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Chapter 271
Last Updated:
2024-08-19 07:20:10
VictoryAnne ViceHey everyone, Here is an extra-long update for you. I could have broken it into two chapters, but I didn't want to disrupt the flow or put a break in the middle of a flashback. Going forward, there may be some days with only one chapter updated per day. I am returning to my day job in three days, and I won't have the same time in the middle of the day to write. Don't worry, you will still get daily updates. Thank you all! I appreciate you!
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Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 272
[Cordelia]The press was all over our breakup minutes after I stormed out of that ballroom. This was all according to plan. Our relationship is about to become messy, public, and unavoidable. Magnus won't need to have me followed because the press will do it for him. And we will have an opportunity to set the script. Not him. We won't let him control our lives any longer. Delilah gave us the idea to use her as part of the excuse. Her father sent her to our wedding, let him think that Atlas is still so obsessed with Angelica that he'd sleep with another one of her doppelgangers on the day of our wedding. The hope is that if Magnus believes his daughter has a chance of stealing Atlas' heart, maybe he'll give us back our son. Maybe I can convince him that he doesn't need Jasper any longer if he thinks he has another way to get what he needs. Or maybe, he'll be so distracted by what he thinks we are doing that he won't notice what we're really up to. I know I should be happy that Atl
Last Updated : 2024-08-20Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 273
[Cordelia]Steadying my frayed nerves with a deep breath, I realize I can't remember the last time I spoke with him. Oh yes, now I remember. It was when he was threatening my life."Cordelia, are you there?""Jude," I hiss. "Why are you calling?"There is a long pause. "You know why. "He must be somewhere that he can't speak freely. Then why did he call me? Why not wait? "Is he okay?" My little guy is so small and precious. "Is he...?"Would he call just to tell me he's dead? That my precious little joy is gone from the world, lost and far away, without his mother to calm him. "He's doing well now that I've adjusted his treatment. He still has a long way to go until recovery but..."Jude gives me precise medical details of my son's current condition. With his skills, he was able to bring him back from near critical. He's become quite familiar with the disease since working on Magnus' son, Devin. "Listen, I don't have a lot of time before she wakes up," he murmurs rapidly. "Listen.
Last Updated : 2024-08-21Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 274
[Atlas]A month has passed since Cordelia and I went our separate ways to save our family and bring everyone home. A month of hell. Everything irritates me. The sound of Delilah's voice as she brings me my morning coffee and the latest fashion news. Clark as he shows me yet again that Cordelia has sent him a message, HIM and not me. And the photos. Jude, the man who kidnapped Cordelia and trapped her on an island with my first love, Angelica, is asking me to trust him with my child. Somehow he got my cell phone number and has been sending me photos discretely. Photos of my son being cared for by two enemies--Sydney and Henri. I'm not sure if he is trying to comfort me or torture me, but considering our history, likely both. "I wonder if Cordy is also receiving photos," Clark wonders at one point. "She's been getting messages and we haven't been." "Does it matter," I muse, "I still don't trust him." Fall Fashion Week is just a month away. Steele Industries plans to make a big sh
Last Updated : 2024-08-22Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 275
[Jude]She isn't Angelica. No amount of wishing her to be Angelica will make her into the woman that I once loved. That I still love--I don't think it is possible for me to ever stop loving her. I knew what she was about when she started flirting, but I was lonely enough to not care. Now I just wish she'd go away, that I could forget we even started this mess. This isn't right, this fooling around. Especially now that I know she is playing around with my affections just to keep me under Magnus' control. I wish I hadn't seen that text on her phone. I could have gone on believing we had something real if I hadn't"It's 5:30," I nudge her foot and she groans, rolling over, her beautifully round breasts cresting the comforter. "It's time for you to get back to your job. Jasper will be hungry and Henri will be worried." "Do I have to," Sydney pouts, her eyes still closed as pulls the blankets roughly over her naked form, flashing her other assets in the process. Closing my eyes, I turn aw
Last Updated : 2024-08-24Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 276
[Cordelia]My husband took long enough to read and decipher my message. I guess I could have made it easier for him, but I didn't want to risk Magnus finding out the truth. I arrived last night. Officially I'm staying in a hotel in Downtown LA while I prepare for my presentation at LA Fashion Week. My mother and I have created a satellite version of Devaroux Designs here in LA located just across from Steele Industries.My plan to pretend at a hostile takeover of Steele Industries as a way to get control of Atlas' holdings and find the location of the cure to give to Magnus is on target. With Clark's help, I have "purchased" stock from several board members, including himself and Atlas, to have the controlling share--38%. This is more than I need to shut Atlas out of his own company. As the disgruntled current wife who refuses to give Atlas a divorce, I am using all of my might as Mrs. Atlas Steele to take him down piece by piece--first socially, then financially, and finally I will
Last Updated : 2024-08-24Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 277
[Cordelia]I've never been so happy, to get so little sleep. But in the morning the reality of our situation came to rest on us both as a crushing weight. We need to lure Magnus into our trap, but how?"We need to make a loud, public show of it," Atlas decides as he runs a finger up my naked spine, using my back as a prop as he maps out our plans, his fingers dancing along my ribs. "We need to taunt him into coming forward, get him to want to come to us." The problem is, that Magnus is an intelligent, complex man. He must know that someone at his headquarters is feeding us information. He's very likely testing Jude with this information that our baby's time is limited. "Do you want to risk that though," I sit up, grabbing a nearby robe. "What if Jude's report is correct? Our son will only have weeks to live without his treatment. "What he needs is the cure," Atlas looks up towards the attic. "But if we put the cure out there, he'll steal it. There is no way around it.""What if we
Last Updated : 2024-08-25Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 278
[Cordelia]Two hours later, give or take 15 minutes, we finally separated ourselves from one another long enough to get dressed and eat. Once breakfast was done, we needed to set our plan into motion. But first, we need the cure. We know WHERE it is, or at least we think we do. The problem is that Susanna Steele was just too good at creating locks."This is an awful lot of lock for a kid's treasure chest," I observe as I lift and drop the lock for the third time, baffled as to how to open it. "Couldn't we just break the damn thing?""The treasure chest is made of titanium. She was tired of us breaking all of the toys she'd invented for us, so she started having them crafted out of titanium. She made this chest in our shop out back. She manufactured a lot of her special gadgets out there.""That shop out there is your mom's?" I don't know why I'm so surprised. From everything he's told me, his mother was just as much a master craftsperson as her husband who built the house. "They sh
Last Updated : 2024-08-25Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 279
[Cordelia]Atlas turns the book around and shows me the pages in the book where his mother explains the locking mechanism she installed on the box. According to her notes, she had finished the lock only a week before she died."She knew," a tear fell on the yellowed paper. "She must have known he was coming for the cure. She made this lock knowing. And the key," he shows me her drawing of the comb with rays of light bouncing from the gems. It is a lovely rendering, the comb looking like a precious bit of treasure."She made sure it was something that would stay in the family," I marvel, laughing. "The first real present you ever give me turns out to be the key to saving our family. You weren't kidding when you told me it is priceless."There were so many moments when this precious heirloom could have been lost forever. I almost left it behind at the first fashion expo, it nearly burned in the fire that had been set at my studio as well. I almost gave it up for collateral for what ended
Last Updated : 2024-08-26
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[Cordelia] Today is our 20th second anniversary. We've lost count of the first one, forgetting it entirely as a moment of sadness. Instead, we honor the day when we took our vows and meant them, 7 years later in Napa. Usually, we leave Los Angeles and take the week for just the two of us. Even after two decades, we haven't lost our hunger for one another and I look forward to our time away where we can just be two people together and in love. But this year, my husband is feeling a bit nostalgic. This is why I'm in the lobby of the Steele Hotel and Resort, recreating a memory I wish I could forget. When he sent me the cryptic text this afternoon, I confess I was more than a little bit confused. Why, of all places, would he want me to meet him there? At least this time I'm not wearing a hoodie with a dress tucked into a pair of loose sweats. And while my face is covered with large sunglasses, it's more to protect my identity and not draw too much attention. I am far too recogniza
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[Clark] "Come on. Dad!" My daughters pull me along by my arms. I've never been able to deny them anything they wanted but tonight they are asking too much. "It's only a blind date!" "Girls," I admonish, "What have I said, I'm not ready to let someone new into my heart. Your mother was more than enough for me." Cassie stares up at me with her starlight eyes, as deep and black as her mother's, and doesn't relent. "You promised you'd let us have anything we want for our birthday. Grandma helped us pick her out. You have to try, Dad. For us!" "Grandma Suzanna or Grandma Jenny?" I grump, "Who do I need to send a thank you note." "Both!" the girls giggle. "You owe us, Dad," Cassie counters. Her red curls bounce as she stomps her foot. "Do you know how weird it is to look on a DATING AP for potential girlfriends for our father? It's so gross. You should be grateful" "Yeah," Maddie chimes in, swinging her hair over her shoulder as she twists her lips just like Tilly used to, her hand
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[Jude]If the universe were fair, I wouldn't have lived to see today. If karma took her toll, I wouldn't be friends with Clark and Atlas Steele, our children growing up side by side. Once the shadow of Magnus was lifted from our shoulders, and Angelica and I were finally able to go about our lives the way we always should have been able to do, It became easier to make good with my life. Angelica and I were married shortly after Mathilda's funeral. It was a small ceremony on the family medical boat, just before the two of us set sail with our daughters, Melanie and Veronica. When the DNA showed that they were indeed my children, and NOT Magnus', that his experiment had never stuck, it was easy to adopt them. In their mind, Angelica is their mother. When they are old enough, we'll tell them the truth about Aunt Sydney, but for now, we are sparing them the burden of her insanity.And we give them love, all the love of a couple who has always wanted children of their own.Angelica, it tu
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 404
[Cordelia]15 hours later I place my feet back in LA for the first time in 6 months. We have been gone for so long that I had forgotten how loud it is, or how oppressively hot it can be in summer. Clark met us at the runway alone, the girls with their grandparents. "I hope you don't mind, but I wanted to drive you home. We could have sent a driver but," he explains, "I wanted to be the one to welcome you home." He does his best to smile, but as his melancholy grin drifts to how I hold on to my husband's hand, I can see how much this is costing him. "I'm glad it was you," I reach forward to give him a hug. "Thank you." Atlas, who has been receiving a slew of messages from Theo as soon as we landed, asks to be dropped off at the new Steele Industries building. "Looks like they need me," he apologizes, kissing my hand. "I'll make it up to you tonight," he whispers in my ear and I shiver in anticipation. "I'm going to hold you to that," I whisper discretely in his ear, trying to be mi
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 403
[Cordelia]The rest of that day went by in a blur. I insisted we rush back to the compound even though everyone had received the news that Tilly was gone. I couldn't believe it. My mind couldn't process the possibility of a world without Mathilda Madison. She wasn't just my best friend, she was my sister. So I couldn't let her go. Clark was distraught. He and Tilly took a while to find one another, and when they did finally make the right connection, they fell for one another hard. It was beautiful watching my two best friends fall in love--they were perfect for one another. But not all stories end with a happily ever after. That was a hard lesson for me to learn as well. I wanted nothing more than to watch Tilly raise her daughters. When we made it back an hour later, her body had already been collected. I had wanted to see her, to give it a chance to see if I could have brought her back: just one touch, one spark. I was convinced that I could have been the one to save her. The
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 402
[Sydney]Why can't they just let me die? It would be so easy, I'm already cut and bleeding. Why bother with the IVs and the monitors? It doesn't matter anymore. Did it ever matter?My entire existence has been a fraud. If my hands were free I'd count the ways on my fingertips all the ways I've been lied to and used.A madman altered my DNA and injected me into the wrong mother. I was raised believing I was special only to discover I was the offspring of my enemy. The man of my dreams was married to the daughter my mother was supposed to have, and I was just a cheap copy of the woman he once loved, my genetic twin, Angelica. Was this life ever really mine to begin with? Even now they aren't honoring my desire to die. "She needs more blood," the doctor announces over my head, her clear voice cutting through the din of the operating room chatter. "Her blood pressure has dropped to dangerous levels. We can't use the anesthesia. She'll need to be awake for the procedure."Procedure?"I d
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 401
[Clark]The dissection of Magnus' brain was one of the most intensely fascinating and uniquely horrifying things I have ever experienced. Using my computer to guide the charge, we attached wires to his brain, fed through a divide that my mother had retrieved from her vault. "This will disrupt his signal. It will keep him from making a full memory transfer. Hopefully whomever he's jumped into will have a fighting chance." Everything my mother has said since I volunteered for this task has sounded like something from a science fiction movie. The duplicates we had seen in Delilah's footage of her father's secret lab were all designed to hold Magnus's memories in an artificial extension of his life. Not all of them looked like his current body, as often it was useful for him to become someone entirely different for spying purposes. "Is this how he always seemed to know everything?" I ask aloud. We had wondered how he managed to get around all of our codes, to find ways to learn about wh
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[Cordelia]"Wally?" Holding my hand above his head, I pause, hesitating. Just a moment before I was about to take this man's life without even the smallest shred of remorse. It was necessary to protect my family. My children and my husband. "Cordelia," He blinks, his eyes roving my face and the surroundings like a caged animal. Licking his dry, salty lips, his body is otherwise completely still. "I don't have much time. He's fighting me...I..."Wally's muscles spasm, shaking Atlas as well as he holds him in place. Closing his eyes, his body stills, as if the effort of keeping still is so great that he cannot do anything else at the same time. He whispers something that I can't quite make out, so I lean in, trying to capture his words.As my hair brushes his cheek, he repeats himself. "You need to end this, Cordelia. Don't let him escape to harm another. His other mind is gone, Suzanna saw to it, but he can still jump to someone else.""Wally, what are you saying," I shake my head. "No
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 399
[Cordelia]Atlas and I raced down the hall to the exit, soldiers moving out of our way as we passed, nobody bothering to stop us as my husband's icy glare and dominant aura kept them pinned in place. Magnus is dead and I have never been more terrified in my life. The door to the outside pushes open and we are instantly blinded by the overhead sunshine that covers the beach with an oddly bright gray that stings the eyes. It is warmer than it had been earlier, the wind having died down, trapping the moisture of impending rain, held in place by the gathering storm. "Jasper," I call out gently, scanning the beach. "Wally?""Atlas do you see Jasper?" I grab my husband's arm. His pulse is rapid beneath my fingertips as we move forward as one and find the abandoned picnic blanket and Jasper's little galoshes next to a much larger pair. "Wally!" I scream out towards the waves and find him standing in the water, at the far edge of the beach. There is no sign of my son. None. It's as if the
