Chapter 189 CHAPTER 189
The Weight of a Father’s Last Strike
Julian reached the mansion in a rush that bordered on frenzy. His car barely stopped before he yanked the door open and stepped out, the slam echoing across the quiet evening.
The guard barely had time to open the door before Julian pushed past him and stepped into the grand foyer. A quiet unease hung in the air, the kind that lived in homes that had been struck by news no one knew how to carry. He followed the faint sound of clinking glass, and when he entered the living room his chest tightened.
Ares sat alone on the massive leather sofa, elbows on his knees, an untouched bottle of whiskey on the table and a half-filled glass dangling from his hand. He looked like a storm held together by sheer will, eyes tired, shirt rumpled, shoulders set in a rigid line as if they were holding up the weight of the entire building.
Julian’s voice broke out before he could stop it. “Ares.”
Ares didn’t turn. He simply lifted the glass halfway and finished it in one slow swallow.
Julian stepped closer, his heart pounding. “Ares, we need to talk.”
Ares set the glass down, but the movement was too gentle, too controlled for a man who had just learned that everything he thought he knew about his father had been overturned. He leaned back, stared ahead at nothing, and waited, silent, heavy, unreachable.
Julian sat opposite him but didn’t relax into the chair. His body remained coiled, tense. “Marcus leaving everything to the quadruplets… Ares, what the hell is going on?” His voice cracked with incredulous anger. “Why would he do something like that?”
Ares’ jaw twitched, but he remained quiet.
Julian exhaled sharply, trying to keep himself steady. “No, listen to me. We need to fight this. All of it. Something isn’t right.”
Ares finally blinked, slow and weary. “There’s nothing to fight.”
The simplicity of the statement enraged Julian. “Nothing to fight?!” His voice rose, echoing off the tall ceilings. “Ares, your father left everything, your birthright, your inheritance, your empire to your children. Children from a woman who has been in the middle of every crisis in your life. How do you not see how insane that is?”
Ares didn’t look at him. He poured another inch of whiskey into the glass, watching the amber swirl like it held answers. “Julian, don’t start.”
“Oh, I will.” Julian leaned forward. “If you won’t think straight, I will do it for you. Maybe this was Tessa’s plan from the beginning. Think about it, Marcus suddenly changing his will? Everything conveniently going to her children? And he dies right after? What if…”
Ares’ head snapped up, and for the first time since Julian arrived, something alive sparked in his eyes. “Don’t,” he said sharply. “Don’t say she killed him.”
Julian scoffed. “Why not? It’s a reasonable suspicion. She was there. She had the most to gain…”
“No.” Ares’ voice was cold and absolute. “I know she didn’t do it.”
Julian blinked, thrown off balance. “You know? How…why would you say that now?”
Ares leaned back, a tired exhale slipping from him. “Because my father hated me,” he said quietly. “He hated me enough to do something like this. This isn’t Tessa’s plan. This is his.”
Julian stared, stunned. The bitterness in Ares’ voice wasn’t normal bitterness. It was deep, jagged, bone level truth. “Ares…”
Ares stood abruptly, paced two steps, then ran a hand down his face. “You don’t understand. My father spent his whole life reminding me of what I wasn’t. Of who he thought I should have been. Of every way I failed him. He never forgave me for things that weren’t even my fault. And when he finally had the last word, the last strike, he used his will to make sure I felt it. Even in death.”
Julian swallowed hard. “Ares, that’s not…”
“It is,” Ares snapped, the anger finally surfacing, raw and sharp. “He knew leaving everything to those kids would get to me. He knew it would drag me back to a past I left buried. He knew it would put me in direct conflict with Tessa again. And he wanted that. He wanted me angry. He wanted me cornered. He wanted his ghost to keep punching me in the face long after he was gone.”
Julian looked at him for a long moment, understanding slowly dawning. Ares wasn’t angry at the inheritance. He was angry at the message behind it. At the manipulation. At the lingering violence in Marcus’ final decision.
Julian walked closer. “But Ares… the optics. The law. The implications. Even if he hated you, even if this was one last play, we can still challenge it. You can still fight for what’s yours.”
Ares looked at him like the idea was dust. “I don’t care about what’s mine.”
“Then care about the fact that Tessa benefits from this,” Julian pushed. “Care about the fact that she…”
Ares cut him off again, slower this time, but with more weight. “Julian, she didn’t kill him.”
“Fine,” Julian fired back, “but she gains from it. Ares, be serious, this is a setup. Maybe she didn’t kill him, but she sure as hell won.”
Ares turned away, shoulders rising and falling with a slow breath. “Julian… I don’t think she won anything.”
Julian frowned. “What the hell does that mean?”
“It means,” Ares said, turning again, voice lower, “that the person who dies doesn’t always lose. Sometimes the ones left alive lose more. Marcus is gone, and he still found a way to control everything from the grave. Tessa didn’t win anything. She just inherited.”
Julian stared at him, speechless for a moment. It was rare to see Ares speak like that, quiet, flat, resigned. It unnerved him more than any shouting would have.
Ares sank back into the sofa, exhaustion shrouding him like another layer of clothing. “The will is real. The lawyers are real. The signature was verified. The dates match. There’s no fraud here, Julian. He meant it. He wanted it this way.”
Julian shook his head, clenching his fists. “I still think something is wrong. I think we should investigate. I think we should contest it. I think we should…”
“No.” Ares’ voice softened, but the finality in it was unmovable. “We won’t.”
Julian felt the fight drain from him in a slow burn of disbelief. “So you’re just going to accept this?”
Ares didn’t answer for a long time. Then he whispered, “I’m accepting nothing. I’m just tired of fighting him. Even in death.”
Julian looked down, heart twisting for his friend. “Ares…”
Ares didn’t look up. “Let it go, Julian. There’s nothing left to fix.”
Silence settled between them, heavy and unbroken.
Julian sat back slowly, watching the man he had always seen as unshakeable look more human than he ever had. More wounded. More lost. And for the first time, Julian realized that Ares wasn’t thinking about money or property or battles.
He was thinking about betrayal. About family. About the kind of hurt that didn’t bleed but still killed something inside.
Julian stayed for a long time, sitting quietly across from him, while Ares drank in silence, slow, controlled sips of a man trying to dull the edges of a truth he never asked for.