All Chapters of Between Her Shithead And The Wrong Brother : Chapter 171 - Chapter 180

Ariella’s POVDamon dropped the envelope on my desk. I took it up and opened it. Inside were two flight confirmations. My eyes went back to the flight details, destination-Barbados. I leaned back. “You can’t be serious. We just closed the post-audit report. There are still investor follow-ups.” He nodded. “And there always will be. That’s why we’re leaving.”I stayed silent for a few seconds. My mind was already running through logistics, pending reports, and system alerts that would keep coming in my inbox. Damon stood by the window, watching the skyline like he had already decided.He turned. “Roe can handle interim coordination. Marcus and Lyra are synced. There’s nothing left that requires us here for a week.” I frowned. “There’s always something.” He smiled faintly. “Then it will wait.” He said it like an order, not a suggestion. I didn’t reply. He walked out before I could argue further.By noon, he had already set the travel permissions, the temporary delegation protocols, and

Ariella’s POVThe sun felt dimmer that morning. Damon sat beside the balcony rail, reading a message that changed the rhythm of our supposed peace. His jaw moved once before he passed me the screen without a word.Lyra’s encryption key blinked in the subject line. Inside, the message carried only coordinates and a timestamp, no greeting, no sign-off. It wasn’t her style. I called her directly.Her voice cracked through static. “Ariella, someone breached the offshore node tied to your secondary trust.” She paused, heavy with control. “The access fingerprint matches an entity listed under the Cadenza Holdings shell group.”Damon rose. “Cadenza again?” His voice was flat. I met his gaze, remembering the same group that appeared on Isabella’s early funding trails. He didn’t need to say more.Lyra continued. “We’ve sealed the nodes, but the signature wasn’t just data theft. It looked like mapping.” That word meant more than intrusion; it meant someone was tracing us physically. I felt the

Ariella’s POVThe alert came before dawn. Roe’s message arrived first, brief and coded. The leak was live, spreading through financial networks faster than containment systems could flag it. Damon woke up early, his eyes fixed on the laptop.Immediately, I got up, and he turned the screen toward me. The headline flashes our names again. The accusation is recycled. I read through it once, twice, then said, “Activate full containment.”I opened my secure console and entered the emergency override. Roe appeared on the encrypted feed within minutes, his background dark, voice low. “Already moving. Servers isolated. We’ll trace it.”Marcus joined next, still in his operations vest, the hum of generators behind him. “Stock movement is minimal so far. We froze the automated bots before they hit the main exchange.” Damon nodded but didn’t look away from his monitor.Lyra’s voice followed on a separate channel, sharp and controlled. “Media blackout engaged. We’ve bought a four-hour delay win

Ariella’s POVThe leak was gone, the investors silenced, the system whole again. But something in his eyes said we weren’t finished. He looked at me once that morning and said, “We start with what’s ours.”I knew he meant my family. Adrian had called the night before, his tone careful, distant. Damon had taken it as a sign. “You should meet him before someone else tries to rewrite what your father built,” he said.The meeting was arranged in the executive lounge on the fortieth floor. Roe ensured the room was empty. Marcus was on standby. Damon and I waited together in silence. Soon, the elevator’s hum signaled someone was coming.Adrian entered without greeting us. His eyes scanned me. He said, half-mocking, "You still know how to pick your allies."Damon only nodded. “I learned to choose the ones who stay.” His tone was calm, not defensive. It disarmed the tension without yielding ground.Adrian sat, but his posture didn’t relax. I could feel the old resentment moving between us lik

Ariella’s POVWe began the acquisition cycle the morning after Lyra’s alert. Damon and I met Adrian at the lower conference room, where the asset lists were projected. I asked Adrian to start with the properties he considered irreplaceable.He pointed to three that had been lost in the early years after their father’s collapse. Damon reviewed the numbers and said they were still salvageable with the right negotiation sequence. I drafted the legal steps tied to each acquisition.Adrian seemed overwhelmed by the scope. He asked whether it was normal for a revival to require this much movement at once. Damon said the pace was necessary to stay ahead of rival interests.We reviewed the acquisition timeline. Some assets needed immediate offers to prevent interception. Adrian asked if Talon was prepared for that level of commitment.Damon confirmed the capital allocation had already been authorized. He said Adrian would retain operational control once the acquisitions were finalized. I adde