Chapter 7
On the screen, Hailey’s hands were clamped viciously around Sophie’s neck, her voice dripping
with venom.
“You little brat. Just like your mother-an eyesore. Competing with me for Ryan’s love? You
deserve to die.”
“But I’ll make your death worth something. If Ryan thinks I have talent, and I blow you up,
that’s killing two birds with one stone, isn’t it?”
“Once you’re gone, I’ll take care of your mother next. Then you two can be reunited
underground.”
She slapped duct tape over Sophie’s mouth and drove a savage kick into her stomach.
“You’re just as disgusting as your mother!”
Sophie crumpled to the floor, struggling for breath, her face flushed scarlet as she tried to cry
out but couldn’t make a sound.
Each frame of the video hit Ryan’s chest like a sledgehammer.
He ached for his daughter, gasping on the floor and the truth that her kidnapper was none
other than the woman he had spoiled and protected most.
The face on the screen was almost unrecognizable to him.
Ryan slammed the laptop shut, unable to watch another second, and barked into his phone for
Hailey to come over.
When she walked in and saw the wreck of the room, she plastered on a mask of concern.
“Ryan, I know you’re grieving. You’ll be okay… I can stay with you, or maybe I could move-”
Her words cut off with the crack of his hand across her face.
Hailey’s eyes went wide in shock. “Wha-what’s wrong with you?”
Ryan’s second slap landed harder than the first.
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“You dare ask? You kidnapped Sophie! You deliberately shortened the timer on that bomb!”
“Hailey, you’re not walking away from this.”
She dropped to her knees, sobbing.
“Ryan, I didn’t mean to! Please, believe me-it was just a mistake. Don’t leave me!”
His boot caught her squarely, sending her sprawling across the floor. His eyes burned red.
“A mistake? That was deliberate! You wanted Sophie gone so you could go after Natalie next.
You’ve got some nerve!”
His fist crashed into her face, splitting her lip.
Bloody and trembling, she crawled back toward him.
“No, please… forgive me just this once, won’t you? I don’t believe you don’t love me. I don’t believe you can watch me cry and feel nothing.”
She smeared her tears across her cheeks, looking up at him with feigned fragility.
Ryan let out a harsh, mirthless laugh that made the air in the room drop cold.
“Hailey, you’ve wildly overestimated your worth to me. I could indulge you, favor you but you lay a hand on my wife or daughter, and I will make you pay in blood.”
He turned to the doorway and called for his security detail.
“Lock this bitch in the basement. I want her to feel exactly what Sophie felt before she died.”
Hailey froze. She knew that basement-it was where Ryan interrogated kidnappers.
Lined with implements of torture, any one of them could end her life.
She backed away, shaking her head violently.
“Ryan, you can’t do this to me! What’s so great about Natalie and that little brat that you’d go
insane over them?”
He grabbed her by the collar, his gaze fierce and unblinking.
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“I’ll warn you one last time. They are my wife and Sophie. They are my life.”
He shoved her toward the guards, who dragged her out despite her screaming pleas. His face
didn’t soften once.
All Ryan felt for her now was a depthless, burning hatred.
Clutching the court summons in his hand, his emotions twisted into something he couldn’t quite name-but fear wasn’t one of them.
Because there was one thought, bright and unshakable, in the back of his mind.
He was finally going to see Natalie again.
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