Semua Bab My Father's Rival Is My Lover : Bab 131 - Bab 140

The Amalfi coast bathed in gold as the sun kissed the Mediterranean horizon. Waves crashed gently against the cliffs below, and the breeze danced through the linen curtains of the private villa Adrian had secured. It was supposed to be peace. It was supposed to be over.But peace never lasts when you’re born of war.Grace stood at the edge of the infinity pool, wrapped in Adrian’s shirt, her eyes fixed on the sea. It had been a week since the Phoenix Protocol was destroyed. A week since Elijah disappeared into the wind. A week since Jade’s plan fell apart.Adrian emerged from the villa behind her, shirtless and sipping espresso, shadows still haunting his gaze.“You didn’t sleep again,” she said, not turning.He placed the cup down and came beside her. “Can’t sleep when you know the devil’s still alive.”Grace looked at him sharply. “Jade?”Adrian nodded. “She’s not done. She never is.”“But the system was destroyed. Echelon is gone.”He turned to face her. “You destroyed a system, no

The silence in the jet was almost sacred.Grace sat near the window, her knees pulled up to her chest. Below them, the lights of Europe blinked like distant memories. Beside her, Adrian stared blankly ahead, lost in thought.Ghost Protocol was dead.Livia had vanished in the explosion.But both of them knew, this wasn’t the end.It was just the beginning.Grace turned to Adrian. “You’ve been quiet.”He finally looked at her, and for the first time, she saw fear. Not for her. For himself.“There’s something I need to tell you,” he said slowly. “Something I’ve never told anyone.”Grace leaned forward, alert.Adrian hesitated, as if the words might curse him. “My mother was part of Ghost Protocol before it even had a name. Before Jade. Before everything.”Grace’s brows drew together. “But I thought your father…”“He didn’t know,” Adrian interrupted. “She kept it hidden. She worked in genetic sequencing, on something called Genome-X.”Grace froze.“Genome-X?” she whispered.Adrian nodded.

The world knew everything now.The leaked data from the Zurich lab had gone viral within hours. News stations blasted the headline:“GENOME-X EXPOSED: Human Experiments Linked to Billionaire Tech Dynasty.”Grace stared at the screen from the presidential suite in Geneva. The footage of Henry being taken into custody was on every news channel. Jade was nowhere to be found.“She vanished during the extraction,” Cassian said grimly. “Interpol’s after her, but she’s slippery. She has safehouses in twelve countries.”Adrian rubbed his temples. “And we thought Zurich was the end.”Grace sat down at the dining table, sifting through dozens of documents: declassified test subjects, financial trails, media inquiries, and subpoenas.“We stopped a mass cleansing,” she said. “But we just ignited a war.”The SummonsThat evening, a black car arrived outside the hotel.Two suited agents entered the suite and handed over sealed envelopes.World Bioethics Commission, Emergency Hearing.Grace blinked.

The winds over Morocco were merciless.Dust spiraled in golden cyclones across the dunes outside Marrakesh, where the Ember Circle’s stealth jet had landed under heavy camouflage. Inside the cavernous shelter of an old fortress carved into the cliffs, Grace stared at a map projected across the sandstone wall.“She’s here,” Cassian confirmed, placing a glowing red marker in the desert northeast of the city. “Surveillance shows unusual heat signatures, untraceable power surges, shortwave radio silence.”Adrian stepped forward. “And?”Cassian hesitated. “And she’s not alone.”A fresh data feed rolled across the screen. Body heat scans. Nine figures.“She’s building her version of us,” Adrian muttered. “An anti-Ember Circle.”Grace didn’t say a word. She already knew it.Echo was faster than they expected. Smarter. She wasn’t waiting for Jade anymore, she was building something in her image.Cassian leaned against the wall, arms crossed. “I’ve fought doubles before. They’re unpredictable.

Paris never slept, but tonight it was silent.Grace sat on the windowsill of the penthouse she shared with Damien, watching the river where she’d thrown away the GR-Alpha vial just hours ago. The world hadn’t ended. No alarms had sounded. But something inside her had broken and settled all at once.That vial represented everything Jade had built, power disguised as promise, salvation wrapped in chains. By letting it go, Grace hadn’t just denied Jade. She’d denied the future her past had tried to design for her.But the ache remained.Because in that moment of freedom, she’d also chosen chaos.Damien’s SilenceDamien hadn’t said a word since she threw the vial into the river. He stood near the glass kitchen counter now, drinking his second glass of aged bourbon, eyes dark with something unreadable.“You’re mad,” she finally said, unable to bear the silence.“No,” he replied quietly, still not looking at her. “I’m terrified.”Grace frowned. “Of what?”“That you’ll disappear again. That