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The heavy mahogany door of the dressing room seemed to close in on us, trapping the suffocating tension inside. Richard’s hands were shaking as he clutched the small, tarnished silver pendant. His knuckles were bone-white. / Chapter 25 / 30

Chapter 25 - The Counter-StrikeMarcus laughed, a chilling sound that echoed off the corrugated metal walls of the warehouse. "You thought you won the kingdom, Grace. But you were just consolidating the throne for me."

I didn't panic. I didn't scream or flinch. Instead, I pulled out my encrypted secure tablet, unlocked the screen with a biometric scan, and tapped a single icon labeled: Project Override.

Marcus’s laughter abruptly died in his throat.

The flashing red warning banner on his main screen suddenly turned blinding green. A rapid sequence of complex decryption algorithms began scrolling across his monitors at lightning speed.

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The heavy silver fork slipped from my fingers, clattering sharply against the gold-rimmed porcelain of my dinner plate.

The heavy silver fork slipped from my fingers, clattering sharply agains...

The heavy mahogany door of the Fairmont Copley suite clicked shut with a muffled, expensive thud.

The heavy mahogany door of the Fairmont Copley suite clicked shut with a...

Vanessa’s eyes were dry, clear, and sharp. She looked around the library as if measuring the dimensions for a redesign.

Vanessa’s eyes were dry, clear, and sharp. She looked around the library...

"What... what is this?" Marcus stammered, frantically typing on his keyboard. "You're overriding my firewall? That's impossible! This system is military-grade encryption!"

"You forgot one critical detail about my time before I inherited this estate, Marcus," I said, stepping closer to him, my voice cutting through the hum of the servers. "When you grow up bouncing between foster homes with no money, you learn how to fix things that are broken—including compromised digital architecture. Three months ago, I hired the best cybersecurity firm in the world to map every legacy terminal your father ever built."

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