Chapter 4 - THE QUEEN OF BLACKWELL TOWERThirty miles away, inside the penthouse suite of Blackwell Tower, Victoria Blackwell stood by the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, swirling a glass of vintage Pinot Noir.
Below her, the glittering lights of Manhattan stretched out like a chessboard.
Her phone was pressed to her ear. "Patterson, tell me he has signed the merger contract. The board meeting is in twelve hours."
Patterson’s voice came through the speaker, strained and nervous. "Mrs. Blackwell... Mr. Blackwell left the boardroom mid-meeting. He hasn't returned."
Victoria’s manicured fingers tightened around the wine glass. "Left? Where did he go?"
"A hospital in Brooklyn, ma'am. Apparently... there was an emergency involving two children."
A cold, deadly silence filled the penthouse suite. Victoria’s eyes narrowed into dangerous slits.
For five years, she and Harrison had maintained a strictly corporate arrangement—a marriage built on mutual ambition, shared stock portfolios, and zero emotional attachments. Victoria had made it crystal clear before they walked down the aisle: children were a liability, a distraction from corporate domination.
"Two children?" Victoria whispered, her voice dropping into a venomous hiss. "Find out who they belong to, Patterson. And find out why my husband is spending his evening playing nursemaid."
She hung up the phone without saying goodbye, walked over to her sleek mahogany desk, and opened a locked digital safe. Inside lay a thick dossier labeled Clare Morgan.
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Victoria had known about Clare all along. She had paid private investigators to track the woman for years, waiting for the exact right moment to destroy her if she ever dared to cross paths with the Blackwell name.
"You should have stayed in the Bronx, Clare," Victoria murmured to herself, a cold smile touching her lips. "Because nobody takes what belongs to Victoria Blackwell."
