Chapter 217
[ 484 words ]
Chapter 217:
“We have to stop her,” Harper whispered, scrambling to her knees. She grabbed the hem of Cornelia’s silk robe. “Mom, please. We have to get rid of her.”
Cornelia stopped pacing and looked down at her daughter. A slow, terrifying smile stretched across her face — the smile of a predator that had finally cornered its prey.
Cornelia reached down and gently stroked Harper’s red, swollen cheek.
“We are not going to play games with schedules and rumors anymore, Harper,” Cornelia said softly. “You cannot fight a weed by pulling its leaves. You have to rip it out by the root.”
Cornelia leaned down, bringing her face inches from Harper’s ear.
“I have already made contact with a specialized team from the underground,” Cornelia whispered. “Cleaners. Professionals who know how to make a problem disappear without leaving a single fingerprint.”
Harper’s breath hitched. Her eyes widened. She was talking about murder.
𝘙o𝗆𝖺𝗻𝖼e 𝗻𝘰𝘷𝘦l𝗌 𝗼𝗇 𝗀аlnо𝘃е𝗅ѕ.𝗰𝗈𝘮
“Jarrod is deployed,” Cornelia stated, her eyes flashing with dark triumph. “But his lapdogs are still here. However, I’ve found a blind spot in their surveillance net. This is our only window. We have to strike before he realizes what’s happening.”
Cornelia gripped Harper’s chin, forcing the girl to look her in the eye.
“But until it is done, you will sit in this room, you will be quiet, and you will not cause another scene,” Cornelia warned. “Do you understand me?”
Harper stared into her mother’s dead eyes. The fear in her chest mutated into a sick, twisted excitement. She nodded her head violently.
“Yes,” Harper whispered. “I understand.”
Cornelia let go of her chin, stood up, and looked out the window into the pitch-black night. The trap was set. The money was paid. Caroline Thompson was already a dead woman walking.
Back on the second floor, the atmosphere in the General’s study had shifted from a battlefield to a quiet, intense negotiation.
The General leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desk. He studied Caroline’s face, deeply impressed by her intellect and her absolute refusal to be intimidated. But there was one massive piece of the puzzle that still did not fit.
“You are a highly intelligent woman, Miss Thompson,” the General said, his voice dropping into a low, serious register. “You clearly do not care about our money, and you are immune to our titles.”
He paused, his pale blue eyes locking onto hers.
“So tell me,” the General demanded softly. “What brilliant, manipulative tactic did you use to force Jarrod to sign that marriage certificate? How did you trap him?”
The General’s underlying assumption remained: Jarrod was the prize, and Caroline was the hunter who had successfully snared him.
Caroline stared at the old man. For a second, she was genuinely stunned by his arrogance. Then a short, sharp laugh escaped her lips. It wasn’t a tactical laugh. It was a sound of pure, unfiltered irony.
She shook her head, dropping the polite facade completely. The temperature in her gray eyes plummeted to absolute zero.
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