Chapter 176

His father had laughed at him, and so had she—the slut who had ultimately been responsible for the death of his mother. The official cause of her death had been pneumonia, but Arni knew better. His gentle, beautiful mother had died of the wounds inflicted on her heart and her pride by a tramp who hadn’t been fit to breathe the same air. He loathed the kind of woman his father’s lover had been—greedy, sexually available to any man who had the price of her in his pocket.

He had been reluctant to return to Ralapur at first, when Anmol had succeeded their father, but Anmol had persisted, and out of love for his brother, Arni had finally given in. Even now, he wasn’t sure if he had done the right thing.

The boy who had walked away from a life that held the status of being his father’s second son into an uncertain future where he would have nothing but his own abilities, had returned to the place of his birth a very wealthy man, who commanded respect not only in his own country but througho