Chapter 103 CHAPTER 103
Lady Bianca
The morning sky over Manhattan stretched pale and endless, the color of watered down steel. The city below pulsed faintly, cars slipping through intersections, horns echoing in the distance, life moving on with its usual indifference. From the penthouse suite of the Langford Estate, the chaos looked almost serene, a symphony of control from ten stories above.
Lady Bianca stood by the window, her reflection ghosting across the glass. She wore a robe of deep crimson silk, tied loosely at the waist, her hair pinned in a sleek twist that gleamed beneath the muted light. She was beautiful in that precise, deliberate way that left no trace of softness, every line of her face a statement, every gesture designed to command attention.
Behind her, the sound of a door opening broke the quiet. A man stepped in, her private investigator, Colt Ramirez, dressed in dark gray, carrying a file pressed to his chest. His shoes made no sound on the Persian carpet.
“Talk,” Bianca said without turning around. Her voice was low, even, carrying the kind of authority that came from habit rather than effort.
Colt cleared his throat softly. “We found her, ma’am.”
Bianca’s reflection tilted its head, but she still didn’t move. “Chloe?”
“Yes, ma’am. She’s in Tokyo.” He walked closer, laying the file gently on the table beside her untouched breakfast tray. “She’s living with Ares now. Has been for a few weeks. Word from our overseas contact says she’s pregnant, about four weeks along.”
The sound of that word, pregnant hung in the air like a shard of glass.
Bianca turned slowly, the hem of her robe whispering against the floor. Her eyes, a piercing silver gray, found Colt’s face. “Pregnant,” she repeated quietly, tasting the word as if it were something bitter.
“Yes, ma’am. And…” Colt hesitated, flipping open the file. Photographs slid out, glossy prints showing Chloe entering the mansion gates, her hair hidden beneath a hoodie, and later, laughing beside Ares in the garden. Another photo captured her standing near a fountain, one hand resting lightly on her stomach.
Colt exhaled. “She didn’t honor her part of the deal.”
Bianca’s lips curved, not in surprise but in amusement — a slow, deliberate smile that never reached her eyes. “Of course she didn’t,” she murmured, walking to the table. Her fingers brushed over the photographs, pausing on the one where Chloe looked up at Ares, her face half-lit by sunlight. “She never could resist comfort when it was offered. That’s always been her flaw.”
She straightened, her voice soft but precise. “Tell me, Colt , did she forget what we agreed upon?”
Colt swallowed. “No, ma’am. I think she chose to ignore it.”
Bianca turned her gaze back to the skyline. The glass reflected her face, calm, unreadable, beautiful in that unsettling way that made people forget she was dangerous. Her hand rose, fingers tracing her reflection faintly.
“She forgets herself too often,” Bianca said, her tone almost wistful. “She forgets that she was bought out of ruin, that her freedom was not hers to begin with.”
She looked over her shoulder at Colt, her eyes suddenly hard. “And she forgets who I am.”
Colt said nothing. He’d worked for Bianca long enough to know when to stay silent. He’d seen that expression before, the one that meant someone, somewhere, had just run out of chances.
Bianca walked toward the bar at the far end of the suite. She poured herself a glass of red wine, though it was barely past noon, and lifted it in her hand, letting the liquid catch the light like a dark ruby. “My own son, Ares Langford,” she said, almost to herself. “Always the man women destroy themselves over. Tessa did, now Chloe. And somehow, none of them ever learn.”
She sipped slowly, then set the glass down with quiet precision.
Colt shifted. “What do you want me to do, ma’am?”
Bianca smiled faintly, the kind of smile that belonged to someone who had already decided. She took one of the photographs from the table, the one of Chloe at the garden and held it between two fingers. “She broke her promise,” she said, her tone low, silken, unshaken. “She was supposed to stay away from Ares. That was our deal. In exchange for her freedom, silence, for her safety, for a life rebuilt.”
The photograph trembled slightly in the air before Bianca dropped it into the ashtray beside the wine glass. She struck a match and lit it.
The flame caught the glossy paper, curling the edges, devouring the image until only black ash remained.
Colt watched quietly.
Bianca’s voice was a whisper, but each word landed sharp and deliberate. “If she had kept her word, she would have lived quietly. But she’s gone back to him. Pregnant, no less. That means…”
She lifted her gaze, meeting Colt’s eyes directly. “She and her unborn dirty blood have to die.”
The words came without heat, without anger only that cold, absolute certainty that made Bianca who she was.
Colt’s throat tightened. “Understood, ma’am.”
“Good.” Bianca picked up her wine again, walking back toward the window. The flame in the ashtray burned low, the last edges of Chloe’s smile collapsing into smoke. “I will give you instructions when the time is right.”
Colt nodded, retreating toward the door. “I’ll make arrangements immediately.”
“See that you do.”
When he was gone, Bianca stood alone again, the city stretching endlessly beneath her. The faint hum of traffic rose from the streets, mingling with the sound of her quiet breathing.
She tilted her head slightly, the morning light gilding the edges of her robe. “You should have stayed away, Chloe,” she murmured to the glass, her reflection staring back like a ghost. “You had your chance. And now you’ve chosen death.”
The silence that followed was almost peaceful.
Outside, the clouds began to shift, slow, heavy, gray, moving across the skyline like a prelude to a storm.
And in that penthouse, Lady Bianca smiled again, a small, knowing smile that could freeze even the devil’s pulse.
Because once Bianca decided something…
there was never a way back.