Chapter 125: The Price on the Table

The new, fused reality within the penthouse’s inner sanctum had created a fragile, potent bubble. For three days, they were a perfect, closed system: planning the legal and public destruction of Sir Malcolm Thorne with the cold precision of surgeons, their personal intimacy a warm, private fuel for the work. The outside world, with its threats and manipulations, felt held at bay by the sheer density of their shared focus.

The bubble burst on the morning of the fourth day.

It wasn’t another ghost call or a physical attack. It was a piece of paper, delivered not by a kidnapper, but by a perfectly legitimate courier from a respected international law firm. It arrived in a thick, cream linen envelope, addressed to Anton Rogers, CEO. Jessica brought it in during the morning briefing, her expression carefully neutral, but her eyes held a warning.

Anton slit it open with a silver letter opener. Inside was a single sheet of heavy bond paper. No letterhead. Just a few lines of typeset text.

Mr. Rogers,

A final courtesy. Withdraw your bid for the Kijani Energy Consortium in Tanzania. Announce it as a strategic reassessment by close of business today.

Fail to comply, and the liability presented by Mr. Sabatine Stalker will be realized. The details of the “Butcher of Belgrade” will be provided to the International Criminal Court, along with evidence of his current activities within your corporation. His extradition will be swift. His fate will be public. Your association will be ruinous.

The choice is simple: a minor business concession, or the destruction of your companion and your legacy.

Sincerely,

A Concerned Shareholder.

The room went very quiet. The hum of the climate control seemed to grow louder. Jessica stood frozen. Sabatine, from his chair beside Anton, watched as Anton’s face underwent a terrifying transformation.

All colour drained from his skin, leaving it the white of carved marble. His eyes, fixed on the paper, didn’t blaze with the volcanic fury Sabatine had seen before. Instead, they turned cold. A glacial, absolute cold that seemed to leach the warmth from the very air. His expression became utterly still, devoid of all human emotion. It was the face of a predator assessing a kill.

He didn’t crumple the paper. He didn’t swear. He placed it down on the table with a slow, precise motion, as if it were a toxic specimen.

“Jessica,” he said, his voice so calm it was more frightening than a scream. “What is the current market valuation of the Kijani bid?”

Jessica, professional to her core, recovered instantly, though her voice was tight. “Two-point-four billion. It’s a cornerstone of our green energy pivot in East Africa. The analysts are calling it visionary. The board is unanimously behind it.”

“And the strategic value?”

“Immeasurable. It gives us a fifty-year foothold in a region poised for explosive growth. It’s… it’s a legacy project, Anton. One of yours.”

Anton nodded slowly. He looked at the paper again, then his gaze lifted, finding Sabatine’s. In those icy depths, Sabatine saw no fear for the company, no anguish over the business decision. He saw only a single, laser-like calculation, and a fury so deep it had frozen solid.

“They’ve named their price,” Anton said, his voice still that eerie, controlled calm. “Two-point-four billion, and a strategic future, in exchange for you.” A faint, horrible smile touched his lips. “They think it’s a difficult choice.”

Sabatine’s own blood ran cold. He understood the threat completely. Thorne and Silas were done with subtlety, with kidnappings that could fail. They were going for the jugular—Sabatine’s past, the one unhealable wound. They would bury him in an international legal nightmare and drag Anton down into the mud beside him. It was the “messy” end, promised and now delivered as an ultimatum.

“Anton,” Sabatine began, his own voice rough. “You can’t—”

“I can't do what?” Anton interrupted, his head tilting, the movement reptilian. “I can’t let them destroy you? I can’t hand them a victory? Which part is unclear to you?” He picked up the paper again, holding it between two fingers as if it were contaminated. “They believe they have found a lever. They believe my sentiment for you is a weakness they can exploit. They have made a critical error.”

He stood up, the motion fluid and deadly. He walked to the window, looking out at the city, his back to them. “Jessica, draft the press release. Rogers Industries is withdrawing its bid for the Kijani Energy Consortium, effective immediately. Cite… unforeseen complexities in local regulatory frameworks. Sound disappointed, but resolute. Project strength.”

Jessica’s breath hitched. “Anton, the board, the markets—”

“Will do as I say,” he stated, without turning. “This is not a discussion. Draft the release.”

She looked helplessly at Sabatine, then back at Anton’s rigid back. With a sharp, reluctant nod, she left the room, the weight of the unprecedented surrender hanging on her.

When the door clicked shut, Anton remained at the window. Sabatine rose and went to him. He didn’t touch him. The cold radiating from Anton was a physical barrier.

“This is what they want,” Sabatine said quietly. “They want you to blink. To show that I’m a pressure point. You’re handing them a two-billion-dollar victory.”

Finally, Anton turned. The cold fury in his eyes was breathtaking. “They want a transaction,” he hissed, the calm finally fracturing to reveal the inferno beneath. “They want me to weigh you against a business deal. To make a cost-benefit analysis on your life. That is their mistake.” He took a step closer, his gaze pinning Sabatine in place. “There is no analysis. There is no price. You are the ledger. Everything else—Kijani, the company, all of it—is a line item to be zeroed out if it means keeping you safe.”

He reached out, his hand coming up to Sabatine’s face, but his touch wasn’t tender. It was possessive, desperate, grounding. “They have threatened what is mine. They have put a number on your head. So I will pay their price. I will give them their victory. I will let them think they have won, that they have found my weakness and exploited it.”

His thumb stroked Sabatine’s cheekbone, the gesture at odds with the lethal ice in his voice. “And while they are counting their money and congratulating themselves on their cleverness, I will be dismantling them. Brick by brick. I will use their arrogance against them. Thorne will think he’s safe because I capitulated. He will get sloppy. And when he is busy gloating over East Africa, I will drive the proof of his treason so far down his throat he chokes on it.”

The strategy was suddenly, horrifyingly clear. Anton wasn’t surrendering. He was feigning a retreat to lure the enemy into the open. He was sacrificing a queen to checkmate the king. The fury wasn’t hot; it was calculating, patient, and utterly lethal.

“You’re using their threat against me as the bait,” Sabatine whispered, a mix of awe and dread twisting inside him.

“I am using everything,” Anton corrected, his voice dropping to a deadly whisper. “They made it personal. They made it about you. So now, the only objective is their total annihilation. Not victory. Annihilation. Kijani is nothing. A piece on a board. You…” His voice broke, the control slipping for a second, revealing the raw, terrified love beneath. “…you are the board. And I will burn the whole game down before I let them take you.”

He pulled Sabatine into a fierce, brief embrace, then released him, the CEO’s mask slamming back into place, harder and colder than ever. “Now, I have a press release to approve. And you,” he said, his eyes holding Sabatine’s with an unshakeable command, “will stay here. In the keep. Voss’s detail is tripled. We have paid their price. Now we wait for them to spend it.”

He turned and left the room, a man walking not to a defeat, but to the first move of a counter-offensive so brutal it would leave no survivors. The enemy had named a price. And Anton Rogers, with cold, lethal fury, had just agreed to pay it—in order to bankrupt them completely. The price was on the table. The real cost was yet to come.

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