"My flight from Singapore landed shortly after five in the morning, two full days before anyone expected me home.

By Wednesday morning, the legal trap had snapped shut around Marcus and Eleanor.

Sterling had served the formal injunction freezing all corporate accounts linked to Marcus, while the county sheriff’s department served an emergency notice of investigation regarding financial fraud.

I was sitting in Claire’s hospital room, watching her eat her first proper meal in days, when my phone screen lit up with twenty consecutive text messages from my mother.

You are destroying this family!

How dare you involve lawyers against your own brother!

Your father would be ashamed of you!

Call me immediately or I will release your medical records to the press!

I ignored them all.

Then, at 2:00 PM, Marcus showed up in the hospital lobby.

My security guard at the door alerted me via intercom. I stepped out into the hallway and walked down to the main waiting room.

Marcus was pacing back and forth, looking disheveled. His polished exterior had vanished; his collar was open, his hair unkempt, and his eyes bloodshot.

"Julian!" he yelled as soon as he saw me, rushing forward. The two security guards immediately stepped between us, hands resting on their belts.

"Keep your distance, Marcus," I said coldly.

"Are you insane?!" Marcus screamed, uncaring of the hospital visitors watching. "The bank just froze my personal credit lines! My house in Chicago is being foreclosed on! You filed criminal charges with the DA?!"

"You embezzled four million dollars from the family charity, Marcus," I said. "And you locked my pregnant wife in a freezing outbuilding to cover your tracks. You’re lucky I’m letting the police handle you instead of dealing with you myself."

"Mother gave me permission to use those funds!" Marcus lied frantically. "It was an advance on my inheritance!"

"Father’s inheritance," I corrected, stepping closer. "And Father left you nothing except a small stipend conditioned on your complete rehab and financial independence—neither of which you achieved."

"You think you’ve won?" Marcus sneered, his tone dropping to a venomous whisper. "Mother still has the original board proxy. At the shareholder meeting on Friday, she will vote you off the board of directors. You’ll be powerless."