Chapter 10. The Countermove.

Damon’s POV

The message hit harder than I expected.

I watched Ariella’s face fade from the screen. I went through her statement inwardly again. What rattled me wasn’t the confession or the accusations but her tone. She was calm and Cold. So controlled and strategic. She’d stopped being my wife the moment she’d stopped being afraid.

She wanted a war.

Fine.

I pressed the intercom. “Marcus.”

“Sir?”

“Two things, first, freeze every account tied to Ariella. There was. There was a direct link. Use our offshore chain through Zurich. Make it look like a compliance audit.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Second, verify Elsa’s last three reports. Cross-reference them with the footage from the east hallway. I want to know who she’s talking to.”

He paused. “You don’t trust her anymore.”

I closed the laptop. “I don’t trust anyone.”

I stared at the envelope still lying on the desk when the call ended. There was a black, unlabeled, and untouched document except for my fingerprints. It was a symbol, and a warning.

She was repositioning, and I was losing ground. I pulled up the satellite feed from the Westside penthouse. Outdated camera. Low-res but still functional.

She was there, with the lights on, planning. This wasn’t about rage. Ariella had always been emotional, but not reckless. Not like this way. Every step she took now was calculated.

She wanted me to feel this shift. I thought she wanted to prove she was no longer under my beck and call. She thought she could win.

Control isn’t seized. It’s maintained. I dialed the secure line. “Clean the New York file.”

“Everything?”

“Don't leave breadcrumbs. Make them real enough to bait her, fake enough to lead her nowhere.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And the Panama property?”

“Already sanitized. Paper trail burned last night.”

“Good, now we move.”

I called Marcus again.

“New directive, spread the word that the Thorne Trust is vetting a new public relations director. Leak it just enough for Ariella to hear.”

He hesitated. “You want her to believe she’s being replaced.”

“She needs instability. Doubt weakens resolve. Add a name, something close to home.”

“How close?”

“Layla, use a proxy account. She’ll crack trying to confirm it.”

The phone buzzed. Elsa.

“Sir,” she said, “We have movement on the secondary tail.”

“Go.”

“She visited a storage facility on Sixth. In and out. Twenty-three minutes, no cameras.”

“Send someone to sweep it. Quietly.”

I hung up.

I stared at the wall, where Ariella’s wedding photo still hung. Her smile had been real that day, I think. Or at least, she’d wanted it to be. She always gave more than she took until I took too much.

This wasn’t about betrayal. It was about balance. She wanted to level the field. I intended to flip the board.

Marcus returned ten minutes later, folder in hand. “Preliminary pulls on Ariella’s movement. Her father’s accounts show minor fluctuations. Enough to suggest communication.”

I scanned the reports. “Nothing on the asset?”

“Not yet, but she’s guarding something.”

I nodded. “Keep her close, don’t engage. Just monitor every pattern and every contact.”

“And if she moves on us again?”

I looked up. “Then we strike.”

I pulled a burner from the drawer and typed one name. ''Achilles.''

An alert, my fail-safe was accessed.

She’d found it. I smirked faintly. “Of course you did.”

I activated the deadlock. The Achilles data was corrupted in real-time. This time around, she would see the shell, but not the source. This would compel her to come to me for the truth.

I nodded, and I lit a cigar. I walked toward the balcony and let the cold air bite. She had her message. Now, she’d get mine.

In Layla’s Apartment by 9:22 p.m., Elsa’s voice crackled in my earpiece. “She’s pacing. She had two phones and one laptop. Facial tension, she’s angry.”

I smiled. Ariella would’ve gone to Layla first. Loyalty was her blind spot. Let her search and let her scream. It only fueled the collapse.

Thorne Tower Surveillance Room by 11:47 p.m.

The screen showed Ariella standing by the window of the Westside penthouse. Motionless. Even in stillness, she was dangerous. I leaned back. “She’s waiting for a response.”

Marcus nodded. “She’ll expect retaliation.” “She won’t see this one coming.”

I wasn’t just reacting. That’s what Ariella didn’t understand. She thought she’d found every skeleton, every shadow. But there were things buried even deeper, tools she didn’t know existed, threats I’d never needed until now. I’d built more than contingency plans. I’d built extinction protocols.

And tonight, I’d unlock one. I opened a new file on the terminal. It held the contingency no one knew about. Not even Marcus or Elsa.

It is Project Halcyon. I keyed in the override codes and initiated Phase One. A financial shell collapse. Slow. Subtle. Just enough to trigger audits. Block Ariella’s access to data and expose her leaks to third parties, without pointing to me. Retaliation wasn’t about fire. It was about famine.

Thorne Estate by 2:10 a.m. I arrived alone. No guards. No entourage. The estate was quiet, opulent, and meticulously staged, as always. I went to the vault behind the study wall. Entered the code. Pulled out the original Panama manifest. The one Ariella didn’t have.

She was missing a name. Her ace was incomplete.

I took a photo of the last page and sent it to an untraceable address marked only ''ECHO.''

Let her chase ghosts. Then I did something unexpected. I wrote her a letter. Short. Blunt. Untraceable. "You want the truth? Meet me where it ended. No backup. No moves. Just answers."

I sealed it. Had it delivered anonymously by sunrise. Let her think it was a mistake. Let her hope for closure.

And when she came, I’d decide if she left. In my Office by 4:43 a.m. I stared at the screens. Ariella was moving pieces. So was I at the same time.

This wasn’t marriage anymore. This was a war strategy. And if she wanted to play this like war, she’d learn the hard way.

I would show her that I don’t fight to win, that I fight to destroy.