Betrayed By The Billionaire

248

"Enough," Xavier’s voice cut through the air like a guillotine. "Don't let me hear that nonsense again."

Vince stiffened, the words of the ancient legends dying in his throat. He remembered years ago when the staff first whispered about the shifting shadows in the wine cellar. Xavier hadn't just dismissed them; he had mocked them. To prove his point, the "Demon CEO" had moved his bed into the subterranean halls for three nights, daring the ghosts to show themselves. He saw nothing. He heard nothing. To a man of logic and cold steel, if it couldn't be caught on a high-definition security feed, it didn't exist.

Xavier’s gaze returned to Chloe Bishop. Her skin was a translucent marble, her pulse a faint, frantic drumming beneath the surface. "If she’s cold, give her medicine. If she’s tired, let her sleep. Don't invent demons to excuse her lack of discipline."

Vince bowed, hiding the flash of pity in his eyes. "Yes, Sir."

The Nightmare’s Threshold

The night was a fever-dream of iron bars and bloodied faces. Chloe was trapped in a loop—the Lady in White drifting closer, the sound of her own skull hitting the metal, the crushing weight of the Grayson name. She clawed at the sheets, her whimpers ignored by the silent walls of the master suite.

When the first light of dawn finally touched the balcony, Chloe’s eyes snapped open. She bolted upright, her breath hitching in a series of sharp, panicked gasps.

She wasn't in the cellar. She was in the guest suite adjacent to Liam Jr.’s room. But the relief didn't come. The damp chill of the dungeon seemed to have settled permanently in her marrow. She wrapped the duvet around her, shivering violently, her eyes darting toward the shadows in the corner as if expecting the bars to manifest out of the air.

The door creaked open. Liam Jr. padded into the room, his small face lighting up when he saw her awake. He ran toward the bed, reaching out to grab her hand.

"STAY BACK!"

Chloe shrieked, a raw, jagged sound of pure trauma. She recoiled, her limbs flailing as she shoved the boy away with a strength born of terror. Liam Jr. tumbled onto the plush carpet, his eyes wide with shock and hurt.

He stared at his "Auntie Chloe," but he didn't see the gentle woman who read him stories. He saw a stranger with hollow eyes and a deathly pallor. He tried to speak, but the words wouldn't come. Terrified, the boy scrambled up and ran for his father.

By the time Liam Jr. dragged Xavier back into the room, the bed was empty.

The Barefoot Escape

Chloe had fled.

She hadn't stopped to put on shoes. She hadn't grabbed a coat. In her silk pajamas, her feet bruised and bleeding on the gravel driveway, she had sprinted past the iron gates of the Grayson Estate like a prisoner escaping the gallows.

In the living room, Xavier stood like a pillar of salt, his face a mask of absolute, frozen fury.

"I’ve already sent the detail to follow her," Vince reported, his voice trembling. "She ran out without even a pair of slippers. Her state of mind is... unstable, Sir. Perhaps we should bring her back by force—"

"Don't touch her," Xavier barked. "I want to see exactly where she thinks she can go."

Vince hesitated, his heart heavy. "Sir, I really believe the Young Madam is... compromised. She isn't herself."

"Are you going to tell me she’s 'hexed' again?" Xavier’s eyes flashed with a lethal sarcasm. "She’d better be possessed, Vince. Because if this is a performance—if she’s playing 'mad' just to escape the consequences of those photos—she will find that I am far less forgiving than a ghost."

Vince lowered his head. He realized Xavier truly believed this was a calculated move. A tactical retreat designed to elicit pity. He couldn't see that Chloe’s spirit had been systematically dismantled in the dark.

The Return to the Bishop Manor

The gates of the Bishop Estate swung open as a disheveled, barefoot figure stumbled through. The security guards gasped, but before they could reach her, Chloe had burst through the front door.

She collapsed into Madam Bishop’s arms, her body racking with sobs that sounded more like a wounded animal than a human being.

"Chloe! My god, your feet... you're freezing!" Madam Bishop cried out, her heart shattering at the sight of her daughter’s condition. "What happened? Did Xavier do this? Did he throw you out?"

Chloe couldn't answer. She only clutched her mother’s silk robe, burying her face away from the light, the cold of the Grayson dungeon finally giving way to a searing, hysterical heat.

The "First Socialite" has returned to her nest, but the scars on her feet are nothing compared to the fractures in her mind. Chloe has chosen her family over her "contract," but in doing so, she has declared open war on the Grayson empire. Upstairs, Xavier is watching the GPS coordinates of her phone—which she left behind—realizing that his wife has walked away from him with nothing but her life.

Will Madam Bishop call Donovan Tang to protect her daughter, or will Xavier arrive at the Bishop gates to claim what he still believes is his property?

Should the scene shift to a confrontation between the Bishop and Grayson families, or should we see Donovan Tang's reaction when he discovers Chloe fled barefoot in the night?