Chapter 7

"Damien thinks Hart Pack is afraid of him? What is he to us?"

My brother nodded, his eyes flat. "Dad's right. Kane Pack is what it is because we lifted them up. Kane would have collapsed three times over without us. He dares to hurt Sel, we collect every debt with interest."

It hadn't occurred to him that the man he called a brother was this kind of creature underneath.

I looked up at the only family I'd ever had, and my tears wouldn't stop.

They comforted me. They cursed Damien. Mom stroked my back. Dad sat on the couch, voice cold. "If Damien wants to play dirty, Hart has tools too."

"Right," my brother said. His face was frozen. "From today on, Damien doesn't have a peaceful day. What he owes us, the Harts will collect. Every ounce of it."

I finally couldn't hold it in anymore. I held the urn and cried until I had no voice left.

"Evie. Mommy didn't mean to. Mommy was just too soft, too afraid of dragging the family in, so I tried to carry everything alone."

"If I'd told my brother sooner, told Mom and Dad, you might still be alive."

"I'm useless. I couldn't protect you. I couldn't even keep you safe long enough to grow up."

Mom's hand was in my hair. Her tears kept falling. "Not your fault, Sel. You did everything you could. It's Damien. It's Fiona. They deserve to die. You're not useless. You were just too kind, so they took advantage."

I cried until my voice was gone, and then I went limp in her arms.

Meanwhile, Damien sat alone in his empty office, watching contract cancellations and withdrawal notices pile up. His hands slowly clenched.

My phone kept going straight to the shutdown message. He'd gone to the Hart estate and been turned away at the gate.

Fiona was still making a scene, telling him she was being sued, that the Counsel was threatening her, that I'd lost my mind.

He couldn't listen to her anymore.

He'd thought, given enough time, I'd fold the way I always had. That I'd come back, crying, forgiving him.

He'd never expected that this time I'd bring the whole Hart Pack with me.

And he was the first target.

Damien didn't even get a chance to think. Hart's moves dropped on him, one after another, with no cushion.

Ten in the morning, he was in a meeting, and the secretary came in, pale in a way he'd never seen before.

She leaned to his ear. Every word hit like thunder.

"Alpha Kane, three more of the partners we just signed — Blackstone Capital, Jenvale Technologies, and Standel Media — just sent notices. They're pulling their investments and terminating all cooperation."

His eyebrows knit. "What reason?"

"Internal restructuring. All three used the exact same wording."

Clean. No cracks. And exactly because of that, it was wrong.

Three partners breaking contracts at the same hour, citing the same reason, with identical phrasing. Unplanned was impossible.

He put his pen down. His face was cold. His eyes got darker.

He understood this was no accident. This was Hart Pack's hunt, carefully set.

And it was only the start.

Finance came in next. A major Hart-linked fund had announced a full pullout of all Kane investments and was calling for a liquidation review of the Kane-held portfolio. Within an hour, several huge blocks of capital were already fleeing. The damage went well beyond the Kane-owned core, and bled into two subsidiaries whose cash flow was starting to crack.

In the afternoon, the legal team reported in too. Long-term suppliers, media partners, and subcontractors were jumping ship in waves.

The reasons were still clean. "Strategic misalignment." "Contract review pending." Harmless on paper. But each one was slicing flesh off Kane Pack holdings.

He knew only Hart Pack could have pulled something this tight, this fast.

He'd spent years in business. He'd seen every kind of knife fight. He'd never seen anything this clean.

No warnings. No negotiations. Not even a threat.

Elder Gerald Hart had moved one finger and his Kane empire was already cornered.

First he pulled every Hart-linked investment out of every Kane-tied project, willing to eat massive breach fees and exit costs just to sever the financial ties.

Then he linked up with the old-guard Alphas who'd never liked Damien anyway, and together they cut off Kane Pack's financing and Council credit standing.

It was the first time in his life Damien truly tasted being unable to do anything.

He leaned back in his chair and pressed his thumb between his eyebrows. His knuckles were white.

The gentle, patient woman. I was never the soft, useless thing he kept calling me. I was the blade in the sheath. The moment I wanted to, I could finish him.

I wasn't holding back anymore.

Damien was eating himself alive. If he'd been a little smarter. If he'd stopped me before I walked out. He wouldn't be here.

At the same time, Fiona was sitting in a high-end hotel afternoon tea. She'd just ordered her dessert when she heard the women at the next table whispering.

"Did you hear? The Kane girl, the youngest. She's apparently caught up in a death case."

"I heard too. Her own sister-in-law filed against her. She did something to her own niece. The pup's gone."