Chapter 4 - Kneeling in the Storm
Ethan lunged forward to grab my wrist, but Richard stepped directly between us, raising his heavy silver-tipped cane to slam it against his son's chest, holding him back.
"Touch her, and I will convene an emergency board meeting to strip you of your executive powers by midnight," Richard warned, his voice low and uncompromising.
I didn't turn around to watch the fallout. Holding Noah close to my side, I walked out of the double glass doors into the cool Chicago night, taking deep breaths of the damp autumn air to keep my knees from shaking.
Inside the restaurant, the storm broke wide open. Ethan turned on Victoria, his posture terrifying, his gray eyes dark with a violent fury her family had never witnessed.
"Did you know?" Ethan growled, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "Did your father pay off my staff to burn her letters while I was strapped to a hospital bed breathing through a tube?"
"Ethan, darling, listen to reason!" Victoria sobbed, abandoning all decorum as tears ruined her makeup. "Your father was dying of heart disease, your company was facing a liquidity crisis, and the Sterling merger was the only thing that saved Blackwood Enterprises! I did what had to be done for our future!"
"You stole my life!" Ethan roared, slamming his fist down onto the mahogany table so hard that crystal champagne flutes shattered onto the marble floor.
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Within two hours, Ethan called an emergency midnight assembly of the board of directors. By 1:00 AM, Blackwood Enterprises publicly announced the immediate termination of all joint commercial ventures with Sterling Holdings. By 3:00 AM, formal legal notices were served to Victoria's father for corporate espionage, wire fraud, and evidence tampering.
Ethan didn't return to his penthouse. He sat alone in his high-floor office overlooking the foggy skyline, staring at the eleven letters Richard had left behind. He read every word, weeping quietly in the dark as he realized the woman he had spent seven years hating had been cradling his newborn child in a damp studio apartment while he lived in a golden cage built on lies.
