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Chapter 134
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2026-04-21 00:47:58
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Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 136
Esmeralda's POVI wake up and there is nothing to prepare for, that is the first thought that came to my mind, not a relieved thought or a triumphant one. Just a simple fact.The particular awareness of a body that has been oriented toward something for so long that the absence of it is its own sensation.There was no testimony to rehearse, no motion to fight, no article to respond to.No Julian.I lie still and let the quiet of that settle.Damien is asleep beside me, actually asleep, the deep even breathing of someone whose body finally believed the alert could be stood down. He slept the way he hasn't since before any of this started. I noticed it in the night, woke briefly at three and heard him breathing and thought: “good.” And went back to sleep myself.Now it is seven in the morning and the room is grey and still.I look at the ceiling.*****The first thing I feel is not what I expected.I expected relief. Or something like triumph, the clean, earned satisfaction of a thing c
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 135
Esmeralda's POVHe stands up and tells the truth.I hear every word, but I didn't bother to not look at him.Not because I can't, not because looking would cost me something I can't afford to spend today. But because his statement is not for me, it is for the record, for the room, for whatever version of himself he is trying to become in the wreckage of the version he was. That is his work to do. Not mine to witness.But I hear something that got my attention “Morrison Manufacturing was not failing. It was a healthy company run by a man who understood what he built.”The judge's face gives nothing away.Mine gives nothing away.Underneath both of those surfaces, I don't know what is happening in her. In me, there is something moving that I don't have a name for yet. Something that started when he said my father's name. Something that has not finished arriving.“That decision killed that man's belief in himself in the last years of his life.”My hands are flat on the table.I let the
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 134
Julian's POVThe judge asks if I wish to make a statement.Richard told me I didn't have to. Told me that in cases like this, statements from defendants before sentencing often do more harm than good, they invite scrutiny, create new material for the record, give the prosecution a final opportunity to respond.He told me to consider carefully.I considered it and stood up.*****The room is very quiet when I stand.The particular quiet of a space that has been loud all day, testimony, argument, the weight of accumulated words suddenly holding its breath.I don't look at the gallery.I don't look at the plaintiff's table.I look at the judge.She is watching me with the expression she has maintained throughout the entire proceeding, attentive, measured, giving nothing away.I speak.*****"I am not going to argue against the prosecution's recommendation," I say. "I'm not going to ask for leniency I haven't earned or suggest that the sentence proposed is disproportionate. It isn't. What
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 133
Esmeralda's POVMatheson stands for the defense counter argument and He speaks for twenty-two minutes.I listen to every word.He does not dispute the financial figures. He cannot, Dr. Reeves' testimony is airtight and Julian's guilty plea makes the factual record immovable. What Matheson disputes is the weight the prosecution has assigned to them. He argues for context, the pressures of high-level corporate environments, the normalized practices of aggressive acquisition strategy, the distinction between a man who did harm and a man who intended to destroy.He uses the word *complexity* again.He asks the court to consider that fifteen years is disproportionate for crimes that, while serious, did not involve physical violence.He asks the court to consider Julian's cooperation, the guilty plea, the lack of a prolonged trial, the resources saved by a defendant who chose to accept responsibility.He asks the court to consider the man Julian Voss is today versus the man he was when the
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 132
Damien's POVFifteen years.The number goes through the gallery like weather quiet, immediate, felt in the body before it is processed by the mind. I hear the shift around me. The barely audible intake of breath from someone three seats to my right. The stillness that follows.I sit with the number.Fifteen years.With no parole for ten.I look at Esmeralda's back, the set of her shoulders, the position of her head, the absolute stillness of someone holding something enormous with both hands and refusing to let it shake her in public.She doesn't move.I don't move.We are very good, the two of us, at holding things still in rooms that are watching.*****I look at Julian.I have been looking at him intermittently throughout the day, not with the fixation of someone still in the fight, but with the particular attention of someone who wants to understand a thing completely before it closes.He is sitting with his hands folded on the table.He has been sitting that way since Esmeralda'
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 131
Esmeralda's POVDr Reeves… hmmm, he was the financial Expert, he is a compact man in his sixties with reading glasses he pushes up his nose every time he references a document, which is frequently, because his entire testimony is built on documents, numbers and different timelines. The language of forensic accounting that turns what was done to my father's company into columns and rows and percentage points.It is the least human part of the proceeding.It is also, in some ways, the most devastating.Because numbers don't have motivation. Numbers don't have a narrative that can be cross-examined or complicated or framed differently depending on who is asking the questions. Numbers are what they are.And what these numbers are is damning.*****Dr. Reeves speaks for forty minutes.He walks the court through the Morrison Manufacturing financials year by year, the genuine performance of the company before the interference began, and the engineered decline that followed. He identifies the
Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 77
ESMERALDA'S POVMy phone wakes me at 6:23 AM.Not the alarm. The buzzing.Constant, relentless buzzing.Text after text after text.I grab it, still half asleep.47 missed calls.132 text messages.What the—Then I see the news alert.BREAKING: Is Hale Marriage a Fraud? Contract Details ExposedMy
최신 업데이트 : 2026-04-05Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 58
DAMIEN'S POVThe footage is grainy but clear enough.Table 14 at Lucienne. Camera angle from the bar.Her foot. His foot.Under the table where she thinks no one can see.I watch it three times.Then pour another drink.Then watch it again.The way she leans forward when she talks. The way he mirro
최신 업데이트 : 2026-03-30Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 53
DAMIEN'S POVI watched the footage three times.It's from the coffee shop. Angle from the security camera across the street. You can barely see their faces but I can read body language.The way Julian leans forward.The way Esmeralda leans back.The flowers he brought that she left behind.Marcus
최신 업데이트 : 2026-03-28Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 7
JULIAN'S POVThe weekend in the Hamptons was exactly what I needed. Vivienne's beach house, her children running along the shore, dinners without tension or tears. Alexander and Sophia call me "Uncle Julian" now, their small hands reaching for mine when we walk.It felt like family. Real family. No
최신 업데이트 : 2026-03-17
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