All Chapters of The CEO’s Regret: My Ex-Wife is the Hidden Tycoon: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The interior of the submarine was a claustrophobic hum of red emergency lights and the scent of ozone. Through the thick, reinforced portholes, the abyss of the Atlantic was no longer empty. Hundreds of glowing signatures bloomed on the sonar—a ghost fleet of repurposed industrial subs, private yachts converted into blockade runners, and deep-sea trawlers.They weren't just a militia. They were the people Xander had just made wealthy beyond their wildest dreams, and they were here to collect their debt."They’re hailing us," Cassian’s voice crackled through the comms, sounding more like a general than a monk. "They aren't asking for orders, Seraphina. They’re asking for a target."I ignored him. I was on the floor of the sub, my hands trembling as I held a discarded hospital blanket that still smelled like my son—milk, baby powder, and the metallic tang of the Sinclair lab. He was gone. Melanie Sinclair had my child, and she was heading East, into the lawless zones where the GRC and t

The air in the submarine grew thin, tasting of recycled breath and the copper tang of Xander’s blood. The voice of the Deep Council lingered in the cabin like a cold mist, turning my spine to ice."Bring the Sovereign's head to the surface.""Xander!" I screamed, shaking his limp shoulders. His head lolled back, his skin the color of a winter dawn. He wasn't breathing. The neural link with the Auditor had drained him to the very marrow, leaving a hollow shell where the most powerful man in Aurelia had once stood."Julian, the paddles! He’s in cardiac arrest!" I roared.Julian scrambled to the medical kit, but it was my mother who moved first. Eleanor Vance shoved Julian aside, her eyes fixed not on Xander’s face, but on the glowing green "Anchor" status on the main console."If he dies now, Seraphina, the Auditor loses its biometric anchor," she said, her voice terrifyingly clinical. "The machine will revert to its primary directive. It will finish the liquidation. If his heart stops,

The air in the docking bay was thick with the scent of scorched ozone and the metallic tang of blood. Xander stood tall—too tall for a man who had been a ghost only minutes ago. The violet glow in his eyes wasn't just a color; it was a shimmering, digital current that seemed to pulse in time with the very walls of the submarine.Beatrice Sinclair gasped, her wrist trapped in Xander’s iron grip. The golden dagger fell, clattering against the deck plates. "Xander... you’re burning up," she hissed, her eyes darting to the glowing veins tracing up his neck. "The Sovereign code... it’s a death sentence. No human mind can host the entire Trust without melting.""Then it’s a good thing," Xander rasped, his voice vibrating with a dual-tonal resonance, "that I stopped being just a man the moment you traded my son for a seat at a table of ghosts."He didn't throw her. He simply let go, and the sheer force of the bio-electric static radiating from him sent Beatrice stumbling back against the obs

The wind at the peak of the Aurelia Spire was a predatory howl, whipping my hair across my face like a lash. Below us, the black obsidian of the tower fell away into a churning, violent sea, but all I could see was the bone-white cradle hanging over the abyss.Arthur Thorne—the man who had orchestrated his own death twice over—stood only a few feet away. He looked at his grandson with the clinical detachment of a scientist examining a successful culture."He’s not a tool, Arthur," Xander growled, his hand tightening on my waist, pulling me back toward the safety of the Zenith. "He’s a Thorne. He’s my son. And he is staying with us.""Is he?" Arthur asked, his voice calm against the gale. "Look at your phone, Xander. Look at the data Seraphina just tried to save."Xander pulled his device from his pocket. The screen was a chaotic waterfall of red. The Sovereign Trust wasn't just stalling; it was reversing. Reports were flashing in from the Northern Territories—the relief funds were bei

The Oregon coast was a jagged line of basalt and mist, a landscape that felt as raw and unfinished as my own soul. As the trawler’s bow cut through the icy Pacific swells, the silence between us was heavier than the gold we had once traded.Xander sat by the rail, his hand trembling as he tried to lift a mug of coffee. The Sovereign light was gone, leaving him with the physical bill of the night—a body that felt every year of the wars it had fought. I sat beside him, our shoulders touching, while Selene stood at the prow, a solitary figure silhouetted against the encroaching fog.She hadn't spoken since the bird-drone had delivered its chilling message. The Thirteen has just been born. And he’s not on this boat."Xander," I whispered, the word catching in the salt-crusted back of my throat. "Arthur said the Thirteenth seat required a name untarnished by a contract. We thought it was our son. But the drone... what if there’s another?"Xander’s gaze didn't leave the mist. "My father was