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Chapter 743:

It wasn’t funny. None of this was funny.

But she couldn’t stop.

She laughed until her sides ached. She laughed until tears streamed down her face.

Then, slowly, the laughter died.

And all that was left was hate. Cold, black, burning hate.

It wasn’t Richard’s fault. It couldn’t be. He was just drunk. He didn’t know what he was doing.

It was Joan’s fault.

Everything was Joan’s fault.

If Joan had never existed, none of this would have happened.

Alisha rose. She walked to the window and stared out at the dark garden. Her reflection stared back—a pale, broken thing with a swollen face and wild eyes.

She clenched her fists at her sides until her nails drew blood.

𝖱𝗲𝘢d 𝘄і𝘁𝘩𝘰u𝘁 𝗂𝗻𝘁𝗲r𝘳u𝗉𝘁𝗶𝘰𝗇ѕ 𝗼𝗻

“I’m going to make you pay, Joan,” she whispered to the darkness. “I’m going to make you pay for everything. And this time, I’m not going to stop until you’re dead p>

The next morning, sunlight filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows of Joan’s office at Apex Bio. Joan sat at her desk, her eyes red and tired. She had been up all night, listening to the recording over and over again, transcribing every word.

She had isolated the part about the Brooklyn garage, running it through audio enhancement software until the words were unmistakable.

…sent the money to that shitty garage in Brooklyn. No paper trail. Nothing.

The mechanic. Mike. The man who had tampered with her mother’s brakes.

Joan had been looking for him for seven years. He had vanished the day after the crash, leaving no trace—no name, no address, no proof that he had ever existed. No one knew where he was. No one knew if he was even alive.

Her encrypted phone buzzed on the desk.

Joan’s head snapped up. She grabbed it.

A text from Arthur. Her hound. The man who had worked for her mother and now worked for her. The best private investigator in New York.

The message contained one line and a GPS coordinate.

Found Mike. Abandoned warehouse, Brooklyn Navy Yard. Come now.

Joan’s heart stopped.

Then it started beating again—hard and fast, hard enough that she thought it might burst from her chest.

Seven years.

Seven years of nightmares. Seven years of wondering. Seven years of hating.

And now, finally, he was here.

She shot to her feet, knocking her chair over backwards. Her ankle twisted, and a sharp pain shot up her leg. She didn’t feel it. She grabbed her trench coat from the back of the chair and ran for the door.

She ran straight into Kevin, the head of R&D, who was carrying a stack of lab reports.

“Dr. Erickson! There you are!” he said, catching himself before he dropped the papers. “I need you to sign off on these clinical trial reports. The board meeting is at two, and p>

“Cancel it,” Joan said, not slowing down. “Cancel all my meetings for the rest of the day. Tell the board I’m dealing with a critical emergency p>

“But Dr. Erickson p>