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The silence in the room was heavier than the snow piling against the windowpane. Declan sat motionless in the chair, his green eyes fixated on me as if I were a stranger who had spoken in a language he couldn't comprehend. Outside, the Seattle storm howled, but inside, the only sound was the soft, rhythmic breathing of our six-day-old son against my chest. / Chapter 17 / 20

Chapter 17 - Burning the Empire

Dust and stone debris rained down across the priceless library. Through the smoke stepped fifty heavily armed officers wearing the tactical gear of the Swiss Federal Intelligence Service and Interpol!

At the head of the tactical team was Marcus—his face bruised, but his eyes burning with absolute triumph.

"Nobody move!" the Interpol commander shouted, red laser sights pinning every member of the Council and Eleanor’s guards to their seats. "Eleanor Rowan, you are under arrest for international terrorism, bioweapons smuggling, and child abduction!"

Eleanor gasped, stumbling back against the mahogany table. "This is impossible! I own the Swiss ministry!"

"You owned them yesterday, mother," Declan said, stepping back from the table with a cold, terrifying smile spreading across his face.

I stared in shock as Declan pulled a small digital device from his pocket. "What... what is happening?" I asked.

"Marcus never betrayed us, Clara," Declan revealed, his voice echoing through the silent, smoke-filled hall. "The phone call in the hallway was a pre-arranged code. We knew Eleanor had poisoned the water supply. We knew she wanted us on this plane. The only way to get the antidote was to let her think she had won!"

Declan pressed a red button on his digital device.

On the massive monitors hanging in the library, financial graphs began to plummet at vertical speeds. Red emergency banners flashed across global financial news networks: ROWAN HOLDINGS SHARES LIQUIDATED IN MASS PANIC.

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"Lock every gate, seal every exit, and cut the main grid to manual," I barked, my voice cutting through the heavy air of the ballroom like a razor.

"Lock every gate, seal every exit, and cut the main grid to manual," I b...

The silence in the ICU room was heavier than the lead aprons I wore in radiology. Dante’s words hung in the sterile air like poison: I had people watching you.

The silence in the ICU room was heavier than the lead aprons I wore in r...

THE MAFIA BOSS THOUGHT HE BROKE MY HEART—UNTIL HE DISCOVERED THE TWIN HEIRS I HID IN THE SHADOWS

THE MAFIA BOSS THOUGHT HE BROKE MY HEART—UNTIL HE DISCOVERED THE TWIN HE...

"What have you done?!" Eleanor shrieked, clutching her chest as she watched her multi-billion-dollar empire evaporate on screen.

"I spent the ten-hour flight executing an automated scorched-earth sell-off," Declan said softly, leaning down until his face was inches from his mother’s. "I transferred fifty billion dollars of liquid assets into an anonymous, untouchable sovereign trust in James's name. Then I crashed Rowan Holdings stock to zero. Your Matriarch Trust is worthless, Eleanor. The empire you sacrificed your soul for... no longer exists."

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