Chapter 32 #2
“Wait for what? For the FBI to track us down?” Silas was already dialing, his finger moving with deliberate precision. “Your father needs to know what's happened to help us figure out our next move.”
The phone rang once. Twice. Three times.
Then a smooth, cultured, voice answered, accented with the faint tilt of someone who'd grown up speaking multiple languages. The voice that had terrified Morgan as a child when she'd disappointed him. The voice that had praised her when she'd proven useful.
The voice she'd spent her entire life trying to please.
“Silas.”
“Uncle,” Silas put the phone on speaker, setting it on a rusted table with deliberate care.
“We have a situation. The operation in Wyoming is compromised.
Harper Walsh was not eliminated. Law enforcement knows about the house, about the trafficking, about Morgan's involvement. We're currently evading pursuit.”
The silence on the other end was long and terrible, making Morgan's stomach clench with dread.
“Explain how this happened.”
Morgan opened her mouth to speak, but Silas continued before she could.
“The target proved more resilient than anticipated. Multiple attempts at intimidation failed. Today's operation was meant to permanently eliminate the threat, but Morgan’s,” he paused deliberately, “personal involvement complicated matters.”
“Personal involvement.” Victor's voice was soft, dangerous in a way that made Morgan's childhood instincts scream at her to hide. “Silas, be specific.”
“The objective was to secure the Whitaker property or remove obstacles preventing its acquisition.
Morgan chose to focus on revenge against Ms. Walsh rather than the strategic goal.
Today's confrontation was emotionally driven rather than tactically sound. She held the target at knifepoint but hesitated, allowing law enforcement to intervene. We barely escaped.”
Fucking traitor.
“That's not—” Morgan started, but Victor cut her off.
“Morgan. Is this accurate?”
Her father's voice was cold and controlled. It made her throat close up like she was a child again being called to his office. “Daddy, it's not that simple. Harper ruined everything. The property acquisition, the operation, everything. I was trying to fix—”
“You were trying to satisfy a personal vendetta.” Victor's voice held no warmth, no paternal concern. Only cold business assessment. “Were you or were you not holding a knife to a pregnant woman's throat when law enforcement arrived?”
Morgan's mouth opened. Closed.
“Answer me, Morgan.”
“Yes.” The word came out small, like she was six years old again. “Yes, but Daddy, she—”
“I don't care what she did.” Victor's voice was ice, the kind of cold that burned.
“You allowed personal feelings to compromise a multi-million dollar operation.
You exposed our organization to federal scrutiny.
You involved yourself directly in violence that will bring maximum law enforcement response.
All because you couldn't handle a failed relationship.”
“It wasn't about Connor—”
“Then what was it about?” Victor's question mirrored Silas's from earlier. “Explain to me, Morgan, how any of your actions in the past month served the organization's interests rather than your own emotional needs.”
Morgan's mind raced, trying to find an answer that would satisfy him, that would make him understand.
But there wasn't one. Everything she'd done from escalating the threats, the boutique destruction, today's kidnapping—it had been about hurting Harper.
About revenge. About making her pay for taking what should have been Morgan's.
Not about business. Not about the organization. About her own rage and pain and desperate need to destroy the woman who'd taken Connor from her.
“I thought—” Her voice cracked. “I thought if I eliminated her, Connor would be vulnerable again. Accessible. We could still get the property—”
"The property is no longer viable." Victor's voice was final, absolute.
"The moment they found out who you were, that land became radioactive.
No one in my organization will go near it for years.
Decades, possibly. You've single-handedly destroyed years of planning and millions in potential revenue. "
Morgan's mind reeled, trying to process what was happening.
This wasn't how it was supposed to go. She was his daughter.
His blood. She'd done everything he'd ever asked. She’d managed his legitimate businesses, laundered his money through her real estate deals, kept his secrets, and sacrificed her own wants for the family's needs.
And now he was…what? Cutting her loose?
No. He wouldn't.
"Daddy." The word came out small, childlike, the way she used to say it when she was little and needed him to fix something. "Daddy, please. I can fix this. I can make it right. Just give me another chance—"
"You had your chance. Multiple chances." His voice held no warmth, no paternal affection. "You let your emotions compromise the operation. You became a liability."
A liability. That's all she was to him. After everything she'd done, every sacrifice she'd made, every line she'd crossed to prove she was worthy of being his daughter.
The betrayal cut deeper than any physical wound could. She'd spent her entire life trying to earn his approval, his love, and pride. She thought if she was smart enough, ruthless enough, useful enough, he'd finally look at her the way he looked at his businesses. With satisfaction. With value.
But she'd never been his daughter. Not really. She'd been an asset. And assets that stopped performing got liquidated.
“Silas, assessment. Is she salvageable?”
The question made Morgan's blood freeze in her veins. No, he wouldn't. I'm his daughter.
Silas looked at her, his cold eyes assessing, calculating like she was livestock being evaluated. “No sir. She's compromised, emotionally unstable. Her face is known to law enforcement. She's a liability that will only lead them back to the organization.”
“I agree.” Victor's voice held no hesitation or fatherly concern. Just business. “Morgan, you've become a problem I can't afford.”
“What—” Understanding crashed over her like ice water, stealing her breath. “No. No, Daddy, you can't! I'm your daughter!”
“You were my daughter. Now you're a liability.” The words were matter-of-fact, like he was discussing a failed investment. “Silas, you know what needs to be done.”
“Yes, Uncle.” Silas's hand moved to his waistband, where Morgan knew he kept his gun.
This can't be happening.
“No!” Morgan backed up, her hands raised, her heart pounding so hard she thought it might explode. “Daddy, please! I can disappear! I'll leave the country, I'll never contact you again, I'll—”
“You'll talk.” Victor's voice was matter-of-fact, like he'd already considered and dismissed every possibility. “When they catch you, and they will, you'll make a deal. Trade information about me and the organization for leniency. I know you, Morgan. You'll do whatever it takes to save yourself.”
“I wouldn't—”
“You would. You're weak.” The words landed like blows, each one a wound.
“I thought this assignment would prove you could be useful and think strategically.
Instead, you proved you're ruled by emotion. By a need for approval and a desperate desire to be loved.” He said the last word with disgust that made Morgan's chest ache.
“Those weaknesses make you a threat I can't tolerate.”
Tears streamed down Morgan's face now, hot and shameful, as her perfectly constructed world crumbled around her.
Her father, the man she'd spent her entire life trying to please, trying to prove herself to, had just pronounced her death sentence with all the emotion of discussing a failed business venture.
“Daddy, please—” The line went dead with a click that sounded like a door closing forever. Morgan stared at the phone in Silas's hand, her father's final dismissal echoing in her ears. No goodbye. No regret. Just business.
She'd thought she understood how the world worked. She’d been playing the game perfectly, following all the rules her father had taught her. Be ruthless. Be smart. Never let emotions cloud judgment.
But the real lesson was that in her father's world, everyone was expendable. Even family. Especially family, if they failed to deliver. She'd spent her entire life trying to be worthy of a man who was incapable of loving anyone but himself.
Silence filled the warehouse, broken only by Morgan's ragged breathing and the distant sound of birds outside, singing like nothing was wrong until Silas drew his gun. The metal whispered against leather, a sound Morgan had heard countless times before, but never directed at her.
“Silas, wait,” Armand's voice was panicked. “We don't have to do this. We can just leave her, drop her off somewhere. She's not our problem.”
“She's everyone's problem,” Silas said calmly. “And you heard Victor. This needs to be clean.”
“Clean?” Morgan's voice rose to a shriek that echoed off the metal walls. “He's ordering you to murder his own daughter and you're calling it clean?”
“It's business.” Silas's gun remained steady, aimed at her center mass. Professional. Efficient. “Its nothing personal, Morgan. You're just a loose end that needs tying up.”
“Just like Harper?” Morgan laughed, high and manic as all of her remaining sanity fragmented into pieces. “Is that what I am now? Just another problem to be eliminated? Just like I wanted to eliminate her?”
“The difference is Harper wasn't family,” Silas said. “This should have been handled internally. But your father made the call.”
“Fuck my father!” Morgan screamed, her voice raw. “Fuck his organization! Fuck all of you! I was trying to fix this! I was trying to—”
The gunshot was deafening in the enclosed space, making her ears ring.
Morgan felt the impact before she heard the sound, a punch to her chest that drove the air from her lungs and sent her stumbling backward.
She looked down, confused, seeing red spreading across her cream blouse in a bloom that looked almost pretty.
“You shot me,” she said, her voice distant and wondering. “You actually shot me.”
“I did.” Silas's voice held no emotion, just brutal honesty.
Morgan's legs gave out, and she collapsed to her knees on the dirty concrete. Her hands pressed to her chest as she tried to stop the bleeding, but there was so much blood. Too much blood, warm and sticky between her fingers.
“This wasn't supposed to happen,” she managed to say, coughing, tasting copper. “I was supposed to be—Daddy was supposed to—”
“Your father doesn't tolerate failure.” Silas lowered his gun slightly. “You knew that.”
Morgan's vision started to blur as darkness creeped in at the edges like a curtain closing. She could hear Armand saying something, his voice panicked, pleading with Silas to stop, to think about this, but it was growing distant, like he was speaking from underwater.
All she could think about was Harper.
Harper, who'd survived everything Morgan had thrown at her. Who was probably at the hospital right now, being checked by doctors, being comforted by Connor, being told her precious baby was fine.
Harper, who'd won.
Morgan tried to speak, to curse her one last time, but blood filled her mouth and no words came out. Only a wet gurgling sound that was pathetic and wrong.
The warehouse floor was cold against her cheek. Funny, she'd never noticed how cold concrete was before. How the smell of rust and rot filled your nose when you were lying on it. How the dust tasted when you couldn't swallow anymore.
Her last thought as darkness swallowed her completely was bitter, small, and filled with rage that would never find release.
It should have been my life. My future. Mine.
Then nothing.
Just darkness and the distant sound of birds singing, completely unconcerned with the death of Morgan Ashford.