2025-09-21 23:53:08
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Chapter 403
The Hayes corporate headquarters occupied forty-three floors of steel and glass in the heart of Riverpoint’s financial district, a monument to old money pretending to be modern. Cassandra had been inside the building dozens of times, had attended charity galas in the penthouse ballroom and dinner meetings in the executive dining room, but she’d never felt the weight of it quite like this. The elevator climbed with smooth efficiency, the numbers ticking upward while her reflection stared back at her from the polished doors.Navy suit, tailored perfectly. Hair pulled back in a style her mother would have called severe. Makeup minimal, professional. She looked like someone who belonged in a boardroom, which was exactly the point. Looking the part was half the battle in rooms like these.The other half was having the spine to stay standing when everyone else wanted you to sit down and shut up.The elevator chimed as it reached the fortieth floor, and the doors slid open to reveal the exec
Chapter 402
The coffee had gone cold in Nathan’s mug, a film forming on the surface that caught the light from the small television mounted on the wall of his quarters. He’d been staring at the screen for twenty minutes, watching the same footage loop over and over. Marjorie Hayes, impeccably dressed even in crisis, being guided into the back of a police car. Her hand shielding her face. Reporters shouting questions that blurred into incomprehensible noise. The chyron at the bottom of the screen scrolling past in bold letters: “Hayes Family Matriarch Arrested for Embezzlement - Millions Missing.”Nathan had expected it. He’d known the moment Diane made that phone call yesterday that the news would spread like wildfire. The Hayes name carried weight in Riverpoint, and watching it burn made for good television. Still, seeing it play out in real time, seeing reporters dissect his family on morning news programs while talking heads speculated about the full extent of the damage, made something twist
Chapter 401
The fluorescent lights in the rented office space hummed with a persistent buzz that Nathan had stopped noticing two hours ago. He stood beside the conference table, his hand resting on one of seven cardboard boxes that lined the room’s perimeter like silent witnesses. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, Riverpoint’s financial district stretched into the gray afternoon, all steel and glass and ambition. Inside, the air felt different. Heavier. Charged with the weight of months of investigation compressed into manila folders and document sleeves.Marjorie Hayes sat across from him, though “sat” was generous. She’d collapsed into the leather chair sometime around the third box of evidence, her designer silk blouse now wrinkled at the collar, the perfect cream fabric creased where she’d been gripping it. Her makeup, always so carefully applied, had begun to smudge beneath her eyes. Nathan wondered if she’d touched her face without realizing it, or if the foundation simply couldn’t hold
Chapter Four Hundred
The warehouse groaned under the weight of its own destruction. Sparks hissed from twisted metal, smoke curled in thick black tendrils, and flames licked the edges of broken crates that had once been neatly stacked along the walls.Every sound—the drip of water from a punctured pipe, the occasional snap of a loose beam, the low roar of a fire consuming debris—seemed amplified in the cavernous space. Nathan’s chest heaved as he kept Marjorie firmly in his grasp, her wrist tight in his hand.Her usual composure, the predator’s confidence she carried like armor was gone. Fear had replaced it, raw and jagged, and Nathan felt an unusual rush of satisfaction mix with the tension that never left him in moments like this.Cassandra moved just behind him, keeping her weapon trained, eyes scanning every shadow, every corner where a stray spark could ignite another disaster. She had learned long ago to anticipate Nathan’s thinking, to move as an extension of his strategy rather than independent o
Chapter Three Hundred and Ninety-Nine
The warehouse shuddered, flames twisting into black smoke that stung Nathan’s eyes and filled his lungs, but he didn’t falter. Marjorie’s face, pale and wide-eyed, stared back at him from the edge of the broken catwalk. For the first time, she was no longer the predator. Every trap she had set, every manipulative scheme she had orchestrated, had been turned against her. She was exposed, and Nathan, Liam, and Cassandra moved like a single, lethal unit, closing in without hesitation.“Marjorie,” Nathan called, his voice echoing over the roar of the fire. “It ends now. No more games. Step down, or face the consequences of everything you’ve done.”Her lips curled into a fleeting, desperate smile. “Consequences… you have no idea what I’m capable of!”Cassandra’s eyes narrowed, weapon trained steadily. “Try me.”Liam moved to the other side, cutting off her escape route. “You wanted chaos, you wanted fear, you wanted control—but you forgot one thing: you can’t break what refuses to bend.”M
Chapter Three Hundred and Ninety-Eight
Marjorie’s body sagged against Nathan’s grip, smoke curling around them, flames licking dangerously close. Her face was pale, eyes wide—not with arrogance, but with fear. For the first time in her life, she was cornered, and the realization hit her like a blade. She was no longer the predator. She was exposed, vulnerable, completely at the mercy of those she had spent years trying to manipulate.Nathan held her tightly, his jaw clenched, every muscle taut with controlled fury. “It’s over,” he said, voice low and lethal. “No tricks. No more games. Every betrayal, every manipulation, every life you thought you controlled—you’re done.”Marjorie’s lips trembled as she tried to speak. “You… you don’t understand… I’ve survived worse. You think you’re the first to corner me? To—”“You’ve underestimated us,” Cassandra cut in sharply, weapon still trained on her, eyes flashing with anger and disbelief at all the chaos Marjorie had caused. “You think just because you set traps and played people
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