Chapter 5 - What Isabelle Found
Damian did not kill Grant.
Ten years earlier, he would have.
Five years earlier, probably.
But Isabelle had changed the way he understood strength long before he understood that she had.
So Damian walked out.
Grant's smile finally disappeared.
Lucas followed him upstairs.
“You believe him?”
“I believe he wants me angry.”
“That's not what I asked.”
Damian stopped.
“No.”
But he did.
His father, Richard Hale, had died in a warehouse bombing fourteen years earlier.
Grant had been the one who identified the Calloways as responsible.
Grant had been the one who brought Damian the intercepted messages.
Grant had been the one who helped Damian retaliate.
The similarities were impossible to ignore.
A manufactured trail.
A convenient enemy.
A grieving Hale who trusted evidence delivered by Grant Doyle.
Damian had made the same mistake twice.
The first time had started a war.
The second had destroyed his marriage.
He called Isabelle.
She answered immediately.
“I need to show you something.”
“Can it wait?”
“No.”
“Then come here.”
Damian was surprised.
“To Emma's?”
“Yes.”
When he arrived, Isabelle had covered the dining table with documents.
Emma had gone upstairs, giving them privacy.
Isabelle wore jeans and a cream sweater. The faint curve of pregnancy was still invisible, but Damian could no longer look at her without knowing.
It changed everything.
Not his responsibility toward her.
His awareness of everything he had nearly lost.
“What is this?”
“The reason I was looking at Northstar.”
She pushed a folder toward him.
“I wasn't auditing your charity because I was bored.”
Damian opened it.
Several payments had gone through a nonprofit founded by his mother decades earlier.
The money eventually disappeared into Grant's shell companies.
But another name appeared repeatedly.
Richard Hale.
His father.
“These transactions predate his death.”
“Yes.”
Damian looked up.
“By almost a year.”
“Keep reading.”
He did.
There were invoices for private investigators.
Payments to attorneys.
And a photocopy of a handwritten letter.
Damian recognized his father's handwriting immediately.
If anything happens to me, Grant cannot be trusted.
The room went silent.
“Where did you get this?”
“Your mother's archived files.”
Damian stared at her.
“You've had it?”
“Three days.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Her expression changed.
“I was going to.”
He understood before she finished.
“Before I accused you.”
“Yes.”
The cruelty of the timing nearly took his breath away.
She had been preparing to warn him that the man he trusted most might have betrayed his father.
Grant discovered she was investigating.
Then he framed her first.
Damian sat down.
For once, Isabelle saw the powerful man vanish.
He became simply a son.
“My father knew.”
“It looks that way.”
“And I spent fourteen years believing his killers were the Calloways.”
“You believed what someone deliberately constructed for you.”
Damian laughed bitterly.
“Sound familiar?”
She said nothing.
He looked at her.
“Why aren't you angry?”
“I am.”
“You should hate me.”
“Don't tell me what I should feel.”
He nodded.
“You're right.”
She gathered several papers.
“I don't want Grant escaping because we're too busy discussing our marriage.”
“Our marriage matters.”
“So does staying alive.”
“Both can matter.”
Her eyes met his.
That was the first moment she saw genuine change.
Old Damian would have insisted.
New Damian listened.
They worked until nearly midnight.
Forensic records revealed Richard Hale had discovered Grant secretly moving money.
Grant was only twenty-six then, ambitious and deeply in debt.
Richard intended to remove him.
Three weeks later, Richard died.
But Grant hadn't acted alone.
The bombing required access to Hale security.
Someone older.
Someone trusted.
Isabelle pointed to a repeated authorization signature.
“Who is M.V.?”
Damian stared.
“Marcus Vale.”
“Who?”
“My father's attorney.”
“Still alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Damian's face darkened.
“He sits on the board of Hale Industries.”
The traitor had never left.
He had been sitting across from Damian every month for fourteen years.
A floorboard creaked upstairs.
Damian's hand moved instinctively toward his weapon.
Emma appeared.
“Relax, Scarface. It's me.”
Isabelle covered a laugh.
Damian stared at Emma.
“Scarface?”
“You have a scar.”
“It's barely visible.”
“I was workshopping.”
For the first time in weeks, Isabelle laughed.
Actually laughed.
Damian looked at her.
The sound hurt beautifully.
She noticed him staring and stopped.
“Don't make it weird.”
“I wasn't.”
“You were.”
Emma pointed toward Damian.
“He absolutely was.”
Damian, feared by men across three states, found himself outnumbered in a Massachusetts kitchen.
Then every light went out.
The house plunged into darkness.
Damian stood instantly.
“Emma, upstairs.”
“What happened?”
“Now.”
A vehicle accelerated outside.
Then came the crash of breaking glass.
A metal cylinder rolled across the floor.
Damian recognized it.
“Move!”
He grabbed Isabelle and pulled her behind the kitchen island.
Smoke exploded through the room.
Men entered through the rear door.
Damian fired once.
A body fell.
He kept Isabelle behind him as Lucas's security team converged outside.
Gunfire cracked through the house.
Isabelle gripped Damian's jacket.
“Emma!”
“Daniel has her.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I planned an evacuation route.”
She stared at him.
“You planned—”
“I promised no guards inside. I didn't promise I wouldn't plan.”
Under any other circumstances she might have argued.
Then a masked man appeared through the smoke.
His gun aimed directly at Isabelle.
Damian moved before thinking.
The shot fired.
Isabelle screamed.
Damian staggered.
Blood spread across his shirt.
He stayed upright long enough to shoot the attacker.
Then his knees hit the floor.
“Damian!”
Isabelle caught him.
His hand immediately went to her stomach.
“Are you hit?”
“No.”
“The baby?”
“I'm fine.”
Only then did he seem to register his own wound.
His head dropped against her shoulder.
Isabelle pressed both hands against the blood pouring from his side.
“Stay awake.”
He looked at her.
“I'm sorry.”
“Not now.”
“I should've believed you.”
“Damian.”
“I should've chosen you.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“Stay awake and tell me later.”
His mouth curved faintly.
“Is that permission?”
“To apologize. Nothing else.”
May you like
“I'll take it.”
Then his eyes closed.
