Chapter 12 - The Weight of the Crown
The office fell back into a profound, suffocating silence.
Clara stood frozen near the armchair, her hands trembling slightly as she looked at me with a mixture of awe and deep-seated fear.
"You've really changed, Ethan," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the hum of the climate control system.
"If I hadn't changed, Clara, I wouldn't be standing here right now," I replied, walking slowly back to the window to look out over the city skyline.
"If I had stayed the soft, trusting kid I was seven years ago, Marcus would have framed me for federal crimes, and I'd probably be rotting in a prison cell right instead of running this company. The world doesn't reward kindness. It rewards power."
Clara walked over slowly, stopping just a few feet away from me.
"Is there any room left inside you for anything other than vengeance?" she asked softly, her hazel eyes searching my face for any trace of the man she had loved years ago.
I looked down at her, feeling a sharp pang of pain deep within my chest—a reminder that beneath the armor of Apex Capital, the boy who had loved her was still trapped.
"I don't know, Clara," I admitted honestly.
"For seven years, vengeance was the only oxygen I breathed. It was the fuel that kept me going when I was sleeping on park benches, when I was working twenty-hour shifts in cold warehouses, when I had nothing left. Now that the war is won... I'm trying to figure out what comes next."
She reached out, her fingers gently brushing against the sleeve of my jacket.
"Let me help you figure it out," she murmured.
Before I could answer, my private satellite phone on the desk buzzed aggressively, shattering the fragile moment between us.
I walked over and picked it up.
"Vance here."
May you like
"Mr. Bellamy," Victor's voice came through the speaker, crisp and urgent.
"You need to come down to the private drawing room in the east wing immediately. Your father has suffered a massive medical emergency."
