Chapter 17

POV: Liam

​The architecture of a trap is rarely made of steel. It is made of paper. Clauses. Sub-sections. Contingencies.

​I stepped into my penthouse, the air still smelling of the rain she had brought in earlier. The silence was heavy. It was a vacuum left behind by a specific frequency—

​I cut the thought. I moved to the window.

​The red dot on my chest wasn't there. I checked my reflection in the dark glass. Nothing. I had seen the feed Sarah showed Isabella in the alleyway. I knew the threat was real, but I also knew Sarah. She was a middleman. She wouldn't pull a trigger; she would only buy the person who did.

​The phone in my pocket vibrated. A private line. Not the one Isabella had. This was the line for the vultures.

​"Sterling," I said.

​"Mr. Sterling. This is Harrison Miller, from Miller & Associates. We represent the Eleanor Vane Legacy Trust."

​I sat at my desk. I didn't turn on the lights. I watched the grid of the city. Everything had a price. Every light was a bill being paid.

​"I thought that trust was dormant," I said.

​"It was. Until forty-eight hours ago. Your recent... activities with the beneficiary have triggered a mandatory review of the inheritance bylaws. We need to discuss the activation clauses for Isabella Vane."

​"I’m her business partner, Miller. Not her guardian."

​"The trust doesn't distinguish between the two when the asset is at risk of a hostile takeover. Specifically, Section 9, Clause C. The 'Control Provision.'"

​I pulled up the Vane family tree on my tablet. It wasn't a tree. It was a gallows.

​"Explain the clause," I said.

​"Isabella Vane cannot access the primary corpus of the estate—the ten billion in liquid assets and the controlling interest in Vane Global—while Arthur Vane is the acting Chairman. Unless."

​"Unless what?"

​"Unless there is a change in her civil status. Or a total resignation of her Vane identity."

​I felt the structural integrity of my plan shift. I had been building a bridge to keep her safe. Miller was telling me the bridge was built over a minefield.

​"Define 'civil status,'" I said.

​"Marriage, Mr. Sterling. Specifically to a peer of equal or greater market capitalization. Or, a complete legal severance from the Vane name, which would trigger a total liquidation of all Vane Global stock."

​I looked at the market data. Sterling Tech was still down. If Isabella liquidated her Vane stock today, it would flood the market. The price would bottom out. Sterling Tech would be insolvent by morning.

​"And the resignation?" I asked.

​"She signs away the name. She loses the protection. She becomes a private citizen with zero legal immunity for the events at the lighthouse. Her father’s lawyers would have her in a deposition within the hour."

​"So she either marries into a merger or she goes to prison."

​"The law is binary, Mr. Sterling. It doesn't account for... sentiment."

​Sentiment. A useless variable. A rounding error in a high-stakes trade.

​I thought about the way she looked at the bakery. The way she had tried to be "neutral." There is no neutral for an Isabella Vane. There is only the cage you choose.

​"Does she know?" I asked.

​"The documents were sent to her encrypted mail ten minutes ago. We assume she is reviewing them."

​I hung up.

​I looked at the screen. The red dot wasn't on me, but the target was clear.

​Isabella was the fuse. I was the matches.

​I drove to the coordinates Sarah had sent. It wasn't a secret base. It was a high-end medical facility in Westchester. Private. Quiet. The kind of place where people go to disappear while their skin heals or their reputations are laundered.

​Security didn't stop me. My face was the key.

​I found her in a glass-walled sunroom. She was sitting in a white chair. She looked like a ghost in a gallery.

​Sarah was gone. It was just Isabella. And the humming of the climate control.

​"You're alive," she said. She didn't stand up. She didn't move.

​"The sniper was a projection," I said. I sat across from her. I didn't touch her. The air between us was static. "Sarah used a laser pointer and a pre-recorded feed. Old school. High impact."

​"It worked."

​"It brought you here. To her?"

​I looked toward the closed door at the end of the hall.

​"She's resting," Isabella said. "The 'accident' was real. She’s... she’s not the woman I remember."

​"She’s a Vane. She’s exactly what you should remember."

​Isabella looked at her hands. She wasn't wearing the sapphire. She wasn't wearing anything that sparkled. She looked economical. Bare.

​"Miller called me," I said.

​Her eyes flicked up. "The trust."

​"You read the clauses."

​"I read them."

​"Then you know the risk. If you stay as you are, Arthur wins. He keeps the chair. He keeps you under his thumb through the courts."

​"I won't go back to him."

​"Then you liquidate. And my company dies."

​I said it flatly. I didn't use emotion. I used the numbers.

​"Sterling Tech is the only leverage we have left, Isabella. If the stock crashes because you want to be 'free,' we both lose the board. We lose the core. We lose everything we fought for on that island."

​"Everything we fought for?"

​She stood up. She walked to the glass wall. Her reflection was superimposed over the manicured lawn outside.

​"You want the merger, Liam. You’ve always wanted the merger. This is just a more efficient way to get it."

​"I want the structure to hold," I said.

​"At what cost?"

​"The cost is irrelevant if the alternative is total collapse."

​I stood up too. I stood behind her. I could see the pulse in her neck. It was fast. A tiny, rhythmic failure in her composure.

​I wanted to—

​I stopped. I checked the perimeter of my thoughts.

​"There's a third option," I said.

​"Marriage." She spat the word. Like it was a bug in her mouth.

​"A legal union. A contract. We bind the estates. We trigger the corpus. You get the ten billion. I get the board back. Arthur is outvoted. It’s a clean sweep."

​"A marriage isn't a sweep, Liam. It’s a life sentence."

​"It’s a document. We can have it annulled the moment the Medusa core is stabilized. Six months. Maybe a year."

​"You’re talking about my life like it’s a line item."

​"Your life is a line item right now, Isabella. The DOJ, the paparazzi, your father—they are all auditing you. This is the only way to close the books."

​She turned around. She was close. Too close. I could see the grey in her eyes. It was the color of the sea before a storm.

​"Is that all this is to you?" she asked. "A closing of the books?"

​I looked at her. I noticed the way her hair was tucked behind her ear. I noticed the small bruise on her wrist from the pharmacy door.

​I noticed that my heart was—

​"Risk management," I said. My voice was a rasp. "It’s the only move left on the board."

​Isabella took a step back. She looked at the door to her mother’s room.

​"My mother said you would say that."

​"Your mother is a ghost who plays with fire."

​"She said you’d try to secure the asset. She said you’d use logic to build a cage I’d walk into willingly."

​"And what did she suggest?"

​"She didn't suggest anything. She just laughed."

​I felt a surge of something. Not anger. Something sharper.

​"I'm not her, Isabella. And I'm not Arthur."

​"Then tell me the truth."

​"I am telling you the truth. The market—"

​"Not the market!" She snapped. It was the first time she had raised her voice. Her eyes were bright. Wet. "The trust. Miller sent me the summary. But he said there were additional addendums. Things he only discussed with you."

​I froze.

​Structure. Leverage.

​Miller had told me one more thing. A detail buried in the fine print of the Eleanor Vane Legacy Trust.

​The 'Heir Apparent' clause.

​If Isabella marries to trigger the trust, she doesn't just get the money. She loses the right to ever leave the company. It’s a perpetual bond. If she divorces, the entire ten billion returns to the trust—and goes directly to Arthur.

​She would be mine. Forever. Or she would be nothing.

​I looked at her. She was waiting. She was looking for a crack in the glass.

​If I told her, she’d never sign. She’d run. She’d go to prison or she’d go to ground, and I’d lose the company. I’d lose the core.

​I’d lose her.

​"What did he say, Liam?" she whispered.

​I looked at the window. I saw a black car pulling into the driveway. More lawyers. More vultures.

​I looked back at Isabella.

​"He just said the timing was critical," I lied. My voice was smooth. Perfect. "He said the board is meeting at midnight. If the signatures aren't in by then, the vote proceeds."

​Isabella searched my face. She was looking for the lie. She was the smartest person I had ever met, and I was betting my life that she wanted to trust me more than she wanted to be right.

​"Midnight," she said.

​"Midnight."

​"And it can be annulled?"

​"Yes," I lied again.

​I felt a cold, dead weight in my chest. I was securing the asset. I was saving the company.

​I was building a cage she would never be able to leave.

​Isabella reached out. She touched my hand. Her skin was freezing.

​"Okay," she said. "Call the lawyers."

​I pulled out my phone. My hand was steady.

​I didn't tell her about the 'Heir Apparent' clause. I didn't tell her that by midnight, I would own her name, her fortune, and her future.

​As I dialed, she looked at me with a strange, soft expression.

​"Liam?"

​"Yes."

​"Why did you really come to the pharmacy?"

​I looked at the phone. I looked at the ringing line.

​"I couldn't let the asset be compromised," I said.

​I didn't tell her the truth. I didn't tell her I had driven 100 mph because I couldn't breathe when I saw her face on that gossip site.

​I didn't tell her because if I said it, the structure would break.

​And I couldn't afford to break.

​Not tonight.