Chapter 10 - The Unwritten LedgerFive years later, the Seattle skyline had changed, but the corner of 4th and Pine remained a landmark of warmth in a city built on rain.
The Hail & Hearth Toy Gallery was no longer just a boutique for wealthy parents to buy nostalgia; it was a sanctuary. Half of the second floor had been converted into a tuition-free after-school creative lab for children from foster care and unstable backgrounds, funded entirely by an anonymous foundation bearing the initials R.N.G.
On a crisp November afternoon, eleven-year-old Ren and Nova stood on the mezzanine balcony, looking down through the glass at the busy showroom floor. They were tall now, wearing matching green and yellow scarves, arguing good-naturedly over whether the new remote-control dragons needed rocket boosters or velvet capes.
Up in the office, Gideon sat at his massive oak desk, going over quarterly financials. His laptop screen displayed profit margins, inventory turnover rates, and charitable contribution allocations.
The door pushed open without a knock—a privilege reserved for two very specific people.
Ren walked in, carrying two cups of hot cocoa with extra peppermint foam, setting one squarely on top of Gideon’s corporate spreadsheets. Nova followed right behind her, dropping a messy, hand-drawn sketch of a rocket-propelled dragon directly onto his keyboard.
Gideon stopped typing. He looked up at them—two brilliant, fierce, unbreakable girls who had walked out of the Seattle rain and rewritten every single rule he had ever lived by.
He closed his laptop, picked up his pen, and tossed it into the drawer.
"All right," Gideon said, leaning back in his leather chair with a smile that reached his eyes. "Let’s review the blueprints for these rocket boosters. Because if we're going to build them, we're building them right."
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The girls grinned, pulling up two chairs beside his desk, right where they belonged.
THE BILLIONAIRE'S RECKONING: CONTINUEDChapters 11 through 20 for Oanh Muun
