My Husband Slapped Me and Ordered Me to Kneel—He Never Knew I Owned His Entire Empire / Chapter 22 / 25

Chapter 22 - Blood and BetrayalThe drive back to the triplex penthouse was an exercise in suffocating silence.

The moment the armored Maybach pulled into our subterranean garage, the entire building was placed on a military-grade lockdown. We stepped into the private elevator, and I didn't say a word until the steel doors slid shut.

"You told me you were an only child," I stated, my voice eerily calm. I wasn't the submissive girl from the Kensington mansion who panicked at the first sign of deception. I was Mariana Escalante. I demanded the truth, and I demanded it instantly.

Julian leaned against the glass wall of the elevator, running a hand through his dark hair. He looked exhausted, burdened by a history he had desperately tried to erase.

"I didn't lie to you to protect myself, Mariana. I lied to protect you," Julian said, his green eyes locking onto mine with desperate intensity. "Sebastian wasn't just a businessman. He was a sociopath. When my father died, Sebastian was supposed to inherit Thorne Global. But he started using the company's private military contractors to fund warlords in Eastern Europe. He didn't care about building an empire; he only cared about the thrill of destruction."

"So you took the company from him," I deduced, piecing the puzzle together.

"I staged a board coup," Julian confirmed, his voice thick with disgust. "I froze his assets and handed his international trafficking dossiers to Interpol. Seven years ago, his private jet went down over the Mediterranean. The wreckage was recovered. The DNA matched. He was dead, Mariana. I saw the coroner’s report."

"You of all people should know that money can buy any coroner’s report, Julian," I said softly, stepping closer and resting my hands on his chest. I felt the furious, erratic beating of his heart. "If Sebastian is alive, why wait seven years to strike?"

"Because seven years ago, I was just a CEO," Julian whispered, his hands coming up to cup my face, his thumbs gently brushing my cheekbones. "Now, I am a king. I have a queen. I have an heir, and another on the way. He didn't just want to take my company, Mariana. He wanted to wait until I had everything to lose."

The elevator dinged, opening into the grand foyer of our penthouse.

My father, Alejandro, was already waiting for us in the war room, flanked by our lead cyber-security analysts. The massive digital screens were tracking thousands of IP addresses, desperately trying to locate the stolen two billion dollars.

"He bounced the funds through sixty different sovereign networks in under a minute," my father reported, his face carved from granite. "The money is gone. But that’s not the worst of it."

My father hit a button on his tablet, and the main screen switched to a live, encrypted video feed.

It was Sebastian Thorne.

He looked terrifyingly similar to Julian, sharing the same dark hair and sharp jawline, but his eyes were completely dead—two hollow voids of absolute malice. He was sitting in a dimly lit, industrial warehouse, casually smoking a cigarette.

"Hello, family," Sebastian smiled, exhaling a plume of smoke. "Julian, you look stressed. Mariana, you look exquisite. I see you’re expecting. How beautiful."

"If you ever speak my wife’s name again, I will tear your throat out," Julian snarled, stepping toward the screen, his entire body radiating lethal violence.

"Temper, temper, little brother," Sebastian chuckled, flicking his ashes onto the concrete floor. "Let's skip the posturing. I didn't steal two billion dollars because I need the cash. I stole it to prove that your unbreakable fortress has a back door. I have spent seven years recruiting the remnants of Silas Vanguard’s syndicate. I have an army, Julian. And I have a simple demand."

Sebastian leaned into the camera, his eyes burning with toxic hatred.

"Mariana," Sebastian said smoothly. "I want you to divorce him. I want you to strip him of his shares in the Escalante-Thorne conglomerate. You hand me his half of the empire, and I disappear. If you refuse, I will systematically leak fabricated, highly illegal corporate espionage documents that will trigger a federal raid on your headquarters. I will freeze your assets, destroy your legacy, and ensure that your children grow up visiting their parents through bulletproof glass."

"You are delusional," I said, my voice dropping to a freezing, absolute zero. "I do not negotiate with terrorists. And I certainly do not abandon my husband."

"I figured you’d say that," Sebastian sighed, feigning disappointment. "Which is why I took an insurance policy."

The camera panned to the right.

Tied to a steel chair, bruised and bleeding, was Marcus—my former Chief Financial Officer, the man I had fired years ago for betraying me to Victoria Sterling.

"Marcus came to me begging for a job after you ruined him," Sebastian smiled. "He had all your old security protocols. He’s the one who let me into your network tonight. But he’s outlived his usefulness. Consider this a demonstration of what happens to people who stand in my way."

Before anyone could react, Sebastian pulled a suppressed pistol from his jacket and shot Marcus squarely in the chest.

I gasped, instinctively stepping back into Julian’s arms.