Chapter 860
Alistair was waiting by the car. He looked tired, his shirt unbuttoned at the collar, a bruise darkening along his jaw from the lingering chaos of the cyber-attack defense.
He didn’t say a word. He simply pulled her into him, burying his face in her neck.
“You’re safe,” he murmured against her skin.
“For now,” Skye said, melting into him for exactly three seconds before pulling back. She needed to be sharp. “Did you contain the malware?”
“Felix’s team patched the breach while you were in the air,” Alistair said, opening the car door. “But Beatrice is the new threat. She’s waiting in the drawing room at Kensington Manor. She looks like a cornered rat. It’s my favorite look on her.”
The drive to the manor was silent. Skye watched the city pass by, feeling the weight of it — a battlefield disguised as a metropolis. Kensington Manor rose from the mist like a monolith of old money and older sins. The gates opened with a reluctant groan.
Inside, the air was stale. The servants were gone — fired or fled; Skye didn’t know which.
Beatrice Kensington sat in the high-backed velvet chair in the main drawing room. She wore her pearls, but the hands gripping the head of her cane were skeletal, and her eyes — usually sharp with malice — were rimmed with red.
𝖠𝖽𝖽𝗂𝖼𝗍𝗂𝗏𝖾 𝗌𝗍𝗈𝗋𝗂𝖾𝗌 𝗈𝗇 𝗀𝖺𝗅𝗇𝗈𝗏𝖾𝗅𝗌.𝖼𝗈𝗆
“You came,” Beatrice said. Her voice cracked on the words.
Skye didn’t sit. She stood in the center of the room, Alistair a silent shadow at her back. “You have five minutes, Beatrice. Before I let the SEC tear this place apart.”
“I need capital,” Beatrice said, dispensing with pleasantries. “The Trust is hemorrhaging. Celeste — that witch — she leveraged our private holdings before she died.”
“And you want a bailout,” Skye said flatly. “From me. The woman you called a gold-digger. A whore.”
Beatrice flinched but lifted her chin. “I am offering you a chance to restore order. If Oracle injects liquidity into the Trust, the stock stabilizes. In return —” She paused, swallowing her pride like broken glass. “In return, I will cease all hostilities. I will acknowledge your position.”
Skye stared at her. Then she laughed — a dry, humorless sound.
“You think I want your acknowledgment?” Skye asked, stepping closer. “You think I want this mausoleum?”
“It is a legacy!” Beatrice snapped, slamming her cane on the floor. “It is power!”
“It’s a cage,” Skye corrected. “And I broke out of it a long time ago.”
“Then what do you want?” Beatrice hissed. “Why are you here?”
“I want the private flight authorization logs from last Tuesday,” Skye said. “The ones you signed off on for the ‘cargo’ transport. And I want something else.”
“Name it.”
“The Kensington Rubies,” Skye said.
Beatrice went white. “The Heirloom Parure? That is the heart of this family. It has been worn by every bride since 1890!”
“I remember,” Skye said softly, her gaze drifting to the safe hidden behind the portrait. “I remember asking to wear them for my wedding to Liam. You told me they were for true Kensingtons only. You said my neck wasn’t worthy of the weight.”