat, pointing a shaking finger at Saul.
"I demand a verification!" Ephraim shouted, his voice shrill with triumph. "Stop the auction! This man is a fraud! He’s making a mockery of Mr. Haruno’s event! There is no way a construction worker has a hundred million dollars! Check his funds! Check them now before he tries to run!"
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Chapter 280. Sooth Her.
Saul could not see her eyes clearly in the dim light. But he could see the way her body tensed under the duvet. He could see the way her breathing hitched and the way the sleepiness in her expression melted away and was replaced by something else. Something that looked almost like fear."Saul?" she asked. Her voice was soft slightly slurring.Confused was the adjective that came to the Man's mind, but there was also a thread of another emotion underneath it. Caution. "Why are you standing there?" She asked lowly, voice falling into a natural whisper. As if she too did not want to break the silence of the night.Saul did not respond immediately.Instead, he watched her, his eyes dark and unreadable, his expression carefully blank. He found that the coldness in his chest was spreading, leeching into the rest of him, making it harder to feel anything at all.The present Saul, the one who had called Veronica in the middle of the night and had confessed his love to a woman he did not
Chapter 279. Unnerved.
"Saul," she said. Her voice was uncertain and hesitant, nothing like the confident woman who had stormed into his office earlier that day."Goodnight, Veronica."It was not a request. It was a dismissal.Veronica opened her mouth, to say something, anything, but the words did not come. She looked at him one more time, searching for something in his face that she could recognize. She found nothing. Stomach twisting with dread, she stepped out of the car and closed the door behind her. She stood there in the darkness, watching as he started the engine and pulled away from the curb without a backward glance.She stood there for a long time after his taillights had disappeared into the distance.Her mind was racing, turning over the events of the last half hour like a puzzle that did not quite fit together. He had been drunk. She was certain of that. She had smelled the whiskey on his breath and heard the slur in his voice and seen the way he could not keep his eyes focused on her f
Chapter 278. Saul Prime.
His chest rattled under the onslaught of his feelings but he pushed past it to finish his statement:“I feel… Love.”The silence that followed was so complete and so profound that he could hear his own heartbeat echoing in his ears. Veronica's breath hitched but that was her only reaction to the bombshell he had just dropped on her.Saul, the Saul before his memories were taken, the original before the isolator protocol had split into this amalgamation of imposter syndrome, the part that was watching from somewhere deep inside, felt sick. It was a visceral reaction: a gut-wrenching nausea that had nothing to do with the alcohol and everything to do with the words that had just left his mouth. ‘Oh fuck… why did I say that? Why the hell would I say something like that?!’He was fucking enraged at his own stupidity but beneath the rage was fear, cold and sharp and paralyzing. He did not know how she would respond.Saul didn't have confidence that he would be able survive whatever she
Chapter 277. Feel Things.
The line went dead with a beep.The thirty minutes he waited for her passed like hours and seconds at the same time. It was the kind of temporal distortion that came from sitting alone in a dark corner with nothing but your own thoughts and the distant hum of a city that did not care whether you lived or died. Saul sat in the driver's seat with his hands in his lap and his eyes fixed on the empty street ahead. His mind spun through the same loop of confusion and fear and cloying lovesickness.The phone was still in his hand, the screen was still dark, and the silence was still pressing in on him from all sides.He thought about calling Kim again.He thought about driving away and pretending that none of this had ever happened. He could go back to the penthouse and crawl into bed and wake up tomorrow as if the last hour had been nothing but a fever dream.But he did none of those things.Instead, he sat there and waited for the woman who was supposed to be his business partner to c
Chapter 276. Shame.
Saul's throat was tight. Each recrimination seemed to hit harder and harder on his shoulders until they shrunk down into his seat.He felt….. shame. An emotion he hasn't felt for some time." Veronica….”His mouth opened and closed, honestly not knowing what to say to the woman and she knew it judging by the derisive snort she let out.".... And after all of that, you call me and tell me you wanted to hear my voice, and I'm supposed to what? Be flattered? Be grateful? Be happy that the great Saul Kinai deigned to think about me for five seconds?" She sneered. It was the most mocking sound he had heard from anyone in his lip except Magnus maybe. "You are an asshole. You are an absolute piece of shit."Her voice broke on the last word. She was quiet for a moment, and he could hear her breathing on the other end of the line, struggling to pull herself together."I can't do this. I can't do this hot and cold bullshit with you anymore. One minute you're so distant, and the next you're cal
Chapter 275. Aspect.
Even as a part of him screamed, 'No. No, I don't. I don't need her. I need Kim. I need my wife. I don't need her-' His thumb moved across the screen. It found Veronica's name in his contacts, '-Don't do this. Don't you dare do this-' And pressed the call button before his mind could argue against it. 'Goddammit-'The phone rang once. Then twice. Then three times. Each ring felt like an eternity. He sat there with his heart pounding, his breath shallow, and his hand shaking. He waited.It took a while.But she answered."Hello?"And the moment he heard her voice, everything just went calm.****Saul had to take a few seconds to just breathe into the speaker, his eyes closed and his heart hammering against his ribs, basking in the feel of her voice washing over him like a tidal wave. He could hear the faint sound of movement on the other end of the line and the distant hum of something that might have been a television and the soft rhythm of her breathing miles away.He let all of it
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