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812 Words
The underground parking lot was a labyrinth of cold concrete and flickering fluorescent lights. The moment Liam Martin stepped out of his car, he witnessed a common yet sordid scene: two men were half-carrying, half-dragging a woman toward a parked vehicle. Her head hung limp, long dark hair veiling her face, clearly unconscious.
In River City’s nightlife, such sights were tragically frequent. Normally, Liam wouldn't spare a second glance. He was turning to leave when a flash of silver caught his eye—the woman’s high heels.
He froze. He recognized those shoes. More importantly, he recognized the elegant, ivory curve of her legs. They were identical to Chloe Bishop's.
His brow furrowed as his gaze shifted to the man holding her. It was Caleb, a notorious lecher from Cloud City. In an instant, Liam’s aura turned murderous. He didn't think; he simply charged.
Caleb paled as he recognized the powerhouse approaching. "Quick! Stop him!" he shrieked at his bodyguard.
The guard barely took two steps before Liam’s foot slammed into his chest. The man was sent flying, crashing into a concrete pillar with a sickening thud.
Caleb scrambled back, using Chloe’s limp body as a human shield. "Don't come any closer!"
"Hand her over," Liam commanded, his voice a low, rhythmic growl of pure fury. By now, he was certain. The woman in the dirt was Chloe.
Seeing his guard incapacitated and Liam looming over him like a God of Death, Caleb’s courage vanished. He shoved Chloe toward Liam with a desperate grunt. "Fine! Take her!" Then, he bolted into the shadows.
A dark figure—Vince, Xavier’s top operative who had been tracking Chloe—sprinted from the periphery. He intercepted Caleb with a brutal kick to the gut, pinning him to the oily floor and raining down heavy, disciplined punches.
Liam didn't wait for the aftermath. He scooped Chloe into his arms and sprinted to his white Porsche, tires Screeching as he tore out of the garage.
Vince stopped his assault just long enough to pull out his phone. His voice was grim as he patched through to the "Demon CEO."
"Master Xavier... Chloe has been taken by Liam Martin."
The Erased Legacy
Liam drove like a madman to a secluded villa on the outskirts of the city—a private sanctuary he rarely visited. The iron gates groaned open, and he carried Chloe inside, laying her gently upon the cream-colored velvet sofa.
In the soft glow of the living room, Chloe looked like a fallen angel. Her obsidian hair spilled across the cushions, and her skin, flushed pink from the combination of alcohol and the drug, glowed with a delicate, ethereal beauty. She was breathtaking, a siren lost in a forced slumber.
Liam stared at the woman who had been his shadow for six long years. His emotions were a tangled web of regret, possession, and a strange, rising panic.
He reached out to remove her designer bag to make her more comfortable, but as he moved it, her smartphone slid out onto the rug. Guided by a dark, irresistible impulse, Liam picked it up. He took Chloe’s limp hand, pressing her thumb against the sensor.
Click.
The screen unlocked, but the sight that met his eyes felt like a physical blow to the heart. The wallpaper—which for years had been a candid, glowing photo of the two of them—was gone. In its place was an image of a red hourglass sitting lonely on a windswept beach, its fine sand being scattered by the ocean breeze.
Beside the image was a single line of text: "The past is like smoke. Since it cannot be held, let it scatter with the wind."
Liam’s chest tightened painfully. He frantically tapped into her photo gallery. It was a wasteland. Every selfie, every anniversary dinner photo, every memory of their six years together had been systematically purged. The only thing left were a few recent photos of a newborn baby—Liam Jr.
He opened their old messaging apps, searching for her digital journals or the "Love Logs" she used to keep. Nothing. Not a trace.
Chloe Bishop hadn't just left him; she had incinerated every footprint of his existence from her life. She had wiped the slate so clean that it was as if Liam Martin had never existed at all.
Liam stared at the empty screen, the silence of the villa ringing in his ears. He had thrown her away, expecting her to wait in the shadows forever. But as he looked at her sleeping form, he realized the terrifying truth: while he was busy protecting Sara, Chloe had already moved on to a world where he was a ghost.
Will Liam try to force his way back into her heart tonight, or will Xavier Grayson arrive to reclaim what is legally his?
- Writer
