Chapter 43
The door slammed behind me with a finality that shook the floor beneath my feet. The heavy clang of the lock echoed through the stone
walls like a death sentence.
of what looked
I was in the basement. No windows. One flickering lightbulb. A rusted metal cot in the corner. A chipped ceramic bowl of like gray mush and a plastic cup of water sat on the floor like some sick offering
I didn’t cry
But my hands trembled as I sat down, the cold concrete seeping into my skin like poison
Then came his voice
Low toy Dripping with power.
“You fucking exist because I allow it. Don’t forget that“)
He leaned close, lips brushing my earl
And then he walked away
I sat there, frozen. Not just from the cold, but from the realization.
He wasn’t bluffing. Titanis wasn’t just a company–it was the vault of confidential defense data, global blueprints for weapons and technologies countries would go to war overli
He wanted inside. Through me
And he was willing to destroy my father–hell, the world–just to own (1)
The next days blurred
Gray food, Half cups of water. Silence.
I spoke to the guards once. Asked for help. The way they stared straight ahead, unmoving, uncaring–I might as well have been speaking.
to statues.
Reagan didn’t need whips or fists. He knew how to destroy someone by emsing them.X
And just when I thought it couldn’t get worse–Dulcie appeared
Her heels clicked smugly against the concrete. She stood on the other side of the bars, perfectly dressed… in my clothes. My silk robe My diamond necklace. My ruby ring on her thumb which was my mother’s gift.
“You always dressed too modest, darling,” she purred, her lips curved in a venomous smile. “But don’t worry. Your wardrobe finally found someone worthy”
I clenched my fists until my nails bit skin.
“And that big bed upstairs?” she added with a giggle, “Let’s just say, it’s not so cold anymore.“X
She laughed. Laughed until it echoed off the walls..
Her heels stopped inches from the cell bars, and her smile widened–sweet as cyanide.X
“You know.” Dulcie said, twirling the gold locket around her neck–my mother’s locket. “I used to wonder what it felt like to be you. The Titanis Princess. The golden girl, Daddy’s genius, Now? She leaned in, voice dropping to a mock whisper. “Now I just feel sorry for you.”
I didn’t inove. Didn’t blink. But my throat burned.
She held up a photo. Faded. Tom at the edges. My mother and 1, arms wrapped around each other. One of the few pictures I kept hidden in my bedside drawer
She smiled, then slowly tore it in half. Right between our faces.
“She hated you, you know? she hissed, letting the pieces flutter like ash. “Always talked about how you reminded her of the mistakes she couldn’t undo. But she loved me. Said Thad potential.”
Lie. I knew it was a lie. I knew my mother too well before she died X
Her voice turned sacchurine again. “Poor little Danica. You always had the grades, the looks, the press, the perfect life. But guess what?” She topped her flat stomach. “I can give Reagan what you can’t.“)
My jaw clenched
“A child,” she said sweetly. “A real heir. One he wants. Not like your brokon body. I mean…. after all those miscarriages, those chemical pregnancies–what’s even left in there?” She laughed, cruel and loud. “Your uterus is basically a haunted house, isn’t it?
Ilurched forward, but the bars stopped mox
She smirked “Touched a nerve? I’m sorry I forgot you’re a little sensitive about being barren. But see, I’m everything you couldn’t be. He doesn’t even flinch when he touches me” Her lingers brushed her collarbone. “He groans. You? You were just a placeholder. The tech girl he had to tolerate until he found someone who could give him more than brainy tantrums and spreadsheets“)
She crouched, voice dripping with venom
“You know what the real joke is?” she whispered. “I used to envy you. I hated how everyone compared us, even when my family had more money. More everything But still–Why can’t you be more like Danico? Why can’t you be smarter, Dulcie?” Her lip curled “All I ever heard. And now? Look at you None Filthy Forgotten “2
She stood, brushing invisible dust from my mobe E
Thanks for the wardrobe, by the way. And the man. And the legacy. You can rot down here while I raise the next heir of Titanis in your
No
va kiss, then turned her laughter slicing through the silence like glass
echo finally faded, I stared at the shredded photo on the floor. My mother’s smile. My younger self
fingers curled over my belly again.I
She could wear my name. My robe. My mother’s necklace
But she would never wear my legacy
He could chain me down here, but he would never own what was growing inside me
I stared at my reflection in the dusty metal door.
Where was she
Where was Danica McKellar–heir to Titanis Global, the girl with the million–dollar mind and an empire in her blood?
I touched my belly. The only part of me still wam.
Three heartbeats. Not just mine. Three tiny reasons to He could take everything. But he would not take them,
a survive.
I wasted.
Days passed. I pretended to weaken. I let my body sag, eyes dull, steps wobble
And when the guard came–tall, impatient, annoyed–1 collapsed into him like a dying animal.
“W–water” I whispered, barely audible
He caught me.
Wrong move.
My fingers found the gun at his waist before he even realized I was conscious.
The cold metal felt like freedom.
Crack
I slammed the butt of the pistol into his temple. He dropped. Hard. His keycard was in my hands before his body hit the ground.
Not fast. My body was weak, but rage made me sharp. Silent. I knew this house. Every inch. Every creak. I slipped into Reagan’s office. The bastard hadn’t changed a thing.
His desk sat like a throne, untouched by morality or conscience.
I opened the drawer fingers trembling–and I planted two things inside
My wedding ring, Scratched. Bent. Still wann from my skin.}
The sonogram Black and white and unforgiving.
Three little shapes. Three reasons he’d never sleep again. S
But it wasn’t just a goodbye. It was a waming. A prophecy. Because I knew the truth. But I’d flipped the game. I left that sonogram not to break him.
Not yet I left it to haunt him.X
To remind him that his future–the one he tried to steal–was still inside me. Untouchable.S
Because I wasn’t running to escape I was running to be reborn. And when I returned, I wouldn’t be his wife. I’d be the huntress.
“You built an empire with my blood. I’ll make you drown in it“!
Not as a prisoner anymore.
Now, I was the reckoning
And the mother of the empire he’d never control.
