Chapter 176 The Mastermind Escapes Her Cage
Harriet glared at the judge. Panic flashed in her eyes. "You cannot do this! She is a Whitmore! She is carrying the blood of a thief!"
"She is my wife," Tristan stated. The absolute certainty in his tone left no room for debate.
The marshals turned and walked toward the glass doors. They realized they were caught in a bitter family feud, not a valid legal removal. The judge followed them.
Harriet stood alone in the lobby. She gripped her leather purse.
I stepped right up to her. I did not raise my voice. I kept it quiet, cold, and final.
"You tried to steal my child to force me out of the company," I said. "You used a private DNA test as a weapon because you have no other leverage. Leave this building, Harriet. If you ever come near Elias again, I will not bother with the courts. I will freeze your remaining accounts. I will bury you so deep you will never see the city again."
Harriet stared at me. She searched my face for a bluff. She found nothing. She saw the truth. I held the controlling shares. I held the power. The husband she thought she could use against me was standing by my side.
She turned around and walked out the glass doors, her heels clicking a sharp, defeated rhythm on the tile.
The lobby grew quiet. The adrenaline faded from my blood, leaving my muscles shaking. I let out a long, ragged breath.
Tristan reached out and took my hand. His long fingers linked with mine. His grip was warm and grounding.
"You handled her," Tristan said.
"We handled her," I corrected.
We returned to the elevator. We rode up to the penthouse in silence. The threat was gone. The outside world stayed downstairs.
When the metal doors opened to the apartment, the quiet sanctuary wrapped around us. Marcus was in the back wing with Elias. We were alone in the front hall.
I dropped my phone on the console table. I turned to face Tristan.
The tension from the lobby melted, replaced by a different kind of heat. The air between us turned thick. He looked at me, his gray eyes dark and heavy with want. But he stayed still. He remembered the rules. Equal power. He waited for me to make the choice.
I stepped into his space. I grabbed the lapels of his dark sweater and pulled him down.
Our lips met. The kiss started slow, a gentle testing of boundaries, but the control snapped seconds later. The dam broke. Three years of anger, grief, and longing poured into the contact.
He wrapped his good arm around my waist, lifting me off the floor. He pressed me back against the wall. His mouth was hot and desperate, mapping the shape of my jaw and my neck. He tasted like rain and coffee.
"Mina," he breathed against my skin. The sound was a prayer.
I ran my hands through his dark hair. I tugged at the hem of his sweater, pulling it over his head. I tossed the fabric onto the floor. I felt the thick white bandages wrapped around his ribs. I traced the edge of the gauze, mindful of his healing skin. He hissed through his teeth, leaning into my touch.
We moved down the hallway, a chaotic tangle of limbs and hungry kisses. We stumbled into the bedroom. The heavy door clicked shut behind us.
I pushed him back until the edge of the mattress hit the back of his knees. He sat down, pulling me with him. The world outside the window ceased to exist. There were no boardrooms. There were no enemies. There were no secrets left between us.
I unbuttoned my shirt. I let it fall to the carpet. He reached up, his rough hands tracing the curve of my waist, pulling me over him. The afternoon light faded into long, dark shadows across the bed.
Hours later, the city lights flickered through the bedroom window.
I lay against Tristan's bare chest. The room was cool, but his skin was warm. I traced a slow circle over his collarbone. He pressed a kiss to the top of my head, his fingers tangling in my hair.
My phone chimed from the pocket of my discarded coat on the floor.
I ignored it.
It chimed again. A double alert. High priority.
Tristan shifted. "Do you want me to get it?"
"No," I said. I sat up, pulling the white sheet around my shoulders. The cold air hit my bare back. I walked across the carpet and pulled the phone from my pocket.
It was a message from Ricardo Salazar.
The family court threw out Harriet's entire case file. She has no legal standing left. We won.
I looked back at Tristan. He watched me from the bed, his gray eyes soft.
"It is over," I told him. "Harriet is finished."
Tristan let out a deep breath. "Then we can finally live."
"Not yet," I said. I sat on the edge of the mattress. I looked at the dark sky outside the window. The legal fight was over, but the media still controlled the narrative outside. They still called me a fraud. They still questioned the validity of our marriage and my past.
"We need to end the rumors," I said. I turned to look at him. "We need to show the board, the press, and the rest of this city that they cannot break us. We need to close the door on the scandal."
Tristan sat up. The sheet fell to his waist. "How?"
"We are getting married," I told him. I held his gaze. "Again. This time, no secrets. No hidden courthouse in the middle of the night. We are doing it in public. We are inviting everyone."
Tristan smiled. It was a real, unguarded expression that reached his eyes. "When?"
Before I could answer, another notification popped up on my screen. It was an urgent email from the corporate public relations department.
The subject line made the blood freeze in my veins.
Emergency Leak: Celeste Whitmore's Final Interview Recorded Before Federal Transport.
She left one last landmine.