Chapter 7 - Midnight Ambush
At 2:00 AM, Grant broke into my private townhouse on the Upper East Side.
Driven mad by the freezing of his accounts and the arrest warrants being drafted by the Manhattan D.A., he used his old emergency key to slide through the rear entrance. He moved silently through the dark kitchen, a heavy steel crowbar clutched in his hand.
He thought I was alone with the baby. He thought he could steal the silver flash drive, destroy the physical DNA files, and force me to sign a recantation at gunpoint.
He crept up the curved staircase, his breathing ragged, and pushed open the nursery door.
The room was lit only by the faint glow of a nightlight. I sat in the rocking chair, cradling Noah in my arms, completely unbothered by his sudden entrance.
“Giving up so soon, Grant?” I asked softly without looking up.
Grant sneered, stepping into the light, his eyes wild and bloodshot. “Hand over the drives, Claire. Hand over the trust documents! You think you’re smart? You’re nothing! I built Ashford Capital!”
“You built nothing,” a deep, echoing voice declared from the shadows behind the curtain.
Grant froze. His jaw dropped, and the steel crowbar slipped from his fingers, crashing heavily against the floorboards.
May you like
A tall man stepped out of the darkness. He wore a tailored charcoal suit. Across the left side of his jaw ran a jagged, faded scar from the yacht fire—but his face was otherwise identical to Grant’s.
It was Julian.
