Chapter 16 - CHLOE'S FINAL DESPERATE GAMBIT
As Interpol agents swarmed the rooftop, slapping heavy titanium handcuffs onto Victor Thorne's wrists, Chloe Miller crawled out of the pool, wet, shivering, and entirely hysterical.
She saw the writing on the wall. She knew that once Thorne was in custody, she had no money, no passport, and no powerful protectors left anywhere on the planet.
In a fit of blind, unhinged rage, Chloe grabbed a broken champagne bottle from a nearby catering tray and charged directly at me.
"YOU DESTROYED MY LIFE, CLARISSA!" she shrieked, aiming the jagged glass toward my face.
Before she could get within three feet of me, my mother’s former head of security—a towering ex-French Special Forces operative named Jean—stepped forward. With a swift, practiced movement, he disarmed Chloe, twisted her arm behind her back, and forced her face-down onto the cold marble floor.
The jagged glass shattered harmlessly against the stone.
I walked over, standing right over her, looking down at her disheveled, wet form.
"I didn't destroy your life, Chloe," I said, my voice echoing across the silent terrace. "You destroyed your own life the moment you believed that taking another woman's husband was a sign of achievement. You thought my modesty was weakness. You thought my silence was stupidity."
"Please..." Chloe sobbed, her makeup running down her face in dark, ugly streaks. "Clarissa... please... don't send me to prison! I was just following Julian's lead! I didn't know he was working for Thorne!"
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"Ignorance is not a legal defense," Richard Sterling said, stepping up with two Monaco police officers. "Miss Miller, you are under arrest for conspiracy to commit corporate espionage, wire fraud, and attempted assault."
As they hauled Chloe away, weeping and begging for mercy in front of the world’s most powerful people, I wiped a single speck of dust off my sleeve and turned back to the view of the Mediterranean.
