THE WOMAN HE WAS ORDERED TO DESTROY3 / 3

Chapter 3 THE HEIR

The Valerion estate loomed behind iron gates and ancient stone walls, tucked away from the city inside sprawling gardens and tall cypress trees. It always felt more like a private fortress than a family home. From the outside, nothing about the place even hinted at warmth. The building itself was all pale stone, towering windows, carved columns, and those black iron balconies that watched over the grounds like silent sentinels. Inside, the hush grew even thicker. Servants moved soundlessly. The lighting stayed low. Even the dining room, with that endless mahogany table, seemed built to remind everyone just how long the Valerions had been accumulating power.

Caspian Valerion had claimed his usual spot-three seats from his father, fingers resting by his untouched wine glass-half-listening to the conversation swirling around him. He'd grown up in rooms just like this, surrounded by people who wouldn't say a word unless they'd weighed and measured it first. Still, he'd never really enjoyed the performance of it all. His father could turn a casual meal into a negotiation with nothing more than a glance, and his grandmother could threaten someone with the same tone she used to comment on rain. Caspian learned fast-silence usually gave him more than words ever could, especially when people across the table believed they held the reins.

He was thirty, and already every magazine and business column called him the face of the 'next generation'. You'd find his name in financial journals, but rarely at social events or interviews. He ducked out whenever he could-unless he had a reason to be there. He'd inherited his grandmother's discipline, his father's sharp, calculating mind, and neither of their patience for people who equated money with intelligence. Give him numbers over gossip any day, strategy over spectacle, certainty over emotion. His place-as heir-had been set long before he understood what that even meant. And at this table, nobody needed reminding who he was.

Well. Maybe everyone except his father, who never failed to point out that being the heir didn't make him free.

Dinner was nearly over when Octavian Valerion set his napkin down and looked straight at his son.

"Caspian."

One word. But it snapped the air in the room. Seraphine looked up from her wine. Leontine kept eating, as if she already knew what was coming. Caspian didn't answer-just watched his father.

Octavian reached for a thin black folder at his side and slid it down the table.

Caspian caught it, glancing at the name printed on top.

VESPERA LAURENT.

He didn't open it right away.

"Who is she?"

"Find her before she finds us."

Caspian's face stayed calm, but his grip on the folder tightened. He opened it, staring at a photo of a young woman. Her expression wasn't inviting, but it wasn't scared, either. At first glance, Vespera Laurent seemed almost pointedly ordinary-dark hair falling around her shoulders, refined features that weren't trying too hard, and eyes that met the camera straight on.

He flipped the photograph over.

Twenty-five. No big inheritance. No powerful friends. No relevant job. No criminal record. No sign of ties to the usual suspects-no mobsters, no political groups, no rival families. She worked, lived quietly, kept out of the spotlight most of her life. The kind of person nobody would notice-except here she was, getting all this scrutiny.

He looked up.

"Why?"

Octavian kept silent.

Caspian closed the folder partway. "You're using PIs to track a random woman with no money, no political weight, and no link to our competitors. You know where she lives, who she talks to, where she works, what she's searching for. That's a lot of attention for someone you think is insignificant."

"She isn't insignificant."

"Then what is she?"

Octavian's gaze hardened.

"Her mother was Isolde Laurent."

That name landed with a weight Caspian couldn't ignore, but he couldn't immediately place it. He looked from the folder to his father.

"Isolde Laurent disappeared nineteen years ago."

"She did more than disappear."

Leontine's voice cut in for the first time. Caspian turned toward her. His grandmother-immaculately composed, silver hair pulled back-could stop Octavian mid-sentence without even trying.

"What did she do?" Caspian asked.

Octavian reopened the folder and slid a few papers toward him.

"Twenty-five years ago, this family faced an incident that almost wiped us out."

Caspian's stare turned cold.

"But the company survived."

Octavian nodded. "Because we made damn sure it did."

He passed over an old financial report, yellowed around the edges, markings and handwriting he didn't recognize splashed across it. Below that, a grainy night photo of a Valerion warehouse.

"Isolde worked in one of our financial divisions. She had access to things she never should have seen."

Caspian leaned in.

"What, exactly?"

"Enough to destroy us."

"So why wasn't she charged?"

His father hesitated. But even a short pause told Caspian enough.

Eventually, Octavian looked away. "The situation got complicated."

Caspian almost laughed. That was the word people like his father used when the real story was too dangerous to say aloud.

He scanned the documents-records of shell companies, hidden accounts, vanished assets. Losses big enough to cripple any international expansion. Handwritten notes, and Isolde Laurent's name standing out beside several suspicious transactions.

Caspian narrowed his eyes.

"She stole from us?"

"That's the official story."

"Official?"

Octavian didn't blink. "The evidence was strong."

Caspian turned another page. More photos-a burned warehouse, scattered police reports, internal memos. A fire had wiped out confidential records-and several people from the finance team. Gone.

He stared at the photo of the ruins.

"She destroyed all this?"

"Among other things."

"And Vespera?"

"She was six."

Caspian's gaze drifted back to the woman's photo. Something wasn't adding up. He'd spent enough time tearing apart corporate disasters to spot when documents were massaged, not just recorded. Some parts were too neat, others missing entirely-pages absent, references to other files that weren't here.

He turned back to the financial report and froze.

His eyes ran over the date again.

"Father."

Octavian nodded at him.

"This report is dated March."

"Yes."

"But the acquisition closed in September."

A quiet hung in the air.

Caspian flipped through the stack again.

"These transactions happened after this report was supposedly filed. So either the date's wrong, or the report was changed later."

Octavian's look didn't change. "It was archived in error."

"That doesn't fix the paperwork."

"It's irrelevant."

"It isn't if you expect me to find this woman using records that don't line up."

Octavian leaned back. "You're overthinking it."

Caspian just stared at him. That wasn't how his father worked. Octavian Valerion built his empire by catching details like these before anyone else could.

Caspian closed the file.

"So what do you want from me?"

"Get close to her."

Simple. Calm. Still, it had the force of a blow.

Caspian's jaw tightened. "Why?"

"She's asking questions."

"What kind of questions?"

"About her mother."

He glanced at the photo again. "You think she's found something."

"I know she has."

"What?"

Octavian's eyes froze over. "Something Isolde left behind."