Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 21 - Chapitre 30

Chapter 21The message lit up my phone again an hour later.Unknown: Your sister’s facility has nice security. Expensive. Wonder how long that lasts if Voss loses everything.My stomach dropped. I deleted it instantly, but the words stayed burned behind my eyes. Lila. The one person I had left. The reason I’d broken into Damien’s world in the first place. Now she was collateral.Damien was in his office down the hall, voice low on a call. I could hear the steel in it — the billionaire masking the man who held me like I was the only solid thing left in his world. I hated how much I needed that version of him right now.I walked in without knocking. He ended the call mid-sentence when he saw my face.“What happened?”“Marcus texted me directly.” My voice sounded distant, even to me. “He’s threatening Lila’s facility. Security. Funding. Everything.”Damien’s expression didn’t change much, but I saw the shift — that dangerous stillness he got right before he destroyed something. He crosse

Chapter 23The words on Damien’s phone burned themselves into my brain.Lila is missing.For a second the world went silent. No penthouse hum, no city noise outside the glass, nothing but the roar of my own pulse. Then everything crashed back in — sharp, violent, suffocating.I snatched the phone from his hand, reading the message again like it might change if I stared hard enough. Two men down. Facility breached in the middle of the night. My sister — the only family I had left, the girl I’d sold my soul to protect — gone.“This is my fault,” I whispered, voice cracking.Damien’s hand closed around my wrist, firm but careful. “No. This is Marcus.”I pulled away and paced the living room like a caged animal. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking. All those years of hacking, lying, surviving on scraps and rage — and still I couldn’t protect her. The one innocent person in this entire nightmare was now paying for my choices.“If he hurts her…” My voice broke completely. “If he so much as touch

Chapter 25The van ride back was silent except for Lila’s quiet sobs against my chest.I held her tighter, one arm wrapped around her shaking shoulders, the other still gripping the gun I hadn’t put down. Damien sat across from us, face carved from stone, blood slowly soaking through the sleeve of his shirt. He hadn’t said a word since the message about his accounts.Fifteen years of contingency plans — wiped out while we were saving my sister.We got her settled in the new safe house. Medical team already waiting. I stayed with her until the sedatives kicked in and her breathing evened out. Only then did I step into the dimly lit hallway where Damien was waiting, leaning against the wall, blood drying dark on his arm.He looked exhausted. Not just tired — hollowed out in a way I’d never seen before.“They’re all empty,” he said quietly. No anger. Just fact. “Every account I could have used to fight back. Marcus timed it perfectly.”I stepped closer. The hallway smelled of antiseptic

Chapter 27The safe house felt smaller with every passing hour.Lila was finally resting in the back room, sedated and monitored by a private medical team. Her breathing was steady now, but the bruise on her cheek and the exhaustion etched into her young face haunted me every time I checked on her. She had asked no questions when we brought her here. She just held onto me like I was still the big brother who could fix everything.I wished I still was.I sat on the edge of the bed in the main room, elbows on my knees, staring at the floor. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Damien was in the next room making calls, his voice low and lethal, the kind of tone that once made me want to destroy him. Now it was one of the few things keeping me from falling apart completely.Every few minutes the silence stretched too long, heavier than any shout.I had chosen him. Fully. Completely. I had looked my sister in the eye after her rescue and known that the price of her safety was tying myself forev

Chapter 29I couldn’t shake the message from Marcus.It sat in my chest like a live wire — proof of my father’s death in exchange for Damien’s head. The one thing I had wanted for years, offered on a silver platter if I was willing to destroy the man sleeping beside me.Damien’s arm was heavy across my waist, his breathing deep and even. I stared at the ceiling, counting the faint cracks in the paint like they might give me answers. Every breath he took felt like another second I was stealing from Lila’s safety. Every heartbeat against my side reminded me how deeply I had fallen.I slipped out of bed carefully. He stirred but didn’t wake, murmuring something unintelligible before settling again. I pulled on a hoodie and stepped into the hallway, closing the door softly behind me. The safe house was quiet except for the low hum of the air system and the distant beep of medical monitors from Lila’s room.I leaned against the cool wall and opened the message again, reading it until the w