Chapter 12 #3
“Every file.” My voice hardened. “Every second of recording from that day.”
I looked directly at him.
“Send the relevant clips to my phone the moment you verify them.” A pause. “Do not fail.”
Marco nodded. “Understood.”
Keegan stepped forward.
“Boss, let me handle the records.” His tone was careful. “I can get them faster. Marco can drive you.”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
“My decision is final.”
I walked toward the exit.
For a moment, he said nothing. Then he followed.
The black SUV waited outside.
Keegan climbed into the driver’s seat while I got into the back.
The engine roared to life.
And we drove.
Neither of us spoke.
The silence inside the vehicle was suffocating.
Only the sound of the engine and the passing streetlights broke through the darkness.
But my thoughts were louder than anything.
Juliet’s empty eyes.
The blood.
Her voice.
Our child is dead. Is that enough for you, Romeo?
My hands tightened into fists.
Then my anger found a direction.
“Sokolov never identified which daughter betrayed me, and you still assumed it was Juliet?”
My voice cut through the silence.
“You made a judgment based on who you liked and who you didn’t.”
Keegan’s eyes flickered toward the rearview mirror. His knuckles turned white beneath the faint glow of the dashboard.
“Yarina has never given us a reason to doubt her loyalty. She has proven herself time and time again, boss.”
“Pray you’re right.” My voice was quiet.
Keegan glanced at me through the rearview mirror.
“Because if you’re wrong...” I leaned forward slightly. “If your loyalty to your assumptions cost me my wife and my child...” My eyes met his in the mirror. “You won’t live long enough to regret it.”
Keegan’s eyes flickered.
The tires suddenly screamed against the road.
The SUV jerked violently as Keegan slammed on the brakes.
My body lurched forward against the seatbelt.
“Boss...” His voice held something I rarely heard from him.
Fear.
“Drive.” The command came instantly.
He released the brake and continued forward.
“You refused to release her from that bungalow for four months. And don’t insult me with excuses about our rules—that you couldn’t act without my direct command. What if I had died in Poland?”
My voice hardened.
“Would you have left my wife there to spend the rest of her life locked inside that bungalow simply because I wasn’t alive to give you an order?”
The word ‘wife’ felt heavier than it ever had before.
My chest tightened.
Keegan’s grip on the steering wheel tightened.
“Listen carefully. You were one of the men who helped me build this empire. I haven’t forgotten that.”
My gaze met his through the mirror.
“But that loyalty does not make you untouchable. Loyalty has value, Keegan. So does accountability.”
Juliet’s empty eyes flashed through my mind.
“Some mistakes cost more than others.” I held his gaze. “And yours may cost you everything.”
The rest of the drive passed in silence.
When we finally reached the hospital, the SUV rolled into the entrance driveway.
The sterile white lights reflected off the windshield.
We stepped out.
Keegan moved quickly beside me as we entered.
The hospital staff immediately noticed us.
Maybe it was the urgency. Maybe it was the way we moved.
Like men accustomed to getting answers.
Keegan approached the front desk.
“Which room is Juliet Sokolov?” His voice was sharp.
“She was admitted through emergency.”
Her fingers moved over the computer. “Second floor. Room 214.”
She pointed toward the elevators.
“They stabilized her upon arrival and are monitoring her condition.”
I was already moving before she finished speaking.
The elevator doors opened.
We stepped inside.
Neither of us spoke.
Seconds later, we reached the second floor.
I walked faster.
Almost too fast.
The room number appeared.
I pushed the door open.
But the room wasn’t what I expected.
It was too quiet.
The bed was there. The sheets were disturbed.
But Juliet wasn’t.
Only one person remained.
A doctor standing beside the bed with a chart in his hands.
He looked startled by our sudden entrance.
I stepped forward.
“Where is Juliet?”
The doctor immediately straightened.
I could feel Keegan behind me.
But I didn’t care.
My entire focus was on one thing.
Finding her.
“Where is my wife?”
The doctor’s expression changed.
Concern. Confusion.
And something else I couldn’t identify.
The doctor adjusted his glasses with unsteady fingers.
“A man who identified himself as her husband took her from this room.”
My entire body went still.
“What?” The doctor swallowed. “It happened about two minutes ago.”
The words barely registered.
“He had the proper paperwork.” His brows furrowed. “He claimed he was transferring her to a private medical facility for specialized treatment.”
A cold feeling settled in my chest.
A man who identified himself as her husband?
“I tried to stop the transfer until everything could be verified, but...”
He hesitated.
“Security became involved.” His eyes moved between me and Keegan. “He was very convincing.”
For a moment, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
My phone vibrated.
The sudden sound cut through the hallway, dragging me out of my thoughts.
I pulled it out immediately.
A message from Marco.
My heart lurched.
Attached was a video.
The CCTV footage.
My fingers tightened around the phone.
Finally.
The truth.
But suddenly, I wasn’t sure I wanted it.
My hand trembled as I stared at the encrypted file. For months, I had believed I knew exactly who my enemy was. Now, one recording could shatter everything I thought I knew.
I opened the file anyway.
My heart hammered as the video decrypted and loaded.
The moment it finished, I pressed play.
The sound filled the hallway.
Keegan stepped closer, but I barely noticed him.
I couldn’t tear my eyes from the screen.
Because for the first time, a terrifying possibility had taken root in my mind.
What if Yarina had been my enemy all along?
A private study appeared on the screen.
Sokolov’s house. Four months ago.
Then I heard Yarina’s voice.
My blood ran cold.
I listened.
Every word. Every confession. Every detail.
The discussion of my death.
The hatred. The revenge. The plan. The betrayal.
The woman I had defended.
The woman I had believed would never turn against me.
The woman I had used as proof that Juliet was guilty.
She was the one who had betrayed me.
Not Juliet.
Never Juliet.
The recording continued, but I barely heard anything else.
Because suddenly, every moment came crashing back.
Juliet telling me she was the one who had saved me from drowning in the lake when I was nineteen.
Juliet telling me she was the one who had written to me throughout my years in prison—not Yarina. That Yarina had never even bothered to open the letters.
Juliet telling me she loved me.
Juliet telling me she was carrying my child.
And me...
I had looked at her with nothing but hatred.
I had dismissed every word she said. Never once had I given her the benefit of the doubt, let alone considered that she might have been telling me the truth.
I had already decided she was guilty before I ever bothered to hear her.
The truth didn’t hit like a punch.
It hit like a bullet.
Because there was no enemy left to fight.
Only the consequences of my own choices.
I had punished the wrong woman.
I had destroyed the one person who had never stopped choosing me.
And now...
She was gone.
“Find my wife. Now.”
My voice cracked through the room, sharper than I intended.
Keegan looked at me.
But I was already moving.
Because for the first time in years, there was something I feared more than death.
Not finding Juliet.
Not knowing whether she was alive.
Not knowing whether I had lost my wife...
And my child...
Because of my own hands.