The Billionaire Ruthless Obsession

Before The Sun Rises

I woke to cold sheets. For several seconds, I stared at the empty space beside me. Bryan was gone. My stomach tightened. Then I noticed the folded note on the bedside table. I picked it up.

Laura,

I had an emergency meeting I couldn't postpone. I didn't want to wake you. Stay here until I return.

—Bryan

I read it twice. 'An emergency meeting.' I asked myself.

Of course. Men like Bryan Nimrod didn't disappear from billion-dollar empires simply because they had spent a night with a woman. Still, something about his absence unsettled me. I got out of bed. My clothes were neatly arranged on a chair. My shoes were beside them. On the table sat a cup of coffee. Still warm. I stared at it. He had left before I woke. But he had made sure I had coffee.

A strange tenderness settled over me. Then my phone vibrated.

One message.

From an unknown number.

YOU SHOULD LISTEN TO BRYAN.

My blood went cold.

Another message appeared.

THEY STILL WANT YOU DEAD.

I stared at the screen.

Then came the final message.

A photograph where my mother was standing beside Bryan. Taken twenty-one years ago. My fingers began to tremble. Why had my mother known Bryan? And why had he never told me?

I zoomed into the photograph. There was something in my mother's hand. A document. A symbol stamped across the corner. I recognised it immediately. The same symbol appeared on the fraudulent board documents Richard had used the night before. My heart began pounding. This wasn't about my inheritance. It had never been only about the company. Someone had wanted my mother dead. And now they wanted me dead too.

The penthouse door suddenly opened. I spun around. Bryan stood in the doorway. His expression was grim.

“Laura.”

I held up my phone.

“What is this?”

When he saw the photograph, his face changed. Not fear. Recognition.

“You weren't supposed to see that yet.”

“Yet?”

I walked toward him.

“You knew.”

“Laura”

“You knew my mother.”

“Yes.”

“You knew she was investigating something.”

“Yes.”

“You knew Richard was involved.”

His silence confirmed it.

“And you knew someone wanted me dead.”

“Yes.”

My voice shook.

“Then tell me the truth.”

Bryan closed the door behind him. He walked toward me slowly.

“There is something I should have told you before last night.”

“What?”

He stopped directly in front of me.

“Your mother's death wasn't the beginning.”

His eyes locked onto mine.

“It was the middle.”

My heart stopped.

“What happened before her death?”

Bryan's jaw tightened.

“The people responsible for what happened to your mother have been waiting for you to return.”

I stared at him.

“Why?”

His answer came quietly.

“Because your mother left something behind.”

“What?”

Bryan reached into his coat. Before he could show me, the penthouse lights suddenly went out. The entire building plunged into darkness. Then every screen in the room flickered to life simultaneously. One sentence appeared in red:

WELCOME HOME, LAURA SANDERS.

Bryan immediately moved in front of me. His voice dropped into a deadly whisper.

“Don't move.”

The screens changed. A live video appeared.

Richard.

Chloe.

And behind them stood a man I had never seen before. He looked directly into the camera. Then smiled.

“Your mother should have destroyed it twenty-one years ago.”

The screen went black. Bryan turned toward me.

“What did she leave behind?”

I whispered.

“I don't know.”

A gunshot exploded somewhere inside the penthouse. Bryan grabbed me and pulled me behind him. And suddenly, I understood. The night wasn't over. It had only begun.