NathanThe air in the boardroom was suffocating.Not because of the heat. Not because of the room itself.But because I could feel it.The shift.The silent, irrevocable betrayal taking shape right in front of me.I had walked into this meeting prepared for war. I had studied my enemies, predicted their moves, fortified my position. And yet—I was losing.I never lost.Yet here I was.Losing.Again.My fingers twitched against the folder in front of me, my pulse drumming like a war drum in my skull. I had brought ammunition. A carefully orchestrated attack. Proof of financial discrepancies, offshore accounts linked to Mitchell Holdings, evidence that could bury Sophia under the same weight she had tried to use against me.And yet—She wasn’t shaken.Not even slightly.Across the table, Sophia sat, poised and unreadable, her silver eyes watching me with the same cold calculation I had once admired—had once controlled.She wasn’t flinching.Not even when I threw the first grenade.I sli
NathanI should have seen it coming.I should have known that Sophia Mitchell wouldn’t stop at just winning—she needed to obliterate me.The board’s decision to strip me of my own company should have been the end. They thought they had caged a wolf and called it victory.But they didn’t realize—I bite harder when I bleed.I stood outside Carter Industries, staring at the gleaming glass tower that no longer bore my name, no longer answered to me. The empire I built now belonged to my greatest enemy.My fingers curled into fists, my nails biting into my palm. It should have burned—losing everything I’d spent years constructing—but all I felt was a slow, dark hunger clawing inside me.A hunger for revenge.Vince stood beside me, silent, waiting. He had learned over the years that when I was this quiet, when I wasn’t punching walls or throwing glasses, it meant I was planning something far worse.Finally, I turned to him, my voice controlled. "Did you get it?"He nodded, handing me a thi
SophiaNathan Carter was a wounded beast.And wounded beasts were the most dangerous.The board meeting may have ended in a temporary victory, but I knew better than to assume it was over. Nathan wasn’t the type to accept defeat. He was the type to retreat just long enough to sharpen his claws before striking again.I sat at my desk, tapping my fingers lightly against the glass surface. The city lights flickered outside, a sprawling testament to power and ambition—the very things Nathan was desperate to reclaim.Alex leaned against the window, arms crossed, studying me. “You’re thinking too hard.”I exhaled. “I’m thinking just enough.”His lips curled into a smirk. “You won today.”“For now.”He moved closer, dropping into the chair across from me. “Nathan’s lost his grip, Sophia. You saw it in his eyes. He’s unraveling.”I shook my head. “No, he’s adapting. That’s what makes him dangerous. He won’t play fair.”Alex swirled the whiskey in his glass, watching the amber liquid dance. “T
SophiaThe air inside Carter Industries felt suffocating.Tension crackled like electricity, thick and charged, pressing against my skin. The walls that once held Nathan’s power now stood under my control, yet somehow, he was still clawing at them, still trying to pull me down from the outside.I stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows in my office, arms crossed as I watched the city below. Nathan’s smear campaign had taken root. The headlines were relentless, each one a twisted narrative designed to shake my foundation.“Mitchell’s Leadership in Question Amid Corporate Scandal”“Whispers of Corruption: Is Carter Industries in the Wrong Hands?”“Nathan Carter’s Revenge? The Battle for Carter Industries Continues”I had expected a counterattack, but Nathan had taken it to another level. This wasn’t just about tarnishing my reputation. He was trying to make the board, the investors—hell, even the employees—doubt me.Bellion entered the office, his steps measured, his expression u
SophiaThere was something different about the night air.It wasn’t just the weight of everything that had happened. It was something else—something unseen but felt. A storm on the horizon. A presence lurking just beyond reach.I stood on the balcony of Alex’s penthouse, my hands gripping the cool railing. The city sprawled below, lights flickering like dying embers, unaware of the war waging in the shadows.“You should get some rest.”Alex’s voice was quiet, but there was an edge to it—like he knew neither of us would be sleeping tonight.I turned slightly, meeting his gaze. He was leaning against the glass doors, arms crossed, his expression unreadable.“Something doesn’t feel right,” I admitted.He exhaled through his nose, his eyes scanning the skyline. “That’s because it isn’t.”There was a beat of silence between us, heavy and unspoken.Then—Bellion appeared in the doorway, his usual calm edged with something sharper. “Sophia. We need to talk.”I turned fully, my spine straight
SophiaThe safe house was silent.Not the quiet that calms. The quiet that suffocates.I sat on the edge of the couch in a room designed to make people forget where they are. Beige walls. No-frills lighting. Non-distinct furniture. Sterile. As if it had no recollection, no past, only a placeholder for moments like this.Moments when all seemed to balance in the scales.Alex paced, each step more aggressive than the previous one. His jaw clenched tight, the muscle pulsating along his cheek. He looked occasionally towards the windows, the door, the hallway. As if peril could slink in through the walls if we were to let our guard down for a moment.My hands were folded in my lap, the reverberation of that gunshot still buzzing through my bones. I could hear the vibration of it in my ears. The heat of Alex's body as he shoved me to the ground. Charred metal smell of gunpowder, the acrid bite of panic which had erupted on the sidewalk.But what lingered most… was the rage.Nathan had wound
SophiaEvery lie we said was a blueprint for their destruction.The safe house was silent, but now the silence was movement. The calm before impact. My head was a fuse, smoldering hot, unwinding the pieces as they fell into place. Athena. Deimos. Vince. Nathan. It wasn't a line anymore, it was a net. One I intended to ignite.I looked at the photograph stuck on the wall and remembered that night two years ago. Nathan had brought in a large European firm. Alex was standing in the shadows, negotiating deals into the ears of men three times his age. And I... I was the smile they didn't anticipate. The woman in warpaint and stilettos who'd already mapped out their weaknesses before I even shook their hands.How quickly it all fell apart. "You're not saying anything," Alex said behind me. I turned. "I'm doing math."He moved closer, his feet quiet on the wood. "You're stalling too.""I don't stall," I said. "I wait. There's a difference."He folded his arms, looking at me. "So wh
SophiaEvery falsehood we uttered was a blueprint for their annihilation.The hideout was silent, but now silence was momentum. Silence before an impact. The kind of silence you get immediately before a bullet is fired. My mind was a fuse, burning rapidly, unwinding the pieces as they fell into alignment. Athena. Deimos. Vince. Nathan.It was no longer a line, it was a net. One that I intended to burn.I scowled at the photograph tacked to the wall, Nathan, Alex, and me. A gala had been on this photo's activities; Champagne, forced smiles, staged applause. That's where the agreement on the London purchase was finalized. A choreographed PR sideshow to mask razor-sharp ambitions fueling all our bargains.Nathan had just acquired a struggling European firm, promising to "revitalize" it, when in actual fact we were stripping it bare from the inside out and selling its skeletons to the highest bidder. Alex had brokered most of the backchannel deals, seducing CEOs with velvet-gloved bul
SophiaAlex's study tasted like decisions. Heavy. Bitter. Smelling of the burden we both knew was going to befall us.He hadn't uttered a sound since I'd given him the pages, Chloe's writing, her hubris bare on every page, in every carefully disguised betrayal and deal. He read slowly, methodical, as if dissecting her lies with a scalpel.I stood at the window, arms folded, watching twilight fall into the cracks of the city. It seemed smaller from up there. Controlled.Contained."You're quiet," I said eventually, my tone a low buzz, too soothing for the turmoil in my heart.Alex didn't look up. "Because if I do, I may tell you how much I want to destroy everything."I turned to him. "Then say it.".His eyes locked on mine, and for a moment, I lost the ability to breathe."I want to take her reputation, her company, her legacy. I want to make Chloe disappear like she made you disappear. But more slowly. So she can see it coming."My lips curled, not into a smile... no, that feeling ha
AlexThe world did not explode in fireworks. It fell apart in the silent cracks.I was at dawn on the east edge of the roof of the manor, the sky bleeding into shades of bruise and fire. Another day, another thread breaking. Nathan's kingdom had started to rot from the inside out, and he hadn't even been aware that the worms were his own people.Bellion stood at my shoulder, silent as always, a specter in suit jackets and restraint."She moved the next pawn," he said, glancing down into the street below where the black SUV parked, one of ours."She was always the better chess player," I grumbled, drumming on the railing with my fingers, timing out the seconds until Nathan snapped.Twelve.That's how long it took.Bellion's com crackled, and then the voice, husky, claustrophobic."Holding an emergency board meeting," he told him. "He's playing it straight down the line. Asset freeze. Public denial. Legal counter-attack.""It's a scandal, is it?"Bellion's mouth flexed. "It's a reckonin
SophiaThe smell of her cologne still in the air.Vanilla, amber, something synthetic trying to mimic heat. Chloe only put it on whenever she needed to pretend to have a soul.I waited in ambush in the tribune room's peeling pillars and broken crystal chandeliers, a poetic observation of what both of us had become. Queens without kingdoms. Sisters without blood. Enemies by design.The air lay heavy. There was ancient judgment within these walls. Sentences echoed through seams in the ceiling.I had wished she'd hear it also.She appeared with her heels clicking as though she owned moments. No guard. No hesitation. Just this smirk carved upon her lips like she'd already emerged victorious.I didn't move.I stood until she was three strides past the threshold before I shattered the silence."You actually believed I'd stay in the ground, didn't you?"She ceased her movement.I advanced one slow, measured step, letting the light strike my face first. Her eyes expanded, shock curving into c
AlexI wasn't supposed to hear her voice yet. Not until I'd processed it. Until I'd decompressed it into a form the human brain could comprehend.But there it was. Raw. Distorted. Defiant."I didn't die," she asserted.I stared at the encoded waveform across the black terminal screen, her voice wavering through the circuit like a ghost crawling through noise.She was alive. She'd woken up—and I wasn't ready for what that entailed."She drugged me again," she gasped, breath thin but clipped. "She wanted me under."My jaw snapped shut. Chloe.Of course.I'd suspected she wasn't loyal, but this? She was racing so fast on the betrayal before the dirt had even settled on Sophia's empty grave."She hired Deimos," Sophia continued. "They're attacking the compound before Athena can get wind. They think I'm out of the game.""They're making a play," I snarled. "Premature. Amateurish.""Let them."She had sounded like war in silk. Broken but smoldering. And like that, the plan was changing. Aga
SophiaDeath wasn't as quiet as I thought it would be.It was loud. Deafening, even in the silence, in the thud of every heartbeat that still resonated despite the sedative crawling like smoke through my veins. My body was limp, a hollow shell, but my mind was fully awake. Burning. Watching. Listening.This was what it was to be a ghost with a heartbeat.Outside the mock ICU room, the world buzzed. Choreographed chaos. Nurses shouting codes that weren't real. A crash cart was brought in for dramatic effect. Bellion had orchestrated every note like a maestro of war. The ECG beeped in steady rhythm, a lifeline strained to a lie. To my lie.I was dead.Or I was supposed to be.The room they'd placed me in smelled of rust and bleach. Softly humming white lights above cast a cold glow that flickered occasionally like they knew this room wasn't meant to accommodate the living. I could hear the beep of the heart monitor beside me, forced into showing a steady, albeit slowing, rhythm. It had
SophiaEvery falsehood we uttered was a blueprint for their annihilation.The hideout was silent, but now silence was momentum. Silence before an impact. The kind of silence you get immediately before a bullet is fired. My mind was a fuse, burning rapidly, unwinding the pieces as they fell into alignment. Athena. Deimos. Vince. Nathan.It was no longer a line, it was a net. One that I intended to burn.I scowled at the photograph tacked to the wall, Nathan, Alex, and me. A gala had been on this photo's activities; Champagne, forced smiles, staged applause. That's where the agreement on the London purchase was finalized. A choreographed PR sideshow to mask razor-sharp ambitions fueling all our bargains.Nathan had just acquired a struggling European firm, promising to "revitalize" it, when in actual fact we were stripping it bare from the inside out and selling its skeletons to the highest bidder. Alex had brokered most of the backchannel deals, seducing CEOs with velvet-gloved bul
SophiaEvery lie we said was a blueprint for their destruction.The safe house was silent, but now the silence was movement. The calm before impact. My head was a fuse, smoldering hot, unwinding the pieces as they fell into place. Athena. Deimos. Vince. Nathan. It wasn't a line anymore, it was a net. One I intended to ignite.I looked at the photograph stuck on the wall and remembered that night two years ago. Nathan had brought in a large European firm. Alex was standing in the shadows, negotiating deals into the ears of men three times his age. And I... I was the smile they didn't anticipate. The woman in warpaint and stilettos who'd already mapped out their weaknesses before I even shook their hands.How quickly it all fell apart. "You're not saying anything," Alex said behind me. I turned. "I'm doing math."He moved closer, his feet quiet on the wood. "You're stalling too.""I don't stall," I said. "I wait. There's a difference."He folded his arms, looking at me. "So wh
SophiaThe safe house was silent.Not the quiet that calms. The quiet that suffocates.I sat on the edge of the couch in a room designed to make people forget where they are. Beige walls. No-frills lighting. Non-distinct furniture. Sterile. As if it had no recollection, no past, only a placeholder for moments like this.Moments when all seemed to balance in the scales.Alex paced, each step more aggressive than the previous one. His jaw clenched tight, the muscle pulsating along his cheek. He looked occasionally towards the windows, the door, the hallway. As if peril could slink in through the walls if we were to let our guard down for a moment.My hands were folded in my lap, the reverberation of that gunshot still buzzing through my bones. I could hear the vibration of it in my ears. The heat of Alex's body as he shoved me to the ground. Charred metal smell of gunpowder, the acrid bite of panic which had erupted on the sidewalk.But what lingered most… was the rage.Nathan had wound
SophiaThere was something different about the night air.It wasn’t just the weight of everything that had happened. It was something else—something unseen but felt. A storm on the horizon. A presence lurking just beyond reach.I stood on the balcony of Alex’s penthouse, my hands gripping the cool railing. The city sprawled below, lights flickering like dying embers, unaware of the war waging in the shadows.“You should get some rest.”Alex’s voice was quiet, but there was an edge to it—like he knew neither of us would be sleeping tonight.I turned slightly, meeting his gaze. He was leaning against the glass doors, arms crossed, his expression unreadable.“Something doesn’t feel right,” I admitted.He exhaled through his nose, his eyes scanning the skyline. “That’s because it isn’t.”There was a beat of silence between us, heavy and unspoken.Then—Bellion appeared in the doorway, his usual calm edged with something sharper. “Sophia. We need to talk.”I turned fully, my spine straight