Chapter 14 Bloodline Of Serpents
“Good morning, Mr Damien Thor…wait…” Damien didn’t respond to his father’s assistant. He walked past him and stormed towards his office.
He barged in. “You must send your bastard son back to the hole he came from!”
The sound of the door slamming open, coupled with his voice made the woman on his father’s desk flinch, detaching fastly from him.
Victor Thorne lazily pulled his lips away from her neck, already looking disturbed. Damien looked between the two of them with disgust. She scrambled off the desk, cheeks flushed and skirt wrinkled, while Victor adjusted his cufflinks with slow, arrongant poise.
“Did I spoil you too much to the extent that you forgot your manners at home? You barged in at the wrong time.” Victor accused, lazy eyes narrowing at his son.
The secretary muttered an apology, straightening her blouse, and hurried past Damien. He didn’t even glance at her. His eyes were fixed on his father, who had already reached for the decanter on his desk, pouring himself a heavy glass of deep red wine.
“So, you’re fucking Rhea now,” Damien said, contempt dripping from his tongue. He could remember how she had seduced him one time during one of the ThorneTech organization parties.
Victor took a sip, savoring it before answering. “That’s none of your business, boy. Focus on why you’re here.”
“Fine. What do you intend to do with Julian? You are not just going to pretend his sudden arrival in town doesn’t mean anything, will you?”
Victor’s eyes flickered with interest.
He set the glass down sharply. “Julian came for the journal,” he said harshly. “But you don’t have to worry. I’ll get it back soon enough. Unless” he leaned forward, a sly smile curling on his lips, “you manage to get it before I do.”
Damien’s tone turned cold. “I have no way of collecting it from him. You’re the one who knows how to send him back to where he belongs. I don’t even want to associate with him.”
Victor’s stare hardened. “Is there something else beneath all that desperation, Son?”
“Yes!” Damien snapped, his composure finally cracking. “Julian has the real Moreau heiress with him!”
Victor stilled, the air between them shifting. “What are you talking about?”
“Seraphina Moreau,” Damien said, almost hissing. “Rings a bell, father?”
Victor blinked. Then his brows drew together, and his voice dropped. “She’s dead.”
Damien let out a low, humorless chuckle. “Only that she’s not. She’s back- and she’s with him. I called her yesterday. Guess who picked up her phone?” He tilted his head mockingly. “Julian.”
Victor’s jaw tensed. For a moment, he looked shaken- an expression so rare it almost startled Damien. Then realization flickered in his eyes. His mind flashed back to the night of the auction, the young woman he’d seen at Julian’s side when he went to accuse him of bidding for the journal to spite him.
No wonder she had looked familiar to him. His late friend—her father, had introduced them when he was still alive.
The daughter Ambrose Moreau hid from the world because of her dynamic intelligence and ADHD symptoms. Something tugged at his chest.
But she died. She was proven to have died in a fire accident. She was alive now? No way.
His glass clicked against the desk as he rested his hands on it. “Why were you calling her, Damien? How long have you known she was alive? I didn’t remember you two to be friends or close at all.”
Damien realized, too late, that he’d said more than he should have. But the damage was done. So he straightened, arrogance masking unease. “Well… I saw the real Will of the Moreaus. You don’t have to ask me how, but it’s the truth,” he said, voice tightening. “Seraphina’s the true heiress, not Talia. And what better way to announce her grand return than me by her side?”
Victor’s gaze sharpened. Damien went on, words gaining confidence.
“Think about it- Seraphina Moreau and Damien Thorne. The media would eat it up. It’d revive our family’s image, merge her inheritance with ours, and draw investors back to ThorneTech. She’s vulnerable right now- she can be manipulated.”
Victor blinked slowly, absorbing his son’s pitch. Then, for the first time in a while, he smiled- a slow, predatory smile.
His company had just taken a drastic dip due to a scandal he was still somehow entangled with. He had exploited a shareholder, thinking he wouldn’t know but he figured and casted him. Investors had pulled out and he was only remained with a very few that he had managed to convinced to stay.
He would have said Damien should marry Talia to get the media talking and get them reigning again, but Talia is a bad image. She do drugs, lives a reckless life and had been asked to step down by the Moreau’s family. She was only still there because of Sheryl…and him.
But right now, he had no reason to attach himself with such ridiculous image again. Seraphina Moreau was back. The intelligent one. If that was true, and if Damien could make engaging the true heiress happen, especially with the shocking news that she escaped death, then the world will forget about his mistakes.
“You’re making sense,” he said. “And I need sense more than ever. The company’s bleeding, and I could use a transfusion.”
He rose from behind his desk, towering in his dark suit, glass still in hand. “I didn’t raise a dumb son after all,” he murmured.
Damien’s smirk returned, half pride, half venom. “You bet, father.”
Victor nodded, smiling with anticipating victory. Then his tone suddenly shifted. “Are you courting her already? Why was she with Julian?”
Damien took a moment to choose his words carefully. “I cheated on her and she caught me. And I guess Julian have her because he knows she’s mine. He wants to get on my nerves.”
Victor muttered a “Oh” before his lips spreaded into a grin again. “That bastard must have easily forgotten what he did that made me send him into exile.”
Then he looked at Damien, “A man cheating isn’t a big deal, son. What you need to do now is to overwhelm her with your charm. Plan a romantic dinner…I shouldn’t teach you the rest. And don’t forget letting her know that your father was her late father’s bestfriend when he was alive. If she doesn’t know that yet.”
Damien smirked, loving the idea, only that there had been more to their separation than just cheating. Even with that, he was going to get her back.
“And Julian?” Damien asked, worry in his tone.
Victor tapped two fingers on his desk as if he was brainstorming. “Here is the plan.” He finally started, “Make her trust you again. Second, get her to retrieve the journal from Julian. Then…” his lips curved into a cruel grin, “take it from her. Leave the rest to me after that’s done.”
They both smirked as Victor sipped from his wine again.
Damien watched him, dark thoughts coiling behind his smirk.
Seraphina belonged to him. She always had. And if Julian thought he could keep her, he was delusional.
Even if Damien had to cancel his brother out of existence—so be it.
He smiled to himself, slow and arrogantly.
“Consider it done, Father.”