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Chapter 72
publish date:
2026-05-06 18:04:41
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Bred for Betrayal Chapter 73
POV: Nora I didn't take Aria that night. That was the honest truth of it. I went back to my apartment alone and I sat on the edge of the bed and thought about what taking Aria actually meant legally, what it would trigger, what it would cost, and I made myself think it through completely before acting on anything. Taking her without a court order would hand Elias exactly the ammunition he needed to paint me as unstable and impulsive in the custody proceeding. I had worked too hard and too carefully to throw it away on a decision made at eleven at night after a fight. I went back the following morning. Elias was in his office when I arrived and Aria was with the housekeeper and I collected her for the day without a conversation and he didn't come out of his office and I didn't knock. I spent that week finding an apartment. Not a hotel, not a temporary arrangement, an actual place. Two bedrooms, doorman building, close enough to Aria's pediatrician that the routine wouldn't be dis
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 72
POV: Nora It started over something small. Aria's second supervised visit with Marcus had been scheduled through family services for the following week and I had confirmed it without mentioning it to Elias first, not because I was hiding it but because I had stopped asking permission for things that were within my rights to decide. He found out when the family services coordinator called the penthouse landline by mistake and left a confirmation message. He waited until Aria was in bed. "You scheduled another visit," he said. "Yes." I was at the kitchen table going through the foundation paperwork Marcus's lawyers had sent. "The court order allows for monthly supervised visits pending the full custody determination. I scheduled it within those parameters." "Without telling me." "I told you last time that I don't need your approval for decisions within my legal rights." "I'm her father," he said. "Her biological father. I have a right to be informed about contact between her and
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 71
POV: Nora The jury deliberated for two days. I spent both of them at the penthouse with Aria, doing the ordinary things that had become routine over the past weeks. Morning bottle, play mat, lunch, nap, afternoon walk in the building's courtyard. Elias was present but distant in the specific way of someone who had made a decision about their emotional position and was maintaining it through discipline rather than feeling. We hadn't talked properly since I stepped off the stand. He had come back to the penthouse that evening after leaving the courthouse and we had managed Aria's routine in the careful parallel way and when she was asleep he had gone to his office and I had sat in the living room and we had both understood that the conversation we needed to have was not one either of us could have that night. The verdict came on a Friday afternoon. Marsh called me before the media got it. Guilty on the primary charge of conspiracy to commit murder. Guilty on the associated fraud c
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 70
POV: Nora I called Reeves the following morning and declined the offer. He said he understood and ended the call without pushing, which told me Marcus had instructed him not to push. That itself said something about where Marcus was in his own process. A year ago he would have sent three more lawyers with three more offers. Now he accepted no and moved on. I called Marsh next and confirmed I was testifying. My terms, my words. She said she understood what that meant for the prosecution's preferred narrative and she was accepting it anyway because my account was the most credible civilian testimony she had and a credible witness telling the full truth was better than a scripted witness telling a partial one. I respected her for that. Elias found out when I told him. That same evening, Aria already in bed, the penthouse quiet around us. He listened to the full account, the declined offer, the confirmed testimony, my decision to tell the complete truth including the parts that compli
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 69
POV: Nora The lawyer's name was Daniel Reeves and he called my phone directly, not through Marsh's office, which told me Marcus had given him my number personally. He was professional and brief. He said he represented Marcus Wolfe in a private capacity separate from the criminal defense team, which meant this conversation was not connected to the trial proceedings. He said his client had authorized him to present an offer and asked if I would be willing to hear it. I said yes because knowing what was on the table was always better than not knowing. He laid it out cleanly. If I withdrew my agreement to testify, Marcus would sign a legally binding document relinquishing all current and future claims to Aria. Not supervised visitation, not future petitions, not letters to the court when she turned eighteen. A complete and permanent legal severance. Additionally, Wolfe Industries would establish a foundation in William Ashford's name, funded at fifty million dollars, directed toward t
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 68
POV: Nora Marcus's statement to the prosecution changed everything and Elias knew it before I did. He called me the morning after Marsh's associate shared the update, and the version of him on that call was not the penthouse floor version or the supervised visit doorway version. It was the operational one, clipped and fast, the one that appeared when something had moved outside his control. "Whatever Marcus told them," he said, "it's a play. He's trying to manage his sentence by cooperating. Don't let that affect your decision about testifying." "Good morning to you too," I said. "Nora." "I heard you." I was making coffee and I kept making it. "I haven't made a decision yet." "Marsh needs your answer by Friday." "I know when she needs it." He was quiet for a moment. "I need you to testify. The full account, everything you found, everything the documents show. The prosecution needs the civilian narrative to connect the evidence." I put the coffee down. "You need me to testify
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 31
POV: Nora I found out about the PI on a Wednesday. Elias told me over the kitchen table with the same tone he used for everything operational, level and direct, no softening around the edges. He'd identified the tail three days earlier, a man who had been appearing in the same radius as my moveme
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 27
POV: Nora I sat with what she'd said about Elias for a long moment. Twice as a witness. Once as a suspect. I didn't let it show on my face because I had been practicing not letting things show on my face for months and I was getting competent at it. But underneath the practiced neutrality I was
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 11
POV: Nora Kellerman's was closed. Of course it was. The lights were off, chairs flipped onto tables, a hand-written sign on the door that said BACK FRIDAY. I stood on the sidewalk staring at it, rain soaking through my jacket, the photograph still folded in my fist. I heard footsteps behind m
Bred for Betrayal Chapter 7
Nora's POVI don't get on a bus. I don't leave the city. Instead, I take Chen's fifty dollars and use twenty of it to rent a locker at a 24-hour gym. The kind that doesn't ask questions if you pay cash. Somewhere I can shower. Somewhere I can keep my stuff safe.The other thirty goes toward a burne
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