2025-07-29 22:37:52The early afternoon sun cast long shadows over the bustling Central Business District of Sun Industrial City, a world far more polished and opulent than the grimy nightclub corners where Ethan had danced with danger the night before.
Standing before a sleek, mirrored building that towered like a monument to capitalism was Ethan Northstrum, hands in his pockets, dressed in simple, neat clothes that whispered ordinary to the untrained eye. But Ethan didn’t care. The document tucked securely into his jacket was the only thing on his mind.
He glanced up at the massive logo engraved in brushed steel:
Norand Interior Limited.
This was the place.
Inside the modern lobby, with high ceilings and glass decor, receptionists chatted idly behind a marble desk until Ethan entered. Their conversation halted, replaced by lingering glances and raised brows.
One of them—Lynette, the senior receptionist—straightened up, her expression shifting quickly from interest to professional indifference. She gave Ethan a head-to-toe scan: plain shoes, no visible brand-name tags, no watch, no entourage, no obvious wealth.
A few of the other girls exchanged whispers.
“He’s cute, but… broke,” one murmured under her breath.
“Just a pretty face—not worth it,” another snickered.
Unfazed, Ethan stepped forward.
“I’m here to see Emma Robbins,” he said coolly.
Lynette arched a brow. “Do you have an appointment with Ms. Robbins?”
“No. But I have something of hers.”
She scoffed, leaning back, her manicured nails clicking. “What could you have for Ms. Robbins? Delivery boy?”
The other receptionists stifled laughs, their eyes glinting with amusement.
Ethan’s smile didn’t falter. “Not delivery. I’m returning something from last night.”
Lynette’s eyes narrowed, a smirk curling her lips as she misread his words—an affair, a scandal, too absurd for a man like him. “Last night? In your dreams,” she said, her voice sharp. “Do you even know who Emma Robbins is?”
Ethan shrugged, his calm unshaken. “Met her last night. Don’t know much else.”
Lynette’s jaw dropped, her disbelief palpable.
“You’re lying,” she snapped, leaning forward. “Emma Robbins is every bachelor’s dream. CEO of Norand Interior, top five industry-leading women under 30, net worth over half a billion. She’s a celebrity—our idol. From a prominent family, courted by the city’s elite. You?”
Her eyes raked him again, lingering on his plain clothes. “You don’t belong here.”
Ethan nodded, unfazed, letting her words roll off like water. Lynette’s rant painted a picture—Emma wasn’t just any woman; she was a titan, a queen in this city’s glittering hierarchy.
His one-night stand, a drunken mistake, was with someone extraordinary. The thought sparked intrigue; she might be worthy of more than a night, a match for the Almighty Master Ethan Northstrum.
“Sounds impressive,” he said, his tone light. “Can you take me to her now?”
Lynette huffed, crossing her arms. “Show me what you’ve got.”
Ethan opened the envelope just enough to reveal the header—Enzogrande Corporation—its bold font a beacon.
Lynette’s eyes widened, her smugness faltering. Everyone at Norand knew of the failed Enzogrande deal, a blow that had sent Emma spiraling.
She snatched the phone, dialing the CEO’s office, her voice tight. “Ms. Robbins, someone’s here with… the Enzogrande document.”
A few moments later, Jennifer, Emma’s personal assistant, stepped out from the glass elevator and walked briskly toward Ethan. “Mr…?”
“Ethan.”
“Mr. Ethan, this way please. Ms. Robbins is expecting you.”
He followed her past gasps, side-eyes, and open mouths from the staff who moments ago had laughed at him.
---
In the CEO’s office, a sleek sanctuary of glass and leather, Emma Robbins sat on a cream sofa, her auburn hair pulled into a loose bun, her navy blazer crisp despite the shadows under her eyes.
Across from her, Stella and Tracy—her closest friends—sipped coffee, their designer bags resting on the glass table.
The air was warm with the scent of espresso and their quiet concern. News of Norand’s lost Enzogrande contract had hit their group chat last night, followed by Emma’s radio silence.
Stella, her blonde curls bouncing, leaned forward. “Where were you, Em? You ghosted us after that message. We were worried.”
Emma’s fingers tightened around her mug, her gaze distant. “I drove out of the city,” she said, voice low. “Some small town on the outskirts, needed to be alone.”
She recounted the night—arriving at the Electric Viper, drowning her loss in martinis, Cobra’s men harassing her. “Some guy stepped in, saved me, but… my memory’s a mess.” Her voice faltered, the fog of alcohol obscuring the club’s chaos.
Tracy, her dark eyes sharp, frowned. “You went alone? No security?”
Emma nodded, her lips tight. “Just me.”
Stella’s brow furrowed. “Then what?”
Emma hesitated, her mug trembling. “I woke up in a hotel… with a stranger. A guy I’d never met. We…” She swallowed, shame burning her cheeks. “It was a drunk one-night stand. No protection.”
Stella gasped, her coffee splashing, while Tracy’s eyes lit up, a grin breaking.
“Scandalous! Was it worth it?”
Emma shook her head, confusion warring with regret. “I don’t know him. What if there’s… consequences?”
Stella reached for her hand, soothing. “You’ll never see him again. Nothing to worry about.”
Tracy leaned back, smirking. “Spill the details, Em.”
Emma steered away, her voice heavy. “Without Enzogrande, my company’s sinking. I need fifty million to keep it afloat, and I don’t have it. Grandfather will hand the family legacy to my cousins now.”
Her shoulders slumped, the weight of failure crushing. Stella squeezed her hand, but before Tracy could respond, the door opened.
Jennifer, Emma’s PA, stepped in, her face tense. “Ms. Robbins, someone’s here to see you—with the Enzogrande document.”
Emma’s heart skipped, her friends exchanging glances.
“Lead him in,” she said, setting her mug down, her voice steady despite the churn in her gut.
Jennifer nodded, and the door swung wide.
Ethan stepped in, the envelope in hand, his lanky frame filling the doorway.
His eyes swept the room—three women, stunning in their tailored elegance, sipping coffee in the plush lounge.
His gaze landed on the last, and recognition hit like a spark. The woman in the red gown, the damsel from the Viper, now in a blazer, her auburn hair catching the light.
Emma’s eyes met his, her mug frozen mid-air, coffee trembling.
Not the club—she didn’t recall that—but the hotel bed, his face beside hers in the morning light.
Shock widened her eyes, her breath catching, the room’s warmth turning cold.
Him.
The stranger she’d fled, the mistake she feared. Ethan’s lips curved, a faint smile, as he held up the envelope, the Enzogrande header glinting like a promise.
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Chapter 207: Visions like memories
Ethan lowered himself onto the woven mat, the coarse fibers a tactile anchor in the surreal chamber. He crossed his legs, rested his hands on his knees, and closed his eyes. The weight of the stone room, the scent of earth, the profound silence—it all pressed in, not as an assault, but as an invitation to dissolve.This was the same thing he had run away from back then that he was now finding himself performing again.But what choice had he got? He needed to complete this before he could think of facing Nathan for the sake of Emma and his unborn baby.“Breathe into the stillness,” the Grand Physician’s voice murmured, not from across the room, but seemingly from within the stillness itself. “The Quieting is not an erasure. It is a re-ordering. You will see the tapestry of your life. The threads of joy, of pain, of choice and consequence. Do not cling to them. Observe them as patterns in the weave. You will have visions. Keep an open mind. The mind that judges is the mind that suffers
Chapter 206: The sanctuary of stillness
They passed through corridors Ethan vaguely remembered, places of instruction and meditation. But the Grand Physician led him deeper than he had ever gone before, to a part of the compound that felt less like a building and more like a natural cave system that had been gently shaped. The air grew cooler, the scent of stone and damp earth replacing the incense.Finally, they entered a circular chamber. The ceiling was a natural dome of rock, with a single shaft of muted light falling from a hidden opening far above, illuminating the center of the room. In that pool of light was a simple mat of woven reeds. Around the perimeter, in deep shadow, stood nine smooth stone pillars, each carved with a single, complex symbol that seemed to shift in the low light.This was the Sanctuary of Stillness. The air itself felt thick, heavy with intention, as if sound went to die here.The Grand Physician gestured to the mat. "The place of unraveling."Ethan moved toward it, the gravity of the room pre
Chapter 205: The ‘Quieting’ Ritual
As Ethan drove to the Grand Physician’s the following morning, his hands tight on the wheel, his mind was a million miles away—or rather, decades.He wasn't navigating by GPS, but by muscle memory of a journey taken in a different life. The towering pines blurred into a green-grey wall, and with them, the present dissolved.“The focus is not to feel nothing, Ethan. That is the crude aim of a brute. The aim is to feel everything… and choose which sensation becomes action. The rest, you relegate to a silent room and lock the door.”The Grand Physician’s voice, dry as ancient parchment, echoed in his mind. He could see the austere training hall, the smell of sandalwood and cold stone. He’d been young, arrogant, flush with the early successes of the skills he’d already learned. The ‘Quieting’ had been presented as the final masterwork, the capstone. Not a new weapon, but the forging of an impregnable armory for the mind itself.And he’d walked away just before he could even get to underst
Chapter 204: Back To The Grand Physician
Ethan didn’t answer for a long moment. He pushed back from the desk, the chair rolling soundlessly on the thick rug. He walked to the floor-to-ceiling window, his back to the room, his silhouette tense against the glittering, indifferent cityscape.“I know my brother,” Ethan said, his voice hollow, stripped of all its usual command. “I know that Elizabeth Robbins would swallow broken glass before calling me for help. The fact that she did…” He bowed his head, a hand coming up to press against the cold glass. “It means she has exhausted every other option.”Ethan gave a single, jerky nod. The weight of it—the dual loss, the compounded violation—seemed to press him physically into the floor. “My brother understands currency. He understands leverage. He has just acquired the only two things in this universe I would trade the crown for. Not that I would ever be given the choice.”He strode back to the desk, not with purpose, but with a frantic, caged energy. He picked up the dead phone, s
Chapter 203: What do we do now?
Elizabeth’s phone slipped from her nerveless fingers, thudding softly onto the carpet. She didn’t hear it. All she heard was the roaring silence of a timeline that ended at seven o’clock.She was leaving.Four hours ago.The chill from the balcony was nothing compared to the glacial fear freezing her from the inside out. Every terrible possibility—the kind she’d spent years as a corporate wife learning to suppress—flooded her mind. An accident on the winding coastal road. A mugging in the city garage. Or worse, something deliberate, something linked to the crown, to the viper’s nest Emma had just been thrust into.Her gaze swept the room, landing on the family portrait from a decade ago—Richard’s arm around her, a young, smiling Emma between them. A perfect, painful lie. She was alone. Utterly alone with this terror.And then, unbidden, the most complicated, infuriating face of all surfaced in her mind: Ethan.She recoiled from the thought. Emma’s fury at him had been absolute, scorch
Chapter 202: Four hours ago
"You're operating under the assumption that Ethan and I are still connected. That I am leverage." Emma's voice was cold and sharp. "You're wrong. What happened with my grandfather severed that tie completely. I am done with Ethan. There is no loyalty to exploit, no affection to manipulate. Keeping me here is a pointless risk. Your quarrel is with him. Let me go, and you eliminate a complication. He will still come for you, for the crown. But you won't have an angry, resourceful hostage who has zero stake in his survival cluttering your operation."She delivered the speech with icy precision, every word a calculated move on this new, horrifying board. She was a redundant asset. A liability. She painted the picture with clear, logical strokes.And of course, that was what she thought. There was no point in dragging her into a sibling rivalry that she had no stakes in, and much worse, dragging her unborn child into it as well.Nathan listened, his head tilted. When she finished, he didn'
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