“Sign it. Transfer eighty percent of your shares to Jovan.”
“Don’t even think about it,” I ground out through clenched teeth.
Jovan’s voice turned falsely humble. “Eliana, Louis looks down on people like me… maybe just forget…”
Eliana forced me down harder. “Weren’t you so high and mighty when you were beating other people’s parents?”
She shoved my fingers into the red ink.
“Today, you’ll sign it, whether you want to or not.”
I was left locked inside the ancestral hall.
Three days later, the doors finally opened.
I thought I was about to be freed, until I saw Jovan walk in alone.
“Eliana said you can go now.” His voice rang sharp in the emptiness of the hall.
With effort, I lifted my head, meeting the venom in his eyes.
He loosened my ropes slowly, then, without warning, shoved me hard to the ground.
The acrid stench of gasoline hit me instantly.
“What are you doing?!” My gaze locked on the lighter flickering in his hand, my voice trembling.
A cold laugh slipped from his lips. “Louis should just disappear, right? Let me make it quick for you, save you from haunting Eliana every day.”
The moment the lighter struck the floor, flames erupted with a deafening roar.
A scream tore from my throat, raw and desperate, piercing through the air and startling Eliana outside.
“What’s going on?!” She rushed in, her eyes widening at the sight of the blazing inferno.
Jovan acted fast. “Eliana! Louis said if he can’t have you, he’ll destroy you! He threatened to burn down the ancestral hall!”
Her furious voice cut through the crackling flames. “Put out the fire! What are you all standing there for?!”
But the flames only raged higher, the scorching heat twisting the air around us.
At that moment, the Anderson gates were torn open by several armored vehicles, the roar of engines shaking the ground beneath us.
Through the haze of flames, a woman strode forward, her fiery red trench coat sweeping past the blaze.
Behind her, two rows of fully armed bodyguards moved in, seizing control of everyone in the courtyard with swift precision.
Her expression was cold, her voice sharp. “Where is Louis?”
Eliana’s face paled. “Why is it you?”
Without so much as a glance at her, the woman plunged into the inferno.
The people she brought worked fast, subduing the flames in moments.