Chapter 99 Pull the Trigger

Chapter 99 Pull the Trigger

My voice cut through the dead silence of the study, sharp and unshakable.

Arthur looked at me, those amber eyes holding a storm of emotions I could not read.

He finally moved.

No defense. No attempt to touch me.

He simply turned, walked behind the massive mahogany desk, and unlocked a drawer.

From it, he pulled out a worn brown leather folder.

"Truth? The truth is... my father was already brain-dead a week before that video was filmed."

My stomach sank like lead.

"Maybe it was Marshall. Maybe some traitor. After my father's stroke, they bribed his private doctor to inject him every day with something that slowly destroyed his nervous system."

He emptied the folder onto the desk.

Yellowed medical records. CT scans. A death certificate.

"When I found out, it was already too late. He was a shell kept alive by machines. The doctors told me he would never wake up."

His voice was calm—too calm. No tremor, no rise. But beneath that stillness, I could hear the rage, deep and suffocating, like a dammed tide.

"The Russell family cannot have a godfather lying in a hospital bed. The elders began circling like vultures. Marshall was desperate to take the chair. I needed time. I needed an opening to rip the rot out of this family one piece at a time."

He lifted his gaze, eyes burning into mine.

"So I locked down the news. I made the doctor I controlled play along. Every day I visited him, pretending he was just sick, that he'd recover soon."

My eyes fell to the records.

On the last pages, the signature of Arthur's father twisted into a clumsy forgery.

"That video..." My voice trembled.

"It's real," he said, each word hitting me like a slab of concrete, "but it's also not real."

"The syringe wasn't poison. It was a high-concentration nutrient solution. The heart monitor was modified in advance. The trigger was under my foot."

He looked at me with a barefaced honesty.

"I needed a believable moment of death. A timestamp no one could challenge, so I could take control and start purging the family."

"So I pulled the plug myself. I pressed the button. I watched the line flatten."

"I killed a man who was already gone... in front of the traitor's hidden camera."

My mind roared in static.

This was a trap. A net woven from his father's death.

He had used the enemy's surveillance, used greed and suspicion, and turned himself into the perfect image of a cold-blooded patricide... all to flush out the hidden hand.

It was insane.

I stared at Arthur—the man who played the world like a chessboard.

Could I believe him?

Or was this just another, more exquisite lie?

"And the doctor? Where is he now?"

"Dead," Arthur said flatly. "The day after I took over, he died in a car crash. He will never speak again."

Ice slid down my spine.

No witness. No proof.

"And the original surveillance footage?"

"Destroyed."

My nails dug into my palms.

Every shred of evidence... gone.

All he left me was a story that fit together too perfectly, with nothing to hold it up.

How was I supposed to trust him?

"Sophia," he said, reading my thoughts, stepping around the desk until he stood in front of me. "I know it sounds insane."

"I have no proof to give you. The only thing I can give you..."

He reached for the polished Beretta on the desk.

He flipped it in his hand, then offered me the grip.

"...is this."

I looked at the gun—cold, heavy, gleaming with the promise of death—then back into those unfathomable eyes.

"If you don't believe me, you can end it right now."

His voice carried a weariness I had never heard from him before, a fragile edge that felt foreign.

"Kill me. Then go to the one who called you. Trade my life for your mother's. It's the only choice you have left—the best choice."

I looked at him.

At that beautiful, bloodless face.

At the unguarded truth in his eyes, laid bare for me to destroy.

In my mind, I saw him again on the helipad—standing naked in candlelight, ready to dive into the dark sea for me.

This man was a lunatic.

He loved to carve himself open in the most brutal ways, forcing me to choose.

I laughed.

I took the gun.

It was heavier than I thought. Much heavier.

I felt Arthur's body tense the moment my fingers wrapped around the grip.

He was gambling.

Gambling on whether I would pull the trigger.

Gambling on who I really was.

"You're right," I said, raising the gun until the cold barrel pressed against his forehead. "This is the best choice."

His pupils contracted hard.

"But," I twisted my tone, my smile turning cold and sharp with a wild edge, "I don't take multiple-choice questions from anyone. I only do what I want."

I yanked the gun back, turned, and slammed it onto the desk.

Then I grabbed my laptop and sat down in my chair—my throne.

"Colin!" I shouted toward the door.

It flew open almost instantly. Colin burst in like a startled animal, followed by several core family members, their faces tight with panic and suspicion.

"Ms. Davis..."

"From now on, the Russell family's crisis management is mine," I cut him off, my gaze slicing through every person in the room.

"Your first job is to spread that damn video even wider."

"What?!"

Colin's voice cracked. The others looked at me like I had lost my mind.

I ignored them, fingers flying across the keyboard.

"I want every screen in Asteria City to have that video within an hour. Headline it: 'Dynasty Secrets: Godfather Arthur's Patricide for Power—Caught on Camera!' Make it loud. Make it impossible to ignore."

"Ms. Davis, you're insane!" an elder snapped, pointing at me, shaking with rage. "You'll destroy the Russell family!"

"Destroy?" I looked up, smiling with a blade's edge. "No. I'm saving it."

My eyes locked on Arthur.

He stood there, watching me.

I didn't need to explain. He knew.

This lunatic had already thought the same thing.