2024-09-26 09:01:49
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CHAPTER 628– Harold’s Backstory I
The courtroom floor was cold, but the memory that flooded the void in the wake of the gunshot burned white-hot.Before the mansions, before the Griffin Group, before the corruption, there was a seven-year-old Harold.He wasn’t a monster then. He was just a boy living in the shadow of his mother, Vivian Griffin.The memory unfolded in the sprawling, manicured gardens of the old Griffin estate.Back then, they weren’t billionaires, but they were the elite of the county.Harold’s best friend wasn’t a Griffin.It was Leo, the son of the estate’s head stableman.They were inseparable.Leo was bold and charismatic, with a laugh that made Harold’s stiff, disciplined life feel bearable.“We’re brothers, right, Harold?” Leo had asked one afternoon, perched high in the branches of an oak tree. “When we grow up, we’ll run this place together.”“Brothers,” Harold had whispered, looking up with genuine adoration.But the core memory that broke Harold came during the Griffins’ annual Autumn Gala, th
CHAPTER 627
The thought hit him like a physical blow. He pictured her not as a ghost, but as a prisoner in some dark, concrete hell, waiting for a son who thought she was under six feet of dirt.The guilt was instantaneous, a suffocating wave that threatened to break his composure.He had been playing for stocks and buildings while his mother was being held by gangsters."She’s alive," Tedmond repeated, his voice barely a breath."She was too valuable to kill," Harold sneered, enjoying the way Tedmond’s face had finally crumbled. "And now, you'll never find her. Every day you spend in that penthouse, just know she’s under the dirt… just not the kind you think."Tedmond’s inner struggle was visible in the frantic twitch of his eyes.The logic that had made him a king was battling the raw, bleeding hope of a son.He wanted to scream, to wrap his hands around Harold's throat and tear the location from him, but he was paralyzed by the weight of the lie he had lived for years."Tedmond!" Persis’s voic
CHAPTER 626
The air in the room vanished, replaced by a raw, jagged panic.The low, professional murmurs of the gallery spiked into a chorus of terror.Reporters scrambled over one another, the sound of heavy benches scraping against the floorboards echoing like thunder."He has a gun! Get down!" someone shrieked from the back.A woman’s sharp, piercing scream cut through the chaos, followed by the frantic sobbing of a clerk who had crawled beneath a desk."TEDMOND!" Harold roared again, the sound tearing from his throat like an animal's.Tedmond didn’t hesitate.In a single he stepped in front of Persis.
CHAPTER 625
“Order!” The Judge hammered his gavel until the room fell into a deathly silence.He leaned over the bench, eyes fixed on the three brothers.“I have sat on this bench for thirty years. I have seen killers, thieves, and monsters. But rarely do I see men who look at the lives they’ve destroyed… lives of their own blood and lives of the poor and demand ‘fairness.’”Flipping through the final pages of the indictment, he continued,“The evidence provided by the whistleblower, who, for the record, has delivered more forensic proof than I’ve seen in a decade, is overwhelming. The accidental deaths resulted from grade-four steel being used where grade-one was required. You traded lives for profit margins. And the treatment of the minor in your care…”The Judge’s eyes softened briefly as they flicked to Tedmond, then hardened again.“It is a miracle he survived you at all.”“We didn’t know!” Harold pleaded, voice now a pathetic whine. “The contractors lied to us!”“The signatures on the cost-
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Tedmond didn’t reply.He walked toward his car, Thomas already holding the door open.As the sedan pulled away, leaving the prison and the name Griffin in the rearview mirror, Tedmond caught his reflection in the tinted glass. The revenge was complete. For the first time in years, the air he breathed felt entirely his own.*****Despite the winter chill outside, the central courtroom sweltered. The air conditioning had failed under the strain of the packed gallery, and the heat from camera lights turned the room into an oven. The thick scent of old wood, sweat, and the electric tension of a falling dynasty clung to the air.The heavy doors at the back swung open. Silence fell. Tedmond entered.To his right, Thomas remained watchful and composed. To his left, Persis moved with effortless grace, her presence commanding enough to make frantic reporters lower their microphones.They took seats in the front row, directly behind the prosecution. Tedmond folded his hands, face a mask
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Seeing the look on Tedmond’s face, confusion flared across Harold’s.“What do you mean?”Tedmond chuckled.“She is indeed my partner, Harold. But the money? The empire? That isn’t hers. It’s mine.”Harold scoffed, a flicker of old arrogance returning.“Yours? Don’t be ridiculous. Since when do you have anything? Even if you’d started a small business five years ago, it wouldn’t have grown into an entity capable of swallowing the Griffin Group. You were a nobody.”“It was my mother’s business,” Tedmond said quietly.Harold froze. The name of the woman he had discarded decades ago seemed to hang in the stale air like a ghost. Then, he began to laugh, a sharp, mocking sound.“Your mother? That beggar? That thief? Tedmond, she didn’t have a cent to her name when I kicked her out!”“She wasn’t a beggar, Harold. And she certainly wasn’t a thief,” Tedmond’s gaze turned lethal, voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.“She was the daughter of an incredibly wealthy, powerful family who chose t
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