Semua Bab Ruin of the Sovereign Billionaire : Bab 1 - Bab 10

Kirrily Archer’s POV:The rain in Byron Bay always brought back memories I had spent four years trying to bury. Saltwater. Cold concrete. The taste of humiliation. Four years ago, on a stormy night in Sydney, security guards had walked me out of the Vance corporate tower like a criminal. I had been carrying one battered suitcase, my reputation had been destroyed, and I had already begun hiding the secret growing beneath my heart. Now, every time rain hammered against the windows, I remembered that night. I dragged a cloth slowly across the weathered dining table, barely paying attention to what I was doing. Outside, the Pacific Ocean crashed against the dark basalt rocks below the headland. Wind whipped through the trees, sending sheets of rain against the bay window. Byron Bay was supposed to be a sanctuary.A quiet coastal town where people came to disappear, start over, or build a softer life. I hadn’t come here for any of those things. I had come here to survive.And while I survi

Callan Sterling’s POV:Loyalty is expensive. I had spent thirty-one years making mine look priceless.The private elevator descended smoothly from the fifty-fourth floor while I adjusted my glasses and studied my reflection in the polished brass: calm, approachable, and trustworthy. That was the man everyone saw. Callan Sterling. Lachlan Vance’s oldest friend. His Executive Vice President. The man who had stood beside him through his father’s death, the collapse of Vance Green Energy, and the bitter years that followed.Nobody knew what I really was. Nobody except me, and that was precisely how I liked it.When the elevator opened, Lachlan was already waiting beside his car. He climbed behind the wheel. I opened the passenger door and slid in.“Get out, Callan.”“No.”His jaw tightened. “I’m not in the mood.”“You’re driving four hundred miles in a storm while you’re out of your mind with fury.”“So?”“So I’d rather not explain to the board why their brilliant CEO drove his car into a

Callan Sterling’s POV:Control isn’t about forcing someone into a cage. It’s about expertly convincing them that the cage was their own idea all along.I stood outside Kirrily’s seaside cottage and watched the edge of the sheer curtain twitch. She had seen me.Good.I adjusted my watch, pushed open the wooden gate, and walked down the path. The gravel crunched beneath my shoes with crisp finality. Kirrily was intelligent far more intelligent than Lachlan had ever given her credit for. I’d known that four years ago when she’d accidentally cracked one of Vance Green Energy’s encrypted ledgers in less than twenty minutes during a routine audit.She had been the one unpredictable variable I could never fully manage. That was precisely why I had had to break her first.A woman like Kirrily doesn’t surrender because someone threatens her. She surrenders when you take away something she loves so deeply that she can’t bear to lose it.Tahlia had been that exact leverage.For four years, the g

The cottage felt like it was holding its breath.My mother's voice was still ringing in my ear “Look at the man standing next to you” When I saw what was in Callan's hand.It wasn't a gun. Not yet. It was a small black jammer, and he thumbed the switch until the LED went from blinking to solid red. The line died. Static, then nothing."Lachlan." Callan's voice had lost every trace of warmth I'd known for thirty years. "You were always too sentimental about family." "Callan." The name felt wrong in my mouth. "What are you doing?" "Saving you from another mistake," he said, unhurried, taking a slow step toward the middle of the room. His eyes weren't on me anymore they were on Toby, frozen on the rug, small fingers white around his wooden block. "Or fixing the one your mother made four years ago, keeping your legal ties alive."Kirrily moved before I could. She dropped to her knees, gathered Toby against her chest, and put her body between him and Callan."Don't you dare touch him.""I d

Kirrily's POVThe world doesn't stop turning just because your heart breaks. It only turns colder.That single line of red text burned into my retina like acid. A thin, high ringing filled my ears, swallowing the hum of the monitors, the distant crash of the surf, even Toby shifting behind me. My legs went to glass. I caught the edge of the desk before they gave out completely.“Tahlia.”Four years I'd endured the rain, the exile, the public shame, the cold isolation of this coastal town. I'd swallowed every insult, eaten bread and water in the early days, and spent whole nights code-stitching algorithms until my eyes bled all for one reason. To keep her breathing. To buy her freedom.And in the very hour I finally stepped out of the shadows, they'd taken her."Kirrily." Lachlan's hand landed on my shoulder not harsh, but a firm, steadying weight warm enough to cut through the ice in my veins. He leaned down, scanning the red lines on the screen, his brow furrowing into deep, dangerou