All Chapters of The billionaire who couldn't steal my heart: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

Annabelle's POVMiranda Chen's office is nothing like I expected. I thought lawyers worked in fancy high rises with marble floors and intimidating receptionists. Instead, her office is in a converted brownstone in Brooklyn with plants on the windowsills and mismatched furniture that looks comfortable instead of expensive."Come in, sit down." Miranda is maybe thirty, with short black hair and sharp eyes that seem to see right through me. "Sofia told me a little about your situation on the phone but I want to hear it from you directly."So I tell her everything. Harrison Blackthorne, the secret inheritance, Ronan pretending to be someone else, Victoria's threats, Walsh and his fraud accusations. By the time I finish talking my throat is raw and Miranda has filled three pages of her legal pad with notes."Okay," she says when I'm done. "First question. Do you want this inheritance or do you want to walk away?""I don't know." It's the most honest answer I have. "Part of me wants to take

Ronan’s POVMarcus didn’t usually barge into his office. He was the kind of man who knocked even when the door was open. But that morning, the door swung wide, and Ronan didn’t need to look up from the spreadsheet glowing on his monitor to know something had gone very, very wrong.“Tell me you’ve seen it,” Marcus said, voice sharp enough to cut through the hum of the city beyond the glass wall.Ronan’s fingers froze over the keyboard. “Seen what?”Marcus tossed a tablet onto the desk. Headlines screamed from the screen: “Barista Heiress Sues Blackthorne Empire for 35% Stake.” Beneath it, Annabelle’s picture, a candid shot from outside the café, stared back at him. The same smile that used to calm him now made his chest ache.Ronan leaned back slowly, his heartbeat pounding against his ribs. “When?”“Early this morning. Federal court filing. Her lawyer’s good, Miranda Chen. Ex-DA, reputation for chewing corporate lawyers alive.”He should’ve been angry at her. Furious. But the only thi

Marcus’s POVMarcus had learned to read lies by the way people breathed. It came with the job, working beside Victoria Blackthorne meant watching truth get twisted into whatever shape she needed it to be.But that morning, when he stepped into Walsh’s office and saw the man’s hands trembling over a stack of “fraud documents,” Marcus didn’t need a degree in body language to know something was off.“Morning, Walsh,” Marcus said casually, closing the door behind him. “You look nervous. Didn’t sleep?”Walsh jumped slightly. “What, no, just busy. Mrs. Blackthorne wanted the quarterly compliance reports expedited.”Marcus leaned against the glass wall, arms crossed. “Compliance reports, huh? Funny. Because these” he tapped the manila folder on the desk…“aren’t reports. They’re falsified wire transfers. Under Annabelle Callahan’s name.”Walsh’s throat bobbed. “I…I don’t know what you mean.”“Oh, come on,” Marcus said, voice smooth, measured. “You really think I wouldn’t notice a Blackthorne

Ronan’s POVThe elevator ride felt longer than any board meeting he had ever endured. Every floor that passed on the panel above the doors seemed to taunt him, dragging him closer to something he wasn’t ready to face but couldn’t stay away from.He didn’t belong here. Not in this quiet Brooklyn brownstone that smelled faintly of coffee and printer ink. Not outside the office of Miranda Lawson, the woman whose name had appeared on every court document that kept landing in his inbox like grenades.But Annabelle was here. That was all that mattered.When he reached the glass door, his reflection caught his eye, the immaculate suit, the polished shoes, the posture of someone trained to never appear rattled. Yet inside, his stomach was a riot. His tie felt like a noose.The receptionist recognized him instantly. “Mr. Blackthorne,” she said carefully, straightening in her seat. “Ms. Lawson is with a client right now. You’ll need to schedule…”He didn’t even hear the rest. He was already wal

Victoria’s POVThe conference room was silent, the kind of silence that wasn’t peaceful but dangerous. The kind that made her feel like she was sitting at the center of a slow, spreading fire.Victoria adjusted the sleeve of her cream blazer, her nails immaculate, her posture perfect. No one could see the faint tremor in her hand as she reached for her coffee. She made sure of it.Across the table, eight men and women, board members she had hand-picked over a decade, avoided her gaze. Screens glowed with headlines she didn’t need to read. She already knew what they said.BLACKTHORNE HOLDINGS UNDER FIRE: LEGAL HEIRSHIP SCANDAL UNSETTLES INVESTORSHer last name had always meant control, elegance, dominance. Now it was being tossed around by gossip blogs like a punchline.“Let’s address the elephant in the room,” said Alan Pierce, the oldest board member and the one she despised most. He folded his hands like a priest preparing to deliver bad news. “The markets are reacting badly. The pr