2026-08-22 17:40:37
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CHAPTER 133
Sarah wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and nodded quickly, eager to prove her value beyond the obvious transaction."People tried to kill the preacher." She swallowed hard and sat up straighter. "Pastor Warren. Two men from Building 6 went after him for your ramen bounty. But his followers stopped them before they even got close. Beat them half to death and threw them out into the rain.""And?""It doesn't matter." Sarah shook her head, a strange flicker of dark amusement crossing her gaunt face. "His people are falling apart from the inside. Half his followers haven't eaten in three days. They sit in that room praying and crying and waiting for God to drop food from the ceiling, and every morning they wake up and the ceiling is still just a ceiling. People are starting to leave. Two families walked out yesterday. One woman told Pastor Warren to his face that his prayers were worth less than toilet paper, and she'd rather starve alone than starve in a group while some fraud i
CHAPTER 132
Marco woke up the next morning to a dead world. Every screen that once connected to the outside had gone dark overnight. Cell signals, internet, news feeds, social media, everything had been completely severed. The neighborhood was now an island floating in a black sea of silence, cut off from the rest of civilization with no way to confirm that civilization even still existed.He stood in his living room and felt absolutely nothing about it.His fireplace crackled with steady warmth. His generator hummed on stored diesel like a loyal heartbeat. His system warehouse held enough food to feed a small army for years. And stacked neatly on the shelf beside the couch were portable hard drives loaded with thousands of movies, shows, and games, along with enough batteries to power them well into the next decade.Marco picked up a controller and loaded a survival horror game.He played it for two days straight.Tank slept at his feet the entire time, occasionally lifting one ear when Marco cu
CHAPTER 131
The only real threat was deception. Someone getting close enough to trick him into opening the door. A woman, most likely.Every relationship he maintained right now was transactional, and he knew with absolute certainty that the moment any of those women saw a better deal or faced a credible threat, their loyalty would vanish like spit on a hot stove.He would trust no one completely. Not Natalie. Not Sophie. Not anyone.Around midnight, the last cell tower in the region finally died. The screen on Marco's regular phone went dark, the signal bars dropping to nothing and staying there. The backup batteries that had kept the towers limping along for days had finally given out, and normal telecommunications collapsed entirely.Marco set the dead phone aside and picked up the satellite phone from his system warehouse. He dialed Giorgia's number.She picked up on the second ring."Marco?" Her voice carried the warmth of a woman who had been waiting for exactly this call. "Thank God. Regul
CHAPTER 130
"And what?" Ashford turned to her with a look so dismissive it could have peeled paint off the walls. "Charm him to death? Breastfeed him into surrender? He just rejected a deal that would have made him a billionaire. You think batting your eyelashes at his security camera is going to crack those doors open?"Amber's face flushed red and she looked back down at the baby without another word."We don't attack the fortress." Ashford walked to the center of the room and lowered his voice, forcing every person in the apartment to lean in slightly. "We build an army. There are nine buildings in this neighborhood. Hundreds of people. Most of them are starving, freezing, and desperate enough to sell their own mothers for a warm meal. We take control of the weak ones first. Seize their supplies. Recruit the strong men through promises and threats. Building by building. Floor by floor. Until we own every single resource and every single body in this neighborhood."He let the words settle befor
CHAPTER 129
Richard Ashford paced the freezing third floor apartment with his hands clasped behind his back, his breath forming thin clouds in the air. The windows were sealed with duct tape and plastic sheeting, and the only light came from two battery powered lanterns placed on the kitchen counter.His young mistress, Amber, sat on a torn couch in the corner with the infant pressed tightly against her chest, her coat wrapped around both of them like a cocoon.Four men stood in a loose semicircle near the doorway. Not two, as Ashford had told Marco on the phone. Four. Each one built like a weapon, with flat eyes and hands that had ended lives in places most people could not find on a map."He said no." Ashford stopped pacing and turned to face the room, his expression carrying the quiet fury of a man who was not accustomed to hearing that word."Then we go in and take it." Briggs, the tallest of the four, cracked his knuckles with the casual ease of a man discussing breakfast plans. "Four of us
CHAPTER 128
"And your powerful in laws." Marco kept going, the pieces clicking together in his head like gears in a machine. "They found out about Amber and the baby, didn't they? They're the ones who hired someone to clean up the mess. To eliminate you, the girl, and the child so they could keep control of the empire you built for them."The silence that followed told Marco everything he needed to know."How did you..." Ashford's composure cracked for a full second before he welded it back together. "That's speculation.""That's fact, and you know it." Marco's mind was already three moves ahead. A man like Ashford, trapped in a neighborhood with no resources but still possessing the organizational instincts of a corporate predator, was far more dangerous than any starving mob."Let me redirect this conversation." Ashford's voice dropped into something harder, the velvet glove coming off to reveal the iron fist underneath. "I have four men with me. Former military. Special operations. Each one of
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