Chapter 9
564words
The shareholders meeting dissolved into chaos, ending only when police arrived.
Ethan was rushed to the hospital, but a prison cell awaited him after recovery.
I submitted everything—the money laundering evidence, the bribery records, all from my brother's cloud drive.
The police reopened investigations into my father's and brother's deaths.
The truth quickly emerged.
Ethan Lane's empire collapsed completely on what should have been his coronation day.
Frank Chen didn't escape justice either; his involvement in shorting Howard Group was equally criminal.
I honored our agreement, sending the contract for ten percent of Chen Group shares to his detention cell.
I wonder what he thought when he received it.
One month later, I visited the detention center where my father had died.
In the same visitation room, I faced Ethan Lane.
He'd lost considerable weight, his prison uniform hanging loosely, his hair cropped short revealing his pale scalp.
Those eyes that once held tender smiles now contained only hollow emptiness.
He registered my presence without reaction, sitting motionless.
We faced each other in silence across the glass partition.
After a long silence, he finally spoke, his voice unrecognizably hoarse.
"Why?"
"Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
I regarded him, feeling nothing.
"Tell you?" I replied calmly. "Tell you, so you could murder me with a clearer conscience and inherit everything?"
"Tell you my father worked tirelessly until his death to give you your inheritance? Tell you my brother was murdered simply because he discovered your plan and tried to protect our family?"
"Ethan Lane, did you deserve to know?"
His body began shaking violently, hands clutching his head as he emitted animal-like whimpers.
"I didn't know… I swear I didn't know…"
"You didn't know?" I sneered. "Does ignorance give you the right to murder? Does it justify building your revenge on innocent blood?"
"My mother?" He suddenly looked up, eyes desperate with hope. "Where is she? Is she alright?"
Even now, he still cared about the woman he'd tried to institutionalize.
"She's fine," I told him. "I've already removed her from that facility. Though she likely never wants to see you again."
I removed a document from my bag and pressed it against the glass.
It was an old will.
In Harrison Howard's handwriting.
"My father searched for this but never found it before his death. Your planted secretary had hidden it well."
"Take a look. See what you threw away."
Ethan's gaze fell on the will. When he read "…thirty percent of Howard Group shares shall be gifted to my son, Ethan Lane…" he completely shattered.
He began frantically banging his head against the glass, creating dull thuds.
"Aaaaaaah!"
He howled and sobbed like a wounded animal.
His face contorted with tears and mucus, utterly wretched.
I watched him silently until our time ended.
I stood to leave.
"Nina!" he suddenly called, his swollen red eyes pleading. "We… do we still have a chance?"
I paused without turning back.
"Ethan, when my father died in this place, it must have been very cold, right?"
"When my brother plunged into that river, he must have felt such desperation, right?"
"You ask if we still have a chance?"
"In your next life—no, in all your future lives—go ask them in hell."
I pulled open the door and walked away.
His anguished cries faded behind me.
