Chapter 270: Chapter 270

Chapter 270

Morning broke over Monterey, bringing cold daylight into the holding facility where Drake Monroe paced back and forth across the polished concrete floor. He pulled out his phone for the tenth time in an hour, scrolling through his contacts, making urgent calls to every judge, politician, and high-ranking official he had paid off over the years.

But every attempt to get Amelia out was slamming into a brick wall. The local authorities were terrified of touching the case, the bail hearing had been delayed, and no one wanted to risk their own career to pull a string for him. He slammed his palm against the reinforced glass window of the holding block, staring at the heavy metal door that kept his daughter locked away.

Inside the holding unit, Amelia’s voice echoed down the sterile corridor, sharp, grating, and hysterical. She had been screaming since five in the morning, her throat raw and raspy, but she refused to shut her mouth. She slammed her hands against the metal bars of her cell, her designer acrylic nails long since chipped and broken, leaving red scuffs against the cold steel. The guards walked past her cell without even turning their heads, completely numb to her tantrums after sitting through hours of her endless threats.

"Do you have any idea who my father is?" Amelia shrieked, her face flushed red and her eyes wide, wild with unhinged fury. "You pathetic little nobodies are going to lose your jobs, your pensions, and your homes! My dad will buy this entire precinct just to fire every single one of you! Get me out of here right now!"

Drake ran a hand through his slicked-back hair, his crisp suit rumpled from staying up all night in the station's waiting area. He stepped up to the desk guard, pulling a thick leather wallet from his jacket and leaning over the counter. "Look, there has to be an administrative mistake," Drake insisted, trying to keep his voice smooth and commanding despite the desperation bleeding through. "She needs medical attention. She isn't supposed to be in a regular cell. Let me speak to the precinct commander, or just sign the transfer papers to get her into a private medical facility. Name your price, cash, right now."

The guard didn't even look up from his computer screen. He typed slowly with two fingers, taking a slow sip from a styrofoam cup of lukewarm coffee. "Mr. Monroe, I've told you three times already today. Her charges are federal and state holds, and the judge signed a strict no-bail order pending her preliminary hearing. You can offer all the money in the world, but nobody here has the authority to unlock that door. Take a seat, or I’ll have you removed from the building."

Drake’s jaw clenched, his teeth grinding together as he stared at the guard's indifferent face. In all his years, money had opened every single door, smoothed over every scandal, and bought every bit of silence he needed. Now, standing in a sterile police station with harsh fluorescent lights overhead, his influence meant absolutely nothing. He turned around and slammed his fist into the wall, furious that every string he pulled simply snapped in his hands.

Down the hallway, Amelia’s shouting grew louder, escalating into full-blown panic. She grabbed the bars and shook them with all her strength, her body shivering in the cheap, oversized county jumpsuit they had forced her to wear. Without her daily cosmetic treatments, tight body-shapers, and professional makeup, she looked completely unravelled. But worse than her ruined hair or smeared eye makeup was the horrific physical reality settling in beneath her clothes.

The botched BBL surgery she had gotten months ago was actively failing in the unsanitary environment of the lockup cell. The injected fat tissue was decomposing under her skin, causing severe infection, severe discoloration, and an unbearable, foul odor that wafted through the cell bars into the hallway. The skin on her hips and backside was hot to the touch, swollen, and turning a dark, dangerous purplish-green, oozing fluid through the thin fabric of her orange pants.

"It smells like rotting meat in here!" another inmate in the opposite cell yelled out, holding her shirt over her nose and slamming her shoe against her own door. "Get this disgusting bitch out of this block! She’s literally decaying right in front of us! Call a doctor before she infects the whole damn floor!"

"Shut up! Shut your mouth!" Amelia screamed back, spinning around and glaring at the other cell with pure venom, despite the sharp, throbbing pain shooting through her lower body every time she moved. "You're trash! All of you are broke, useless trash! You don't get to speak to me! I am Amelia Monroe! I don't belong in a cage with criminals!"

She turned back to the hallway, clutching her throbbing lower back with one hand while grabbing the iron bars with the other. The pain was excruciating, like a hot iron pressing into her flesh, but her arrogance and delusion completely overpowered her logic. She refused to admit she was in danger, and she refused to believe she was going to face actual consequences.

"Where is my lawyer?" she screamed at the top of her lungs, her voice cracking violently. "My court hearing is coming up! You think this bogus hold is going to stick? My father hired the top legal defense team straight out of London! They're flying in right now on a private jet! They're going to tear this whole case apart! The lead attorney handles international corporate defense, and he will sue every single officer who touched my wrists!"

Drake walked down the corridor, stopping just short of the red line painted on the floor that visitors were not allowed to cross. He looked at his daughter through the heavy glass partition, his stomach churning as he caught the sickening smell drifting through the ventilation unit. He could see the unnatural, distorted shape of her body, the way she leaned heavily against the iron bars because she couldn't support her own weight without agonized flinching.

"Amelia, stop yelling and listen to me!" Drake shouted over her noise, pressing his hand against the glass. "You need to save your energy and sit down! I am trying everything! I called the governor's office, I called the district attorney, I even tried reaching out to our contacts in the state department! Nobody is taking the call, Amelia! They're stonewalling us!"

Amelia didn't want to hear it. She slammed her fist against the glass, her dark eyes bulging with rage. "Then offer them more money! Pay them off! Do what you always do, Dad! Why am I still sitting here in these filthy clothes? Why haven't you fixed this yet? You told me you run this town!"

"It isn't about money this time!" Drake yelled back, his composure completely shattering as he ran out of options. "The federal prosecutor took over the docket! The London legal firm you keep talking about just canceled their retainer twenty minutes ago! They pulled out the second they read the formal indictment charges! We don't have a defense team coming, Amelia! You are going to that preliminary hearing with whatever public defender the state assigns you if I can't find a local lawyer willing to take the heat!"

The news barely registered in her mind. Her brain, warped by years of unchecked privilege, total lack of accountability, and the intense fever building up from her infected, decomposing body, simply rejected the reality of her situation. She spat on the glass window, leaving a white streak on the pane right in front of her father's face.

"You're lying!" she screamed, her lungs burning, her raw throat bleeding from the effort. "You're just being weak! I don't care about the local lawyers! I don't care about the prosecutors! My father is Drake Monroe! Do you hear me? I have millions of dollars! I have the best lawyers from London, from New York, from everywhere! You can't keep me here! You can't put me on trial!"

A group of three bailiffs walked down the hall, their heavy boots thudding against the floorboards as they approached her cell to conduct the mandatory pre-hearing headcount. One of them held a clipboard, looking at her with total disgust as he caught the rotting stench coming from her cell, while the other two kept their hands rested casually on their belts.

"Monroe, quiet down," the lead bailiff barked, clicking his pen. "Your preliminary court hearing is scheduled for nine o'clock sharply. The transport van will be here in twenty minutes. Get your hands off the bars and step to the back of the cell so we can put the waist chains on you."

"Touch me and I'll have you executed!" Amelia roared, her hands tightening around the steel bars as she refused to move back. The fever was turning her skin blotchy, and dark sweat stained the collar of her jumpsuit, but her hubris remained completely unbroken. "I am not putting on chains! I am not walking into any courtroom! My London lawyers will be here any second, and when they get here, you will all be begging on your knees for forgiveness! You don't know who my father is! You don't know what we can do to you!"

Drake watched helplessly from behind the glass barrier as the bailiffs unclipped the heavy ring of keys from their belts, inserted the master key into her cell lock, and pulled the metal door open to forcibly restrain her for transport.

Amelia didn't back down. Even as the metal door slid open with a loud, mechanical clank, she stood her ground, clutching her agonizing, decomposing hips, shouting at the top of her lungs, her wild screams echoing through the concrete block as she bragged about her non-existent legal team, refusing to accept that her empire had completely collapsed.