《UNMASKED: The Heiress' Cold Revenge 》全部章節：第 11 章 - 第 18 章

The lobby of Sterling Global was a cathedral of glass and silent power. Julian stood by the reception desk, his breath hitching. His credit cards had been declined at the parking garage, and his phone was persistently vibrating with a final, desperate warning from the Thorne Group’s board of directors, the Vance and other associates.Feeling helpless, he looked out of place in the pristine environment. His usually crystal clear eyes were now bloodshot, his shirt was wrinkled, and his movements were erratic. He looked like a man who had been running all his life.When the elevator finally opened on the 80th floor, he didn't see Theo Sterling at first. All he saw was Elena.She was standing by a floor-to-ceiling window with a tablet in her hand. She was dressed in a white silk suit that made her look sharp and untouchable. Theo was at his desk, his expression was unreadable as he watched the visibly miserable Julian as if he were a bug under a microscope. The office was quiet, save for

 The automatic doors of the St. Regis hissed open, welcoming Julian into the familiar scent of expensive lilies and floor wax. He didn't look like a man who belonged there anymore. His tie was gone, his shirt was damp with sweat, and he was carrying a single leather duffel bag he had managed to throw together at the last minute before the movers changed the locks on the penthouse.He approached the reception desk, trying to summon the phantom of his former authority. "My name is Julian Thorne. I have a standing suite."The receptionist, a young woman who had checked him in dozens of times for lunch meetings, didn't smile. She looked at his disheveled state, then at her screen. "Of course, Mr. Thorne. All I need is a card for the incidental hold."Julian pulled out his black metal card, the one that had never once met a limit. He slid it across the marble counter with a flick of his wrist.The machine chimed, letting out a short, harsh beep.

THE HEIRESS' COLD REVENGE  The boardroom was ready, but Elena wasn't. Instead of heading to the 80th floor of the Sterling tower like everyone had expected, she took a black car to a gated estate on the outskirts of the city: the Blackwood's ancestral home. It was a place built from heavy stones and even heavier secrets.Her grandfather, Silas Blackwood, sat in a library that had thousands of old books nearly arranged on shelves and cold ambition. He didn't look like a man proud of his granddaughter; he looked like a king assessing a potential traitor. On the desk between them sat a small, velvet-lined box and inside it was the Blackwood Seal, the physical key to the family’s untraceable offshore holdings and the final word in any Thorne Group takeover."You want me to just hand this over to you?" Silas asked, his voice like gravel. "For three years, you let that boy, that incompetent imbecile, Julian treat you like a servan

THE HEIRESS' COLD REVENGE The walk from the boardroom to the elevator was less than a two minutes walk, but to Julian, it felt like a thousand years under a spotlight. Theo had two men from his security team follow exactly three paces behind him: not as a courtesy, but as vacuums.When the elevator doors opened on the ground floor, the quiet on the executive levels was replaced by a truckload of noise. The lobby was swarming with reporters. News of the hostile takeover had traveled faster than the elevator."Julian!" "Talk to us." "Is it true the Blackwood Trust has seized your personal assets?" a reporter from a financial news outlet shouted, shoving a microphone in his face."Mr. Thorne, how do you respond to the allegations of shell company fraud?" another screamed."Have you actually been overthrown or are these just rumors?" "How did you marry the Blackwood's heiress and not mak