Chapter 239

Chapter 239
While Serena tightened her grip on the Zhao Group, now strategically tied to the Lin Group through a web of acquisitions, alliances, and silent takeovers, Lucien Feng disappeared at least once every two days.

To everyone else, he looked like the same cold, untouchable CEO orchestrating city shaking moves from the shadows. To the world, he was the devil in a tailored suit, exact, calculated, and omnipresent in every boardroom battle.

But there was one place he kept going to where no one followed.

The treatment wing.

A private, restricted ward in a hospital owned quietly by the Feng family, where only senior specialists had clearance and where all records were encrypted behind Lucien’s personal authorization codes.

He never told Serena where he went.

He never told her why his shirt collar was sometimes slightly rumpled, or why he returned with a stiffness in his shoulders that no corporate war could explain.

He never told her why he always checked his phone right before bed… then turned the screen face down the moment she shifted beside him.

He thought he was covering it well.

He wasn’t.

Because Serena Lin was running an empire now, and her instincts were sharper than knives.

The Zhao boardroom had transformed into her domain. Executives who once bowed to Ethan now scrambled to follow Serena’s directives with trembling efficiency. She reorganized departments, extracted corrupted managers, replaced entire divisions with talent poached from elite competitors.

Every action was clean.

Precise.

Unquestionably dominant.

With the Zhao Group now legally entangled with the Lin Group, she had leverage that Ethan never imagined, and she wielded it like a queen reclaiming her stolen throne.

And yet…

In the quiet moments between meetings, she would sense it.

A shift.

A shadow behind Lucien’s gaze.

He accompanied her to negotiations.

He helped her dismantle Ethan’s influence.

He slept beside her, warm, steady, protective.

But something was off.

Something small.

Something he was hiding.

Between documents and mergers, she watched him carefully.

How his jaw would clench when his phone buzzed.

How the light in his eyes dimmed after certain texts.

How sometimes, when he thought she wasn’t looking, he would stare off as if grounded in a memory he couldn’t shake free from.

Once, she saw him standing on the balcony after midnight, staring at the city, fingers pressed to his brow. He didn’t hear her approach. Didn’t even sense her until she wrapped her arms around his waist.

He had turned, kissed her forehead… But the warmth in his eyes had been forced.

Serena wasn’t naive.

She knew Lucien had secrets, the type forged in blood, grief, and old wounds.

But she was walking a tightrope.

One misstep, one wrong question, and the fragile closeness between them could crack.

So instead of asking directly, she watched.

Measured.

Analyzed.

Just as a CEO should.

But the more she studied him, the more her heart tightened.

Something was wrong.

Terribly wrong.

And though she had no idea that Meilin, Lucien’s wounded past, was slowly waking back into the world…

She felt the storm gathering behind his silence. She just didn’t know when it would break.

Serena waited until late evening, after her final meeting with the Zhao auditors, after the last restructuring memo was signed, after Lucien had driven her home with one hand resting protectively on her knee.

She waited until dinner was finished, until the dishes were cleared, until Lucien reached for the remote as though he might distract himself with background noise.

Then she took the remote from his hand and placed it on the table.

“Lucien.” Her voice was soft. Controlled. Too controlled.

Lucien paused, eyes lifting to hers. “Mm?”

“I need you to tell me what’s going on.”

He blinked once. The smallest shift, barely noticeable, but Serena saw it.

“What makes you think something is wrong?” he tried, voice smooth… too smooth.

She didn’t smile. Didn’t soften. “Because you’ve been disappearing. You’ve been tense. You keep checking your phone like you’re waiting on something that scares you. You lie about where you go and you think I won’t notice, but I do. So tell me.”

Lucien swallowed.

Slowly.

Deeply.

He looked away, elbows on his knees, hands clasped so tightly the knuckles whitened.

“Serena…” he murmured, “it’s complicated.”

“Then simplify it,” she pressed, coming to stand in front of him. “I won’t get angry. I just need the truth.”

Her voice cracked at the end, barely, but Lucien closed his eyes as if the sound hit him like a strike.

He ran a hand down his face.

Then exhaled.

“There’s something I’ve been hiding from you,” he said finally.

Serena’s pulse spiked, but she stayed very still.

Lucien lifted his head. And his next words changed the air between them completely.

“Meilin is alive.”

Everything stopped.

The room.

The breath in Serena’s lungs.

Her heartbeat.

“W… what?” It didn’t even sound like her voice.

Lucien continued quietly, almost painfully. “She’s alive, Serena. We found her months ago. She was… injured. Malnourished. Traumatized. Her condition was unstable at first. But she’s receiving treatment now. She’s improving every day.”

Serena’s hands flew to her mouth.

Her eyes burned. Her chest tightened so abruptly she staggered backward and had to brace herself against the edge of the couch.

“Alive?” she whispered, barely breathing. “She’s… alive? Lucien.. are you sure? She’s...”

“She’s alive,” he repeated firmly, standing and catching her shoulders before she collapsed. “I wouldn’t lie about this.”

A sound left Serena’s throat, half sob, half sharp breath, as tears filled her lashes. Her knees nearly gave out.

Lucien pulled her into his chest.

And she clung to him with trembling hands.

“I thought she was dead,” she choked. “I thought I lost her forever, Lucien... she was my sister.. my best friend.. and... and I...”

“I know.” His voice cracked.