Chapter 88 Chapter Eighty-seven
ARA
My father left Munroe behind with two of his men. He still didn't trust that Thayne wouldn't come up with another hat-trick like when he'd used the chains to fight earlier.
Even with his kneecaps shattered, Thayne had still managed to kill two of them. That alone was enough to make my father wary.
Sasha was dragged away screaming, and despite how hard I begged and cried for her to be released, my father ignored me.
“She’ll serve her purpose,” my father said coldly. “Baits always do.”
Thayne and I both spoke at the same time.
“You're using her as bait?!”
The doors slammed shut behind them, plunging the chamber into a suffocating stillness broken only by Thayne’s cursing and the distant drip of water somewhere in the dark.
The moment Thayne found a way to break those chains, my father would regret ever messing with him.
I counted every second, every breath. An hour crawled by like a lifetime.
“Ara, I'll get you out of here. I promise. Look at me, Arayna.” Thayne said softly.
I lifted my head to look at him, and I was torn apart by the looks in his eyes. He looked ready to kill. Ready to mail and destroy his way out of the situation.
“I want you to know that I lo—”
The door swung open, slamming against the metal wall and echoing like a gunshot.
My father was back, flanked by men dressed in black from head to toe. They were broad, solid, built like weapons given human form. Their boots echoed loudly against the concrete floor.
He stopped directly in front of Thayne. A slow, cruel smile curved his lips.
“Your father will be here in fifty-nine seconds,” he said calmly, checking an invisible clock. “One wrong word, one wrong movement.”
He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a whisper sharp enough to cut.
“And Sasha disappears.”
Thayne curled his fists by his sides, baring his teeth.
“One of my men is already waiting for permission to get a taste of Sasha,” he added, his eyes gleaming with sick anticipation. “Comply, or I let him do whatever he wants.”
Thayne went perfectly still, but it wasn't due to fear or weakness.
It was rage, coiled so tightly it felt like it might tear him apart from the inside. I felt it too. Between Munroe's betrayal and my father's vengeful hate, I knew he was a volcano waiting to erupt.
My mind replayed the moment Thayne had been trying to tell me something before my father's dramatic re-entrance.
Had he been trying to tell me he loved me? Was that it? Did he really love me?
I forced my head out of that hole and focused my mind on what was in front of us.
The countdown had started, and whatever happened next would change everything.
“He’s here,” Munroe announced.
The words dropped like a blade. My lungs locked, my breath trapped painfully in my chest. The room seemed to shrink, the air growing heavier, thicker, charged with something electric and volatile.
Thayne lifted his head. Despite the blood, despite the chains biting into his skin, he straightened slowly, deliberately, like a king rising to meet another.
With his jaw set he fixed his eyes on the door. He looked so fierce and certain, for a man in chains.
The moment Slade Senior stepped into the room, a cold draft followed him in, sharp and unnatural, like the air itself had recoiled.
He entered with four men at his back, big, armed, confident. Then the door slammed shut.
The sound cracked through the room loudly.
Slade Senior spun around, alarm flashing across his face, his hand already drifting toward his jacket as if his instincts told he’d walked into a trap.
He took one step toward the door, then stopped.
Slowly, he turned back. His gaze landed on my father first, then shifted.
His eyes narrowed, then widened when he saw the blood, the chains, Thayne, me.
Whatever words he’d come in with died instantly. His mouth opened, then snapped shut, the color draining from his face as the full picture settled in.
For the first time since he walked in, Slade Senior understood one brutal truth. He wasn’t in control anymore.
“You tricked me, you son of a bitch!” Slade Senior roared.
His voice ricocheted off the walls, raw with fury and disbelief.
“Welcome to you too, Slade,” my father replied smoothly, spreading his arms wide like a gracious host unveiling a masterpiece.
Slade Senior’s gaze snapped back to me. To the chains. To Thayne.
“What the fuck is this?” he thundered. “Why is she in chains?”
My father’s smile widened. “Because,” he said lightly, “leverage is a beautiful thing.”
He stepped forward, boots echoing in the chamber, his eyes never leaving Slade Senior’s face.
“Let’s make a deal,” he continued. “I want everything you stole from me, every asset, every account, every inch of the empire you built on my back.”
He tilted his head, mock-thoughtful. “And here’s how it’s going to work…”
“My daughter is—”
“Your daughter?” Slade Senior cut in sharply.
“She’s your daughter?”
“Yes,” my father said smoothly. Then his tone snapped, hard as a whip. “And stop talking.”
My father stepped aside, giving Slade Senior a clear view of the chains biting into my wrists, of Thayne’s bloodied body hanging few feet away from me.
“Now listen carefully,” he continued. “You only get to choose one person to walk out of here.”
He raised one finger. “Your son,” he said coldly. “The one you despise so deeply you were willing to erase him.”
Then he raised another. “Or my daughter,” he went on, his gaze sliding to my stomach with unsettling intent, “who happens to be carrying your grandchildren.”
Slade Senior’s face went slack.
My stomach twisted violently. My father smiled wider.
“Make the wrong choice,” he said softly, “and you lose everything anyway.”
I understood it then, with terrifying clarity. He wasn’t really giving Slade Senior a choice. He was setting a trap.
If Slade Senior chose Thayne, he would be admitting, publicly and irrevocably that his son mattered. That the heir he’d tried to destroy was worth saving.
And if he chose me… Then Thayne would be sacrificed.
Either way, my father would win. He wanted Slade Senior to damn himself with his own decision.
And the worst part? He knew exactly which choice would destroy him the most.
What I didn’t expect, what none of us expected, was his answer.
“I choose her.”
The words fell clean and decisive, without hesitation.
Silence detonated in the room. Slade Senior didn’t look at Thayne when he spoke. He didn’t even spare him a glance.
“She’s carrying my grandchildren,” he continued calmly, like he was discussing stocks, not flesh and blood. “That gives her more value than Thayne ever did.”
Thayne went perfectly still.
“All I have to do,” Slade Senior added, his voice chillingly practical, “is marry her. Then the children won’t be my grandchildren.”
His eyes finally lifted to mine. “They’ll be my stepchildren.”
Something inside me shattered.
Thayne’s breath broke, one sharp, wounded sound, and for the first time since I’d met him, I saw it.
This wasn't rage or fury. It was devastation.
And my father smiled. Because this choice was exactly the ruin he’d engineered.