All Chapters of Billionaire by Blood, Not by Name: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

It was already eighty-nine degrees before noon, and Noah Quinn’s T-shirt was glued to his back like plastic wrap. Sweat dripped from his brow, mixed with grease on his cheek, and vanished down the collar of his shirt as he leaned over the open hood of a rusting 2011 Toyota Camry.His left hand was inside the engine block. His right gripped a wrench.The world outside the garage smelled like asphalt and dog piss, but inside it smelled like motor oil, metal, and the kind of grit money couldn’t clean.Noah liked it that way.“Try it again,” he called out.The kid behind the wheel turned the ignition. The engine choked, sputtered, then roared to life with a cough and a bang like a smoker on their first cigarette of the morning.Noah smirked. “Hell yeah. That’s your girl.”The teenager leaned out the window. “You’re a miracle worker, man.”“No,” Noah said, wiping his hands on a rag that only made them dirtier. “I’m just the only one who’ll fix her without charging you a kidney.”The kid la

The elevator ride down from the 42nd floor felt longer than the ride up.Noah’s reflection stared back at him from the gleaming metal walls — jaw tight, eyes storm-dark. He looked like a man who’d just walked into the wrong room, thrown a punch, and hit something made of glass.“Biological son.” The words looped in his head like a skipping record.He stepped out into the lobby with the folder tucked under one arm like a loaded weapon. He didn’t speak to anyone. Didn’t look at the polished tile, the gold-veined walls, or the security guard eyeing his boots like they were a crime.By the time he stepped into the blinding daylight outside, his shoulders were rigid with fury.The walk back to his garage took twenty minutes. He could’ve taken the bus, or called Eli to pick him up, but he needed his feet on cracked pavement and city dust in his lungs.It kept him grounded.Every honk, every food cart whistle, every clatter of scaffolding made more sense than what was in that folder.Jasper

The pavement inside the Quinn estate didn’t even look like normal pavement — it gleamed. Like it had been waxed. Like it had been designed to reject dirt entirely.Noah’s boots made dull, honest sounds as he walked across it, unlike the polished shoes he could hear behind tinted windows and polished black doors.Every car parked in the circular drive had a logo you couldn’t buy without an appointment. He passed a matte-black Bentley, a ghost-white McLaren, and something Italian with curves like a sin.No one greeted him at the door.There were no smiling assistants or servants in tuxedos with silver trays. The Quinns didn’t host — they expected you to know your place. To come already grateful, already bowed.Noah didn’t bow.He pushed the door open himself.The entrance hall was large enough to echo. A suspended chandelier spun lazily above a marble floor that looked like it cost more per square foot than his entire apartment building. Art lined the walls — the kind of pieces that scr

The temperature in the room hadn’t changed, but everything felt colder.Noah didn’t break eye contact with Iris, even when she sat down across the long table from him — directly at its head.Not beside Lena. Not beside Victor.Alone. Where she could see everyone.A throne in all but name.Merrick resumed speaking, something about filing protocol and executive transition schedules. But the words sounded distant — background static to the main performance now unfolding silently across the polished mahogany table.Iris reached for a crystal decanter beside her seat and poured herself a measure of amber liquor. She didn’t ask if anyone else wanted any. She already knew who drank and who didn’t.Noah kept his hands flat on the table, the folder still unopened beside him.He could feel Victor’s glare slicing into him like heat from the side. He could feel Lena’s quiet study — colder, quieter, more dangerous.But it was Iris who leaned forward slightly, her glass untouched in her hand, and

The hallway outside the boardroom was all reflective surfaces and soft, soundless lighting — like a luxury hotel built by people who didn’t like people.Noah leaned against the cool marble wall just long enough to breathe.Just long enough to remember where he was.And how far away from home this place really felt.He should’ve left.But something stopped him — curiosity, maybe. Or instinct.He retraced his steps back toward the open lounge, where a few remaining members of the Quinn inner circle were beginning to regroup — not as family, but as players waiting for their next move.The room had changed.There were now drinks being poured. Coats off chairs. Casual laughter with shark teeth behind it. Conversations that were smiles on the surface and daggers underneath.The performance had resumed.He spotted Victor first, reclining on a low couch, glass of something golden in hand. When he noticed Noah, he raised the glass in a mock-toast.“Didn’t expect you to stick around,” Victor ca