Chapter 18
Alexander Vanderbilt?
“Darling, you have no idea how worried we were for you!”
Genevieve coos, like she hasn’t rehearsed that line a hundred fucking times in front of a mirror.
She sweeps across the marble like a goddamn perfume ad, all perfect posture and pearls that probably cost more than Carol’s entire apartment building.
Yeah. Penthouse.
Marble floors so cold they echo. Everything black, chrome, sleek, sterile. Staff I don’t recognize bow their heads like I’m some returning war hero instead of a man who spent two months getting hard for a nurse in scrubs.
And just like that—every missing piece slots in.
Of course I never folded laundry.
Of course I didn’t know how to work a microwave.
Of course I nearly burned down Carol’s kitchen with my caveman cooking skills.
I had people for that shit.
I was raised in a goddamn fishbowl, groomed for boardrooms and bullshit. A suit and a smile and a spreadsheet.
Not this. Not me.
“Thanks, Genevieve,” I say flatly. “But I think I want some time alone, if you don’t mind.”
She does that thing—hands laced behind my neck, fake concern in her eyes, that glossy Stepford smile tilting up. Tries to kiss me and I turn at the last second so she catches cheek, not lips.
Strike one.
“Oh, darling,” she breathes, like we’re in some dramatic movie scene and she’s about to swoon. “Take all the time you need. God knows you must miss your quaint little adventure after that… hell.”
Her voice drips with saccharine pity, but it’s the dig in “hell” that makes my fists clench.
That “hell” was Carol.
That “hell” had warmth and breakfast and someone who saw me—really saw me—before she even knew my fucking name.
I nod stiffly. “Yeah. I do.”
Then I walk the fuck past her.
She looks around like she’s inspecting damage, not stepping into a fucking home. Fingers brushing on surfaces like she’s marking territory. She’s already kicked off her heels like she lives here—which, knowing her, she probably thinks she does.
“I mean… look at this,” she says, gesturing to the sweeping skyline view like I didn’t grow up with it. “Back where you belong, baby. I can’t even imagine the… conditions you were in. A 7-Eleven? A nurse?” Her nose crinkles like she sniffed poverty.
Jesus fucking Christ.
I unbutton the collar of the shirt someone left on my bed, one I didn’t choose, didn’t earn—something with my goddamn initials embroidered on the cuff. I’m choking on my own skin in this place.
Genevieve pads toward the wine fridge like it’s her goddamn God-given right. “Let’s open something good, hmm? Celebrate? Your miraculous return to the land of the living?”
“I said I want to be alone,” I bite out, sharper this time. “Now.”
She freezes—only for a second. Then the smile returns, practiced and poisonous. “Of course,” she says, brushing invisible lint off her designer blouse. “You’re… processing.”
No shit.
“I’ll be back later. I’ll have Marco send up dinner,” she says like I’m a project. A fucking renovation. “You need to hydrate and rest. The press will be rabid by morning.”
She’s at the door when she turns, voice soft and lethal. “Oh, and Alex?”
I lift my head.
“Don’t do anything reckless. You’ve… had a lapse. We don’t want another one.”
And with that, she disappears—heels echoing like a slow fucking metronome of entitlement, hair swinging like she’s in a shampoo commercial, not walking out of a man’s goddamn personal space.
Like this penthouse belongs to her. Like I belong to her.
Like she didn’t just try to tongue me like we’re still playing the power couple of Upper East Side fantasyland.
And yeah, maybe once I did. Maybe once I played the part.
But not anymore.
Because here’s the truth: my memory’s back.
Every fucking piece of it.
The deals, the parties, the private jet smell, the firm grip of my father’s hand on my shoulder, cold and calculated.
The way Reginald would say “Alexander, optics matter.”
The thousand dollar dinners where nothing was eaten and everything was sold.
The vacant sex in five-star suites. My name printed on magazine covers I never approved. All of it.
And the worst part?
They don’t know that I know.
Which is perfect. Because now I see it for what it is.
Every move is rehearsed. Every interaction is staged. I’m not back in the fold—I’m a fucking puppet with a memory card that’s just now been rebooted. And everyone’s trying to download their version of who I should be back into me.
Reginald’s always lurking, with his faux-fatherly bullshit and crocodile smiles. Genevieve’s draped across furniture like a trophy, trying to reclaim territory she thinks she never lost. The guards? Subtle. Suits. Bluetooth earpieces and stone faces. Watching.
It’s not paranoia if it’s real.
I’m being babysat.
Handled.
Steered.
They don’t want me back.
They want the idea of me.
The heir. The brand. The next in line to carry the Vanderbilt name with poise and charm and a bulletproof smile. Not the guy who flipped burgers with one good arm and fell in love with a nurse over tuna sandwiches and reheated pasta.
I’m a fucking liability now.
An asset with a cracked fa?ade.
And they’re scared shitless of what I might remember next.
But I do.
With crisp, brutal clarity.
The kind of clarity that comes like a bullet slicing through fog. The kind that doesn’t whisper—it fucking screams.
There’s a power struggle happening. A slow-simmering coup dressed in cashmere and contract clauses. A game of heirs and sharks, and I was the wildcard no one knew how to play. The inconvenient son with too many questions and a mind that never stopped turning, never stopped digging.
And my “disappearance”? It wasn’t just tragic—it was convenient as fuck.
No body. No questions. Just enough whispers and news coverage to make it look like they gave a shit, while behind closed doors? I bet Leopold and Reginald were already drawing up new lines of succession. Shifting shares. Softening my legacy like a bruise under silk.
And now I see why the police were never involved.
Why everything was “internal.”
Because if the truth spilled—if anyone saw the cracks—they’d risk the entire empire going up in smoke. Can’t have the golden boy missing under suspicious circumstances, now can we?
But here’s the thing.
I might not be able to fold a fitted sheet or make an omelet without burning the damn pan—but I was, and still am, a goddamn strategist.
I remember now.
The meetings I led.
The fucking empire I streamlined.
I was sharper than Reginald, and younger than Leopold. I knew the board’s weaknesses, the investors’ fears. I remembered how to speak numbers like a second language. I outmaneuvered them once before.
And now I’ve got something more dangerous than wealth or influence.
I’ve got nothing to lose.
And that? That makes me a motherfucking threat.
Because here’s the real, raw, ugly truth of old money marriages: they’re not love stories. They’re hostile takeovers in formalwear. Mergers dressed up as champagne toasts. And behind every perfectly posed black-and-white wedding photo? A pile of resentment dressed in couture.
My father—Leopold fucking Vanderbilt—married Margaret Talbot not out of affection, not even for convenience. He did it because Margaret’s dying father had something he wanted.
Legacy shares.
Original stock. Pre-recession, pre-IPO, pre-modern bullshit. The kind of ownership that still counted in blood. The kind of leverage that doesn’t go on public record.
So he wooed her. Married her. Knocked her up. And quietly consolidated power, like a fucking vulture in a bespoke suit.
But here’s the thing. Margaret hated him back.
They lived in a mansion built of marble and mutual loathing. I grew up in that house. Cold. Pristine. Silent as a crypt. She drank herself to sleep by forty. He worked late every night until I could recognize the smell of bourbon over cologne.
And me?
Alex.
Her one act of rebellion. The child she loved. The one she whispered secrets to, gave private tutors, taught chess before I could read.
And that little inheritance she tucked away for me?
Her father’s shares.
Not under Leopold. Not under Reginald. Just me.
She had the foresight to put it in trust under my name—transferable only upon her death or upon my 30th birthday.
Guess what birthday was coming up?
And guess what the fuck I found buried in an archive room two days before my “accident”?
The amendment.
The clause.
The sealed, notarized proof that I—not my father—own controlling interest in the Vanderbilt Conglomerate.
So yeah. Now I get why I “disappeared.”
And now they’re gonna wish I stayed gone.
Because right now? Their best bet is a dazed, doe-eyed Alex.
A confused heir.
An amnesiac golden boy who sips herbal tea, sits politely through board meetings, signs what he’s told, and doesn’t ask fucking questions.
A version of me they can manage.
Marry off to Genevieve in some soulless press-staged ceremony, draped in pearls and lies.
Keep the Vanderbilt-De Vere alliance nice and tight, all while Leopold keeps smiling for the camera and whispering in my ear like the senile king he’s turning into.
Because let’s be real—he doesn’t give a single goddamn shit if I’m happy.
He just needs me obedient.
He just needs a “grateful,” foggy Alex who doesn’t remember shit about legacy shares or trust amendments or how fucking close he was to turning the whole empire on its head.
But what he doesn’t know—what none of them know—is that I do remember.
Every signature. Every clause. Every goddamn notarized page I pulled from the vault like it was a bomb.
And the kicker?
I don’t even have to confront him. Not yet.
I can play their game. Pretend I’m still scrambled, still “healing.” Let Reginald keep circling like a Botoxed shark. Let Genevieve kiss my cheek and parade me around like a pet.
Because when I do move?
When I fucking strike?
It’ll be with all thirty-three percent.
Controlling interest.
Voting power.
The moment I exercise that clause, I’m not the heir anymore.
I’m the motherfucking king.
King of marble floors and blood money.
King of penthouse prisons and silent goddamn hallways that echo when I breathe.
King of a family that sees me as a ledger entry, a PR win, a moving piece on their billion-dollar chessboard.
And still—
I’m the motherfucker sitting in a ten-thousand-dollar armchair, staring at the skyline like it’s gonna whisper her name back to me.
Carol.
Golden hair, messy bun, coffee breath.
Soft thighs and sharp wit.
Voice like gravel and honey.
She didn’t care that I had nothing.
She fed me, bathed me, fought for me—called me Crash like it was the only name I ever needed.
And now I’m here.
In my rightful castle.
Remembering the woman who made me feel like a goddamn human being.
Not an heir.
Not a portfolio.
Not a project.
Just… me.
And fuck if I don’t miss her like my lungs forgot how to work.
I miss her laugh in the breakroom.
The way she refilled my plate like it was a goddamn love language.
The way she let me sleep in her bed like it meant something.
And maybe it didn’t.
Maybe she’s moved on.
Maybe she saw the headlines, saw my face, saw Genevieve fucking De Vere with her clawed fingers on my shoulder—and decided I was just another lie.
But I still hope.
Hope she sees past the headlines, past the suits, past the legacy.
Hope she still wants her Crash.
Because Alexander Vanderbilt?
Heir. Power player. Billionaire?
Yeah, sure. That’s what the world sees.
But Crash—
Crash is hers.
And I’ll fucking claw my way back to her.
I don’t care if I have to play puppet for a while, nod and smile and sip twelve-dollar bourbon while they plot around me like I’m still a blank slate. Let them think I’m soft. Let them think I’m still fogged over, dazed, grateful to be back.
Because the second I wear that crown—the second the boardroom bows and the signatures are inked and those thirty-three percent are in my hands—
I’m done playing house with these snakes in silk.
I’ll burn it all down with a goddamn grin.
Then I’m coming for her.
Not as the guy who stumbled out of a hospital with nothing but borrowed sweats and a mystery name.
Not as the heir in a tailored suit with dead eyes and a legacy of rot behind him.
But as Crash.
The man who knows her coffee order.
Who’s seen her cry in the dark and laugh like a maniac when the blender broke.
Who held her in bed and learned what it feels like to be wanted without expectation.
I’m coming back with everything.
My name.
My power.
My fucking kingdom.
And I’ll kneel at her tiny-ass loveseat throne if I have to.
Because she’s the real goddamn crown.
And I’d trade all the Vanderbilt billions for one more night with her hair in my face and her voice in my ear saying,
“Welcome home, Crash.”