Chapter 96
Chapter 96:
“He tried to kill me,” Skye repeated. “I can send this to the District Attorney right now. Victor goes to prison for twenty years p>
“Please,” Arthur begged, tears welling in his eyes. “He’s my only son. Skye, please p>
“I won’t call the police,” Skye said softly. “On one condition p>
“Anything p>
“The board meeting tomorrow,” Skye said. “You will vote for me as the new CEO of Sterling Media. You will oust the current leadership. You will give me full control p>
Arthur looked at her. He saw the steel in her spine. He realized, perhaps for the first time, that the niece he had underestimated was the most dangerous person in the room.
“Okay,” Arthur whispered. “Okay p>
Skye nodded. She walked out into the rain that had started to fall.
Back at the Annex, Liam stared at the divorce papers. The silence of the cramped space was suffocating. It was not home. It was a cage.
His phone buzzed. It was Seraphina.
Liam? Are you okay? I’m downstairs. Security won’t let me up.
Liam looked at the phone. He looked at the papers. He felt a sudden, violent urge to scream.
He didn’t let her up. He didn’t answer.
He just sat there in the dark, knowing that somewhere out there, Skye was plotting his end.
The morning sky was the color of a bruise, purple and gray, threatening a storm that wouldn’t break. Skye sat in the driver’s seat of the black sedan, her hands gripping the wheel at ten and two.
She was driving to Sterling Media headquarters. Today, she would take her throne.
But she was not alone on the road.
Victor Sterling had woken up in a friend’s basement, hungover and terrified. He checked the news. No crash. No death. Skye was alive.
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Panic, cold and sharp, pierced his alcohol-addled brain. She knew. She had to know. If she was alive, she was coming for him. He had to finish it. It was the logic of a cornered rat.
He stole his friend’s truck, a lifted, modified pickup with a steel bull bar on the front. He knew Skye’s route. He knew the coastal highway was the only way to Sterling HQ from the old estate.
Skye saw the truck in her rearview mirror. It was huge, looming like a beast. She didn’t recognize it, but she recognized the aggression. It was closing in fast, ignoring the lanes.
She pressed the accelerator. The sedan responded, but the truck was modified for power.
Then she saw another car. A modest, dark gray midsize sedan, a rental Liam had been forced to drive since selling the Ferrari.
Liam.
He had followed her from the city. He hadn’t slept. He had driven behind her, keeping a distance, telling himself he just wanted to make sure she was safe. He told himself he was protecting his investment.