Silent Scars

CHAPTER 99

The car rolled to a smooth halt before the grand hall, its glass façade gleaming under a wash of floodlights. Engines hummed in sequence around the circular drive, chauffeurs stepping out, families arriving in their curated elegance. Laughter spilled from clusters near the entrance, the kind of laughter designed to be overheard, brittle and insincere.

The French family had just arrived, their own convoy halting before the entrance. Guards stepped out first, scanning the steps with rehearsed precision. Then their patriarch, silver hair slicked back and gold rings catching the light as he adjusted his coat with the ease of a man in familiar territory.

At his side, his wife clung too close, too young against his age, her smile rehearsed and shallow.

Behind them, his eldest son followed, arrogance stitched into every line of his body. Shoulders squared, chin tilted just high enough to be insulting, he carried himself like royalty rather than a guest.

Arrogance clung to them both, thick and suffocating, impossible to mistake.

They had come to stand at Volkov's side. To lend their weight to the man who promised the Hastings would fall. The old patriarch had even imagined it, Leonardo Hastings stripped of his crown, his family humiliated. He had thought tonight would be the beginning of their end.

They moved as if the night belonged to them. For a moment, it almost did.

Until the next car pulled up.

The next arrival slid into place before the steps, black metal gleaming under the villa’s floodlit glow. For a moment, silence hung outside until the rear door clicked open from inside, not waiting for Marco's hand.

Leonardo Hastings stepped out first.

The sharp echo of his polished shoes striking the marble was enough to turn heads. He didn't glance around, didn't need to. His presence alone was enough to pull every set of eyes toward him.

But that was all it took.

The French patriarch's breath hitched. A cold shiver carved down his spine. His lips twitched before he could stop himself, curving into a smile a thin, fearful, respectful smile, the kind meant to mask weakness. His legs betrayed him, heavy as stone, as though the earth itself had shifted beneath his feet.

This was the man he had come to fight against. The man Volkov called weakened, ripe for ruin. Yet standing here, before him, Leonardo Hastings radiated something different, authority that needed no declaration, power that didn't bow to alliances or whispers.

The patriarch felt the sharp clutch of fingers at his arm. His wife's smile never faltered, but her grip tightened, nails pressing into his coat sleeve. She felt it too, the quiet terror that came with standing in the shadow of a predator.

And Leonardo?

He walked past as though they were nothing.

Marcus followed, his face carved from stone, gaze cutting briefly across the space. It was enough. The French guards shifted where they stood, caught in a moment where they didn't know whether to bow or simply disappear.

And then Domain emerged.

The third Hastings son stepped down slow, broad shoulders framed by the estate's golden lights. His eyes lifted once cold, deliberate and that was enough to make the French patriarch's throat go dry.

His son, still too young, scoffed under his breath,

"So these are the Hastings? They don't look....."

He never finished.

Domain stopped, his head turning just enough for his eyes to lock onto the boy. No words. Just a look cold, unblinking, the kind that stripped arrogance bare. The smirk drained from the boy's face in an instant.