Chapter 36 MORE PROBLEMS FOR VICTORIA

Chapter 36 MORE PROBLEMS FOR VICTORIA
RONAN POV

My mother has been livid since the rumors began to spread.

Not loudly. Not recklessly.

No screaming fits. No public meltdowns.

That was the most terrifying part.

She had gone quiet, the kind of quiet that belongs to predators right before they strike. The calm before a strom

The headlines were everywhere now. Blogs, gossip columns, anonymous forums, whispered conversations in boardrooms and charity galas.

Victoria Blackthorne isn’t who we thought she was.

Dark secrets behind the Blackthorne empire.

All of it traced back to me.

And she knew it.

She hadn’t confronted me yet. Not a single phone call. Not a threatening message. Not even a passive-aggressive warning dressed as concern.

She was calm.

And my mother’s calm was always a promise of violence.

But until she struck back, I wasn’t stopping.

I would hit her with everything I had. Every secret. Every weakness. Every carefully constructed lie she had built her empire on.

I was in my apartment when my phone buzzed.

Marcus.

My stomach tightened immediately. Marcus didn’t text unless it was urgent—or dangerous.

We need to talk. Immediately.

Then another message followed before I could respond.

Ronan… there’s something you need to see.

My fingers suddenly felt numb as I opened the attachment he sent.

I had to read it twice.

Then a third time.

And by the fourth, my hands were shaking so badly I nearly dropped my phone.

Up until now, everyone—including me had believed my father died naturally.

A heart condition. Sudden. Tragic. Unpreventable.

That was the story.

That was the lie.

Marcus’s message told a very different truth.

“There were irregularities in your father’s autopsy,” the text read. “Discrepancies in the toxicology report. A missing medical file. And a nurse who disappeared two days after his death.”

My chest felt like it was caving in.

“No,” I whispered to the empty room. “No… that’s not possible.”

I scrolled back up, rereading the details like the words might rearrange themselves into something less monstrous if I stared long enough.

But they didn’t.

My father, Harrison Blackthorne, though had his own flaws, had been strong, kind, gentle in a world that had hardened me had not simply died.

Something had been done to him.

And I already knew who did it. 

My finger hovered for half a second before I hit call.

Marcus picked up on the second ring.

“Ronan,” he said, his voice low. Tense. “I figured you would call.”

“Tell me this is wrong,” I demanded, pacing my living room. “Tell me you misread the report. Tell me this is some sick coincidence.”

There was a pause.

“I can’t.”

The word landed like a bullet.

I dragged a hand through my hair, my breath coming too fast. “Explain it. Slowly. Because none of this makes sense.”

Marcus exhaled. “The original autopsy lists natural cardiac failure. But when I accessed the archived files—files that weren’t supposed to be altered I saw that there were inconsistencies. Traces of substances that shouldn’t have been there.”

“What substances?” I snapped.

“Sedatives. Low-dose, prolonged exposure. Enough to weaken his heart over time without triggering suspicion.”

I stopped pacing.

My vision blurred.

“You’re saying he was poisoned,” I said hoarsely.

“I’m saying it looks like someone engineered his death,” Marcus replied. “Carefully. Patiently.”

My grip tightened around the phone. “The missing file?”

“A medical log from the private nurse assigned to him in his final months,” Marcus said. “It vanished. Completely erased. And the nurse herself? She resigned abruptly and disappeared. No forwarding address. No records since.”

A cold, vicious rage spread through my veins.

I knew exactly whose signature this carried.

“I’m going to her house,” I said, already moving toward the door. “I’m going to confront her right now.”

“Ronan,” Marcus warned, his tone sharp. “Don’t.”

“Why the hell not?” I shouted.

“Because if she really did this,” he said carefully, “she should not be confronted emotionally. Ronan, you know your mother better than I do. She’s someone you dismantle strategically.”

I froze.

Something in his voice, steady and rational against my irrational thoughts cut through the fog of fury clouding my mind.

He was right.

Storming into my mother’s home, screaming accusations, would accomplish nothing. She would deny it. Twist it. Make me look unstable.

She thrived on chaos but only when she controlled it.

I leaned against the wall, closing my eyes.

“What do I do then?” I asked quietly.

There was silence on the other end.

Then Marcus said, “You take away what she values most.”

Her power.

That word echoed in my mind.

Victoria Blackthorne didn’t fear hatred. She didn’t fear scandal.

She feared irrelevance.

She feared losing control.

I let out a slow breath, my anger sharpening into something colder. Deadlier.

“You’re right,” I said finally. “I won’t confront her.”

Marcus hesitated. “Ronan, whatever you’re thinking…”

“I’m thinking clearly for the first time,” I interrupted. “If she orchestrated my father’s death, then she doesn’t deserve mercy.”

“She’s still your mother.”

“She stopped being that a long time ago.”

The line went quiet.

“I’ll keep digging,” Marcus said at last. “But be careful. If you make a move, she’ll feel it. She’s already too calm after the last stunt we pulled”

“I know but I don’t care, I want her to feel it,” I replied. “I want it to consume her.”

After the call ended, I sank into my chair, staring at nothing.

My father’s face rose in my mind. His warm smile, the way he always placed a hand on my shoulder like grounding me in place. The only person who ever truly saw me without judgment.

She took him from me. All for what?

A sharp thought pierced through my grief.

Why would she do this?

And then another, darker one followed.

Had she already known about Annabelle?

The timing suddenly made too much sense.

If my mother had discovered the truth about Annabelle’s birth, about my father’s betrayal then my father wasn’t just a liability.

He was an obstacle.

A man who loved me more than power. A man who might have confessed. Might have exposed her perfect world.

I clenched my fists.

“She killed him,” I whispered. “She killed him because she couldn’t control him anymore.”

The rage returned, but this time it was focused. Controlled.

Weaponized.

I opened my laptop and began drafting.

Not accusations.

Rumors.

Carefully planted questions.

Why were files missing from the autopsy of Harrison Blackthorne?

Why did a private nurse disappear after his death?

What secrets does Victoria Blackthorne keep buried beneath her philanthropy?

I wouldn’t name her.

Not yet.

I would let the public connect the dots themselves.

By morning, the whispers would begin.

By nightfall, the cracks would show.

And soon, very soon—my mother’s empire would start to crumble.

I leaned back, staring at the ceiling, my chest tight with grief and vengeance.

“You loved me,” I murmured to my father’s memory. “And I swear to you… she will pay for what she did.”

This wasn’t just revenge.

This was justice.

And I was just getting started.