All Chapters of My Father’s Enemy, My Obsession : Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

Leo doesn't sleep.He sits in the control room until the night shift rotates out and the dawn crew filters in, bleary-eyed and yawning, carrying paper cups of bad coffee and murmuring about the weather.He watches them come and go like they're moving through water.The image is still on his screen, minimized but not closed. He can feel it there, burning a hole through the pixels.Damian's hand on the back of Ava's neck.Ava's fingers curled in his shirt.He minimizes it every time someone passes the glass. Opens it again when they're gone.By six a.m., he's made a decision.It's not the smart one. Not the one Cass would endorse.The only one his chest will allow.He showers in the staff locker room, changes into a clean shirt from his go-bag, and heads upstairs.The penthouse is quiet at this hour. Vince left before dawn for a breakfast meeting in Midtown—Leo checked the schedule twice. The brothers are scattered across their own floors, sleeping off whatever last night held.Ava's wi

Her hands slide down, fingers at his belt now, and whatever fragile patience he had dissolves.He returns the favor, skimming the zipper at the side of her dress, feeling the tremor in her body as the fabric loosens and slides down.She catches it at the last second, suddenly self‑conscious, arms folding in.He stops.“Look at me,” he says softly.She does.“You don’t have to hide from me,” he says. “Not this. Not anything.”She hesitates.Then she lets the dress fall.For a moment, neither of them spoke.She stands there in simple black lace, no jewelry, no armor, just skin and strength, and the faint, fading shadow of the bruise his fingers left on her wrist weeks ago.He steps closer, fingers gentle as he traces that mark.“I’m sorry,” he says quietly.She looks down at his hand.“You already apologized,” she says.“Not enough,” he says.She catches his wrist.“Then don’t make me regret this,” she says. “That’s the only apology I need.”He lifts her hand to his mouth and presses a

“Are you hearing yourself?” she says. “You, of all people, telling me something doesn’t have to be a negotiation.”“I negotiate when there’s something to be gained,” he says. “With you, I’m not interested in winning. I’m interested in… having.”Her throat goes dry.“Having,” she repeats.“Having you in my bed,” he says. “In my office. In my space. In my life. Consistently.”“You make that sound like a business acquisition,” she says.“That’s the only language I know,” he says, unashamed. “But if you want me to translate, I can.”She should run.She should throw the coffee in his face, call him a liar, walk out, and never look back.Instead, she hears herself say, very quietly, “Translate.”His eyes darken.“I want you to keep coming back,” he says. “Not just when you’re scared. Not just when you need something. I want you here because you want to be. Because this”—his fingers brush the hem of her dress, the curve of her hip—“is the only place you breathe like you’re not on stage.”Her

Vince is in a good mood.That’s the first warning.Ava feels it the moment she steps into the main dining room that evening for what his assistant has labeled "family dinner" —a phrase that has never meant what it should in this house.The long table glows under chandelier light. Crystal, silver, white linen. The windows throw back the city like a mirage.Vince Moretti stands at the head, decanter in hand, laughing at something her eldest brother Marco has just said. The sound is big, booming, almost jovial.It makes the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.Her father only laughs like that when someone else is about to bleed.“Ava,” he says when he sees her. “You’re late.”She glances at the clock.She’s three minutes early.“Traffic,” she lies smoothly, going to her usual seat at his right. “Some of us still have to share the roads with the peasants.”Vince chuckles.Marco smirks.Luca, younger and slicker, scrolls something on his phone and mutters, “Rude. They’re called taxpayer

Ava doesn’t text ahead.She doesn’t schedule a meeting.She doesn’t tell Cass or Riley or even Leo where she’s going.She just walks out of a planning session at Moretti Holdings with Vince’s voice still echoing in her head—*We have contingencies… we have insurance… when the time is right, Kade will find himself very busy answering questions*—and tells her driver to take her to Kade Tower.The car ride is a blur of glass and steel and questions she can’t untangle.By the time she’s standing in the stark white lobby, the receptionist barely has time to say, “Good afternoon, Ms. Moretti,” Before she’s at the VIP turnstile, badge out.The scanner flashes green.The elevator swallows her.She watches the numbers climb, pulse ticking in counterpoint.Vince has “insurance.”Damian has Lot Seventeen.Somewhere between those facts is a line she’s been pretending doesn’t exist.The doors slide open on the top floor.Nolan is in the outer office, jacketed off, shirtsleeves rolled, talking quiet