Chapter 4

Things played out exactly as Arthur predicted.

The moment Julian left the mansion, paranoia took over.

He scrambled to contact his most trusted lieutenants, only to find every phone line dead. The few old associates he managed to reach stammered evasively, making up excuses that they were out of the country.

Worse, his core assets began falling like dominoes. His shares were frozen under sudden "regulatory fraud investigations," and his offshore bank accounts were locked down without warning.

Julian was losing his mind.

He knew with absolute certainty that this was my doing, but stripped of muscle and money, he didn't dare confront me openly.

I watched in amusement as he scurried around the city like a headless rat.

I had planned to toy with him a little longer.

Unexpectedly, Clara lost her patience first.

Six months pregnant, she emptied every last dime from Julian’s hidden emergency accounts and vanished into thin air.

Her sudden disappearance incinerated whatever sanity Julian had left. He instantly convinced himself that I had kidnapped her to force him back into my arms.

He didn't storm my gates, though. Instead, he called me.

His voice was hoarse, ragged, laced with desperate sorrow and faux-repentance:

"Scarlett, I was wrong."

"That bitch Clara took all my money and ran off with another man!"

"You're all I have left. Can we start over? Just like the day I first met you, in that old warehouse on the west docks. Let's talk. Please."

I smiled faintly, tapping my manicured nails against the mahogany desk.

"All right."

The old warehouse on the west docks.

The heavy iron door groaned shut behind me, sealing out the daylight and city noise. The moment I stepped into the center of the cavernous hall, a figure lunged out from behind a mountain of rusted shipping crates.

Julian stood there, a gun trembling in his hand, aimed squarely at my chest.

"Scarlett, give my life back!" he snarled like a wounded dog.

"The syndicates, the shares, the money... you took it all! Give it back, and I won't kill you!"

"Give it back?"

I repeated the words with cold amusement.

"Julian, before you met me, you were just a two-bit thug guarding underground poker tables. All of those things were gifts I tossed you when I was in a good mood so you could play kingpin in this city."

"Now that I'm bored of you, I took them back. You take what you're given, and you choke on it."

Hearing my dismissive disdain, Julian’s breath grew ragged and violent.

"I bled for every single inch of that empire!" he roared.

I tilted my head, smiling at him as if he were an idiot.

"You bled? If I hadn't stepped in five years ago, your rotting corpse would still be lying right where you're standing. Stop flattering yourself."

My mockery made the jagged scars across his face twist in hideous spasms.

He snapped, changing the subject:

"Fine! To hell with the money! Where is Clara? What did you do to her?! Tell me!"

"I don't know."

Julian looked like he was about to burst a blood vessel. His thumb cocked the hammer.

"Scarlett, for the sake of the years we spent together, I'm giving you one last chance. Don't think I won't pull this trigger!"

"Where the hell is Clara?!"

I frowned, genuinely annoyed by his screeching.

"I said: I. Don't. Know."

My refusal snapped his final thread of control. With a primal roar, he raised the barrel straight between my eyes and squeezed the trigger.

Yet—

In the split second before the hammer fell, his wrist jerked slightly to the side.

He couldn't do it. He went soft.

*Pop.*

A weak, pathetic blank discharged, a soft wad of cotton bouncing harmlessly off my shoulder before tumbling to the concrete floor.

Silence froze the room.

Julian froze in disbelief, his wrath collapsing into blank shock. He stared dumbly at the ridiculous cotton pellet on the ground.

While he was frozen, I watched a slender figure slip out from the shadows behind him, raising a heavy steel revolver.

I smirked, speaking in an exaggerated, theatrical drawl:

"Oh, wait. Now I know."

"Turn around, Julian. The person you're looking for—"

"Is standing right behind you."