CHAPTER 9: THE FIRST RETALIATION

 From the moment Damien stepped from his car, he recognized that something was amiss.

The air outside his penthouse was too quiet.

His security detail — permanently camped at the threshold — was not there.

No calls. No alerts. Just gone.

Damien fidgeted with his cuff links, all his body movements deliberate and measured. He wouldn't be the kind of man to allow his feelings to determine his actions. 

But tonight there was a dangerous energy coiling in his muscles.

Richard Lancaster had finally hit back.

He stepped inside the building, silent against the marble. The moment he arrived at the elevator, he spotted it — the door to his penthouse cracked open.

A warning. A challenge.

He stepped inside.

The smell of rich whiskey soaked the air, but something under it didn't smell right.

Like iron. Like blood.

And then he saw the body.

In a stark white-clean living room.

One of his men.

Dead.

A single gunshot wound to the head — clean, professional. Not a chaotic message, but one of precision.

Damien set his jaw as the fist tightened.

Richard was not there for his business. He had come for his life.

And the war had only just become deadly.

His phone buzzed, shattering the silence.

Unknown number.

He picked it up and brought it to his ear without responding.

There was a low chuckle on the other end.

"Impressive, isn't it?" Richard Lancaster's voice oozed smooth with smug satisfaction.

 "I thought I would do the same for her." 

"You embarrassed me in public — so I figured I'd embarrass you… in Private "

Damien gripped the phone more tightly. "You made a mistake."

Richard clucked in fake amusement. "Did I? Or did I just remind you who you're fucking with?"

A pause.

Then Richard's voice took on an edge. "Stay out of my way, Cross. Or next time it will not be one of your men."

The call ended.

Damien hung up, his heart rate steady —but the rage was white-hot.

Richard took this as a warning.

But Damien was not in the warning business.

He believed in retaliation.

***

Isla shook out her hands as she pulled the surrounding coat, getting out of the car.

The past twenty-four hours had been a crash course in betrayal, and now she was in the front line of a war she didn't entirely understand.

But there was one thing she understood — her father had sent the message tonight. And if she knew him at all, it wouldn't conclude with a body.

The elevator doors slid open and Isla entered Damien's penthouse.

It was as if someone was choking on the tension in the air.

And then she saw him.

Damien was at the bar, facing away, staring at the skyline as if he could see the next five moves on the board.

She swallowed hard. "Damien."

He turned, and now for the first time she saw real fury in his eyes. 

Not the cool, detached amusement he typically wore. This was something darker.

Something lethal.

"You're late," he said, his voice flat.

She frowned. "Late for what?"

Damien paced toward her, slow, a noose tightening around her by the second. 

"Slow to realize something very important, Isla."

He halted mere inches away, gaze locking onto hers.

"I don't lose."

A shiver ran down her spine.

He dug into his pocket and held up a mini, black flash drive.

" Your father intends to play dirty? " Damien murmured.

 "Then let's turn his whole world to ash."

The War Escalates

Isla's heart pounded.

She had expected anger. Expected retaliation.

But the way Damien was looking at her now — like she was no longer just Richard Lancaster's daughter but something useful — rattled her more than she wanted to admit.

She swallowed over and looked at the flash drive. 

"What's on it?"

Damien's lips twitched, but there was no mirth on them.

"Proof."

Isla curled her fingers into fists. 

"Of what?"

Damien did not blink and held her gaze. 

"That your father's not just laundering money" 

He stepped in closer, voice dropping.

 "He's financing something far worse."

Her breath caught. "What are you talking about?"

Damien stared at her for a long moment, as if he were deciding what he wanted to tell her. Then, finally—

"He's buying loyalty, Isla. Not only politicians and businessmen—he's buying men. Dangerous men. Mercenaries. Criminals."

Her stomach twisted. "That's not—"

Damien cut her off. "Do not tell me it is not possible. You've lived under his roof. You know what he can do."

She did.

That was the problem.

They were interrupted by a sharp knock.

One of Damien's men came in, his face grim. 

"Sir. We have intel just in—Lancaster's men are on the move. Fast."

Damien let out a long breath, as if he had been expecting this.

"Then it's time we whacked first."

He turned back to Isla, eyes glinting like a tracker stalking prey.

"Are you ready to pick a side?"

The weight of the question loomed over her like a storm cloud.

Was she?

Could she actually betray the man who raised her?

Or was Richard the one who already betrayed her first?

Isla squared her shoulders, raised her chin.

And answered.

***

Richard Lancaster's words hung heavy in the silence long after the call ended.

" Or next time won't be one of your men "

Damien shut his eyes for a few seconds, breathing through his nose and exhaling, slowly.

A weaker man may have cut loose — gunned someone, hired a hit, gone nuclear. But Damien wasn't an impulsive man.

He was a man of precision.

And Richard had just provided him the perfect excuse to hurry his plans along.

One nod to his security detail, and his men moved with silent efficiency, sweeping the penthouse, securing the perimeter, disposing of the body.

Damien looked to his right-hand man, Jax Monroe—an ex-intelligence agent gone enforcer. Jax was already typing on his tablet, going through the security footage. His face remained impassive.

"They scrubbed the external feeds," Jax said darkly. 

"Someone trained did this."

Damien's jaw flexed. "Of course they were."

Richard Lancaster did not hire common criminals. 

He employed specters — fellows who could vanish without a trace.

But Damien had hunted ghosts for years.

He straightened his cuffs, cold voice. 

"Learn who pulled the trigger." 

A pause. Then — 

"And see that they don't live to do it again."

Jax nodded once and walked off, already calling.

Damien's gaze shifted back to the city sky, the reflections of the glass looking as dark as him.

This wasn't just a warning.

This was an invitation.

And Richard Lancaster had just welcomed the devil to his door.

***

Since the body, Isla hadn't stopped shaking.

The picture etched in her brain — blood and white marble, the contrast almost beautiful in its cruelty.

She wasn't naive. She understood the world she had been raised in. 

But the knowledge of something and the sight of something were not the same.

And now, here in Damien's penthouse, she understood something horrid.

Her father hadn't simply messaged Damien.

He had sent a message to her.

Richard had never directly threatened her before, but he didn't need to. 

His silence said more than any statement could. He was reminding her not a lot of people defy him and live.

And if she weren't careful, she might be next.

Damien's voice broke through her spiraling thoughts.

"Do you know what just happened?"

She looked at him and swallowed hard. 

"My father made his move."

Damien studied her carefully. 

"And?"

Her hands curled into fists. 

"And I'm done pretending that this is merely a business dispute."

A slow, appreciative smile spread across Damien's face.

"Good," he murmured. 

"Because the actual war begins now."

He spun around, reaching for the flash drive he had flashed before her. 

"This has the evidence we need to take your father down."

Isla stared at it. "Expose him to whom?"

"To the people he most fears." Damien's voice had a lethal calmness. 

"The investors that will leave him. The powers that will go on to find him The men he's … betrayed along the way — the ones who have been waiting for an excuse to put a bullet in the back of his head."

He moved closer, a larger-than-life presence. 

"You have a choice, Isla. You can just walk away, pretend none of this exists." His fingers brushed her chin, turning her face to his. 

"Or you can help me take him down."

Isla's heartbeat thumped in her ears.

This was it. The moment of no return.

For years, she had been the perfect daughter to her father. Played by his rules. Defended his legacy.

But what if she had never been meant to protect that legacy?

What if it always had been a cage?

She lifted her chin, eyes pinned to Damien's. 

"What do you need me to do?"

His smirk deepened. "That's my girl."

Meanwhile…

Richard Lancaster did not pour himself a glass of scotch, but miles away he tapped his fingers on the crystal glass.

His chief of private security, Donovan Wells, stood before him, arms crossed.

"It was a clean job," Donovan said.

 "No evidence linked us to this."

Richard swirled his drink. "And Damien Cross?"

"He's still standing."

Richard tightened his grip around the glass. 

Naturally Damien had not begun to fall.

This bastard was a tougher bastard than most.

But that was fine.

Because Richard wasn't ready to kill him yet.

No, he was thinking of something much worse.

He whirled, eyes glinting with sadistic delight. 

"Send the next message."

Donovan hesitated. "Sir?"

Richard's smile was slow. Calculated.

"Make it personal."