Chapter Five

Callan Sterling’s POV:

Control isn’t about forcing someone into a cage. It’s about expertly convincing them that the cage was their own idea all along.

I stood outside Kirrily’s seaside cottage and watched the edge of the sheer curtain twitch. She had seen me.

Good.

I adjusted my watch, pushed open the wooden gate, and walked down the path. The gravel crunched beneath my shoes with crisp finality. Kirrily was intelligent far more intelligent than Lachlan had ever given her credit for. I’d known that four years ago when she’d accidentally cracked one of Vance Green Energy’s encrypted ledgers in less than twenty minutes during a routine audit.

She had been the one unpredictable variable I could never fully manage. That was precisely why I had had to break her first.

A woman like Kirrily doesn’t surrender because someone threatens her. She surrenders when you take away something she loves so deeply that she can’t bear to lose it.

Tahlia had been that exact leverage.

For four years, the girl had remained tucked away precisely where I needed her: alive, weak, dependent, and never strong enough to wake up and tell her sister what had really happened. St. Jude’s was a masterpiece of an arrangement. Publicly, it was an elite private care facility. Privately, it belonged to me. The money flowed seamlessly through a labyrinth of shell companies and offshore accounts, handled by people who knew far too much to ever ask questions.

Tahlia didn’t need to die. That would have been messy and pointless. She only needed to remain perpetually helpless. And as long as she remained helpless, Kirrily remained manageable.

I reached the porch and raised my hand, giving three polite, measured knocks.

“Kirrily?”

Silence from within.

“It’s Callan.”

Nothing.

“I know you’re in there,” I smiled to myself. “Lachlan is coming.”

That got a reaction. I heard a sharp intake of breath and rustling movement from inside.

“He traced the trading node,” I continued smoothly. “He knows you’re behind the purchase.”

Another heavy pause.

“And he won’t be feeling very patient when he gets here.”

Then, from deep within the house, I heard it. A child’s clear, high voice.

“Mummy?”

My smile vanished instantly. Toby. So the boy was here. I had already seen the surveillance photograph, but hearing his voice made it real.

“I came alone,” I called out, weaving the first thread of the narrative. A complete lie, of course. “Lachlan is still on his way.”

I lowered my voice, softening it with practiced concern. “Open the door, Kirrily.”

A sharp metallic click echoed through the porch. The front door cracked open, halted abruptly by a heavy security chain. Kirrily appeared in the narrow gap.

She looked different older, harder, carrying a quiet resilience I hadn't seen before. But beneath the frost, she was still the woman she’d always been. Her green eyes were fixed on me with pure venom.

“Get off my property.”

I gave her a deeply wounded, sympathetic look. “Kirrily, please, just listen to me.”

“No.”

“You don’t understand what’s actually happening.”

“I understand perfectly.” Her fingers turned white, gripping the edge of the wooden door. “You promised me Tahlia would be safe.”

My pulse spiked, but I kept my face an absolute mask of innocence. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“Her medication was increased. Someone paid off the doctor.” She stared straight into my eyes, searching for a crack.

I shook my head slowly, playing the victim of circumstance. “I had nothing to do with that.”

“You expect me to believe a single word you say?”

“I came here to warn you, Kirrily.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because Lachlan is coming.”

Her expression hardened further. “Let him come.”

“He’ll destroy everything you’ve built.”

“I don’t care.”

I took a deliberate step closer to the threshold. “You should.”

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. Then I dropped the name I knew would shatter her composure.

“Bronte.”

She froze completely.

“Lachlan’s mother has been quietly auditing St. Jude’s finances.”

It was a brilliant lie just plausible enough to sow chaos, just complex enough that she couldn't disprove it on the spot. That was the eternal secret of a great fabrication: you don't make it impossible, you make it feed their worst fears.

Kirrily’s grip on the edge of the door slackened by a fraction of an inch.

I leaned in, lowering my voice to an urgent whisper. “Let me inside.”

“No.”

“Then listen to me very carefully.” I held her gaze. “If Lachlan gets here before I can intervene and help you cover your digital tracks, I can’t guarantee Tahlia’s ward will remain open.”

The remaining colour drained entirely from her face.

There. The pressure point. Always her sister. Always her weakness.

Kirrily’s hand trembled as it inched toward the safety chain, moving slowly, reluctantly

CRASH!

I whipped around, startled out of my skin.

A black sports coupe came barreling off the coastal road, smashing straight through the wooden front gate in an explosion of splintered timber. Gravel and dust showered violently across the driveway as the car slammed to a smoking, aggressive halt.

The driver’s door flew open.

Lachlan stepped out. His heavy coat whipped wildly in the coastal wind. His face was a mask of cold, unmitigated fury. His silver-grey eyes locked onto the cottage porch and then locked directly onto me.

For one frozen, breathless second, nobody moved.

Kirrily stared at Lachlan through the narrow opening of the door. Lachlan stared right back at her. Four brutal years of hatred, betrayal, and unanswered questions hung heavy in the air between them.

But as I watched them, a cold dread crept up my spine. I saw something else flickering in the space between them.

Something much more dangerous than anger.

Recognition. Pain. And beneath all that shattered rage... love.

My fingers curled slowly into fists at my sides. This wasn't supposed to happen. Lachlan wasn't supposed to find her like this. He wasn't supposed to see the house, or the life she’d carved out, or the child waiting inside.

I had spent four years meticulously building this trap, turning every variable into a cog in my machine. And now, as Lachlan’s eyes shifted past me toward the open door and the terrified child standing just behind Kirrily’s shoulder, I knew the game was over unless I struck first.