All Chapters of SEDUCING MY ELDER BROTHER'S BEST FRIEND : Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

Victoria’s POV The silence inside the grand boardroom of Vance Group headquarters was far more terrifying than any shouting match. I sat at the head of the monolithic obsidian table, the leather of Benjamin’s executive chair cold beneath my designer skirt. On paper, I had won. The federal monitors had signed off on the emergency administrative transfer. The board of directors had voted unanimously to strip Benjamin of his voting power, handing me total, uncontested control of the multi-billion-dollar empire he had spent a decade coding from scratch. I had the throne. But the kingdom was completely hollow. "He still hasn't logged into the secure proxy terminal, Victoria," my father’s old shadow investor, Arthur, muttered from across the table. He rubbed his temples, his face pale under the harsh LED lights. "We’ve left the corporate channels wide open. We initialized three separate hostile resolutions this morning specifically designed to force his legal team to file an injuncti

Benjamin’s POV The rain in the Savannah docks did not wash away the smell of rotting fish and cheap diesel fuel; it only made the heavy, southern air taste like poison. I stumbled against the rusted flank of a shipping container, my breath coming in ragged, whistling gasps that sent hot spikes of agony through my fractured ribs. I was three months into the dark. Three months of tracking ghosts, chasing dead-end digital blips, and drowning in a sea of my own unhinged madness. I hadn't shaved in ninety days. The reflection I had caught in the rearview mirror of my dirt-caked truck hours ago belonged to a vagrant, a hollowed-out animal with sunken, bloodshot eyes and ribs that pushed violently against my threadbare black shirt. "She isn't here, Ben," Leo’s voice cracked through my earpiece, heavily distorted by static. "The satellite ping from the Savannah terminal was a spoof. Victoria's cell is intentionally looping the old Berlin routing protocols to bleed your resources. You're

Jane’s POV Miller’s loud voice shattered the silence from the gravel parking lot outside. The sound of a heavy garage door opening followed, accompanied by the ferocious bark of his ancient rotweiller. The drifter cursed loudly, the iron crowbar clattering against the gravel as he bolted back into the thick coastal fog. I let out a long breath, my knees trembling, leaving my body feeling hollowed out and twice as heavy. I didn't sleep for the rest of the night. I sat on the edge of the stained mattress, the flashlight resting across my lap, watching the grey dawn slowly bleed through the gaps in the uninsulated timber walls. By eight o'clock in the morning, the coastal storm had cleared, leaving behind a biting cold that turned the saltwater puddles outside into sheets of ice. I walked down the exterior stairs, my limbs stiff, my hands tucked deep into the pockets of my cheap jacket. I needed to hand Miller my forty-dollar weekly rent before my shift at the diner started. Every

Jane’s POV The diner at eleven o'clock on a rainy Thursday night felt like a stage set for a nightmare. The yellow fluorescent tubes overhead hummed with a low, sick frequency, flickering rhythmically against the grease-filmed windows. Outside, the North Carolina coastal rain was relentless, heavy drops drumming against the tin roof with a deafening roar. The smell of burnt coffee, fried onions, and cheap floor wax hung thick in the air, clinging to my clothes like a second skin. I was wiping down the worn laminate counter, my movements mechanical. My back ached with a throbbing intensity that had become a permanent part of my daily existence. My hands were rough, the skin dry and peeling around the cuticles from Silas’s industrial bleach. There was only me, a damp rag, and a twenty-dollar bill tucked into the lining of my boot. "Hey. Girl. Bring the pot over here." The voice came from the back booth, rough and slurred by too many cheap beers. He was a long-haul truck dr

Benjamin’s POV The interstate was not a road tonight; it was a black, churning river of liquid asphalt and silver sheets of rain. I gripped the steering wheel of the heavy black truck with a feral intensity, my ruined right hand cramping violently against the leather wrapping. Every five minutes, a deep, agonizing spasm would ripple through my twisted knuckles, the unlined bone groaning under the pressure. I didn’t loosen my grip. I couldn’t. My fingernails dug into the material until the dried crimson of my old scars began to weep fresh fluid, staining the steering wheel with a slow, dark slick. The windshield wipers slammed back and forth with a rhythmic, metallic shriek that did nothing to clear the blinding wall of water lashing against the glass. "The atmospheric cell has officially breached the coastal line, Ben," Leo’s voice crackled through the vehicle's secondary dashboard monitor, his signal fading into a sea of static as I pushed deeper south into the wilderness of V