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Chapter 28
The DMV in Coral Gables smelled like burnt coffee and broken dreams, and the clerk behind the counter had the weary patience of a man who'd seen every form of human desperation and filed it under "C" for Couldn't Care Less. Marcus stood at the window, Claire asleep in a carrier strapped to his chest, her breath a warm rhythm against his sternum that kept his own heartbeat steady. The paperwork for her birth certificate was spread on the counter, meticulously filled out in black ink, every box perfect except for the one labeled "Father's Occupation." "Occupation?" the clerk—name tag **JEROME P.**, the P probably standing for Pain—asked without looking up, his pen hovering over the form. "Unemployed," Marcus said, and the word tasted like ash. Jerome's pen moved, the scratch loud as a verdict. "Address?" He still hadn't looked at Marcus, his eyes fixed on the computer screen where he was clearly playing Solitaire behind a government firewall. "Coral Gables," Marcus said, and
Chapter 27
"Already on it. But Commander..." She showed him another screen. "Sophia's at the courthouse. She's trying to file a restraining order against Marcus. Claims he's been threatening her.""She's waiving her anonymity. Going public.""Yes."That changed things. A woman who'd once chosen status over safety was now choosing confrontation over comfort. The test subject was rewriting the experiment."Send a protection detail," Ethan ordered. "Discreet. Not Dragon Guards. Civilians. People who blend.""And if she sees them?""She won't." He looked out at the city passing by. "She's learning to see what matters. That's a harder skill than it looks."The SUV stopped at a light. Outside, a newsstand displayed the morning papers. The headline screamed: **WELLINGTON SCION TO WALK FREE? EX-WIFE FEARS FOR SAFETY.**There was a photo of Sophia, looking tired but determined, leaving the courthouse. In the background, barely visible, was Ethan's garbage truck.The irony wasn't lost on him.His phone ra
Chapter 26
"Already on it. But Commander..." She showed him another screen. "Sophia's at the courthouse. She's trying to file a restraining order against Marcus. Claims he's been threatening her.""She's waiving her anonymity. Going public.""Yes."That changed things. A woman who'd once chosen status over safety was now choosing confrontation over comfort. The test subject was rewriting the experiment."Send a protection detail," Ethan ordered. "Discreet. Not Dragon Guards. Civilians. People who blend.""And if she sees them?""She won't." He looked out at the city passing by. "She's learning to see what matters. That's a harder skill than it looks."The SUV stopped at a light. Outside, a newsstand displayed the morning papers. The headline screamed: **WELLINGTON SCION TO WALK FREE? EX-WIFE FEARS FOR SAFETY.**There was a photo of Sophia, looking tired but determined, leaving the courthouse. In the background, barely visible, was Ethan's garbage truck.The irony wasn't lost on him.His phone ra
Chapter 25
The stench of rot clung to Ethan Cole's uniform as he hoisted another black bag into the compactor truck, the hydraulic crusher grinding with a sound like bones breaking. Three weeks since the Gala. Two since he'd watched his mother walk out of his penthouse. One since he'd learned his entire life was a lie written in his father's handwriting. And yet here he was, back in the role that had started it all—because sometimes the only way to see the board clearly was to stand where nobody looked.The Harrison Hills neighborhood was a different kind of prison than the one his mother had built in glass and steel. Here, the mansions were just as big, the lawns just as manicured, but the people carried a different scent: old tobacco money mixed with desperation. These were the families who'd watched the Wellington scandal on the news and thanked God they'd only been spectators. They hadn't realized the show was just getting started."Hey! Garbage man!" The voice cut through the morning air l
Chapter 24
The darkness in the penthouse had weight, a physical pressure that made every breath feel borrowed. Ethan stood motionless, the USB drive cold in his palm, his mother's final words echoing off glass and marble like shrapnel. *Pick a side.* As if sides still existed in the wreckage she'd left behind.The emergency lights flickered on—dim, red, casting shadows that moved wrong. Elena's gun was still out, but it hung at her side now, useless as a toy. "Ethan, I swear I didn't know. About Emma. About any of it.""Save it." His voice belonged to someone else, the Supreme Commander mode kicking in, all emotion routed to a dead channel. "Lin Yue, status."She was already moving, her fingers dancing across a tablet that shouldn't have worked with the power cut but did—because she'd hardwired her own battery into the system three years ago, just in case. "B7 archives are still sealed. No breach. But there's a timestamp on the access log—twenty-three minutes ago. Someone swiped in using your fa
Chapter 23
**Chapter 20: The Devil's Counteroffer**The mattress was thinner than Marcus Wellington's patience, which was saying something. Three weeks in federal lockup and he'd learned that hell wasn't fire and brimstone—it was a six-by-eight cell that smelled of industrial disinfectant and another man's piss, where the walls sweated in summer and the concrete floor sucked the heat from your bones in winter. They'd stuck him in a "white-collar" wing, as if that made a difference when your cellmate was a Ponzi schemer who sobbed through the night and used his Armani tie to hang himself on day nine.Marcus had watched the man kick, watched the guards cut him down, watched the indifferent medical examiner declare it a tragedy before lunch. He hadn't felt a thing. Not horror, not sympathy, not even satisfaction. He'd just thought: *That's one less person ahead of me for the phone.*That was the thing about falling from a billion-dollar penthouse to a concrete box: you learned real quick that statu
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