Chapter 6

20.

I needed to gain control faster.

After several rounds of reshuffling, I began inserting my own people into the core positions of the family business—finance, auditing, legal—leaving no department untouched. Once I grasped the flow of funds, I could reach deeper places.

Next, I hired corporate investigators to dig up dirt on the family elders. I set traps, laid bait, and pressured them with debts. Their children fell into the snares I had set, one step at a time, until they had no choice but to sell off their shares—shares that eventually ended up under the names of the "clean hands" I had prepared in advance.

It should've all happened quietly. But they fell too fast, too uniformly—it still alerted my mother.

That day, she brewed a pot of Biluochun in the courtyard. The tea smelled bitter and fresh. Wind passed through the bamboo leaves, lifting a strand of her hair.

"You're too reckless," she said softly, taking a sip of tea. Her gaze never landed on me, but every word was clear. "I know what you're doing. But you're still too green. One look, and they'll trace it back to you. If your father finds out—how will you explain yourself?"

I didn't flinch under her reprimand. In fact, I was so calm it almost seemed practiced.

"Because he won't give me time to build a slow strategy," I said. "So I had to start with the faction that used to be close to you. I just didn't expect you were still keeping such a close eye on the family. I thought… after hating him for so long, you'd only intervene after I took down a few more people."

She finally looked up, something flickering in her expression.

"You were using me?"

"Don't put it so harshly," I leaned a little closer, voice softer. "I know he owes you a lot, and he's never paid for it. You hate him too, don't you? But because of the title of husband and wife, you can't strike directly. But everything the Lin family has done to hurt the Peis over the years—don't tell me you were completely in the dark?"

Her face stiffened instantly. She stared at me, eyes like deep water.

"You and your brother…" She opened her mouth, but said nothing for a long time.

"I love my brother," I said.

She opened her mouth again, seemingly ready to scold me as a mother should—but something stopped her. Her face paled slightly.

"Think it through," I said.

She wanted to see through me. To know how much I really knew, and how far I dared to go.

But in the end, she couldn't read me.

I didn't give her more time to think. I stood up and looked toward the old osmanthus tree at the edge of the courtyard. My tone was as calm as if discussing the weather:

"Let's work together. Since we both hate him, why keep bowing beneath his feet? Let's push him off his pedestal—together."

I turned and walked away before she could respond.

That afternoon, she sat in the courtyard for a long time.

The tea cooled. The wind died. Night fell.

Late that night, my phone lit up.

It was her.

She said, Okay.

21.

Mother provided me with internal confidential documents from the Pei Group board. From the outside, I slowly dismantled my father's commercial foundation.

The tactics he once taught me had now become the very tools I used to break him down.

But my father wasn't someone easily shaken.

His retaliation was swift and ruthless—my most crucial subsidiary filed for bankruptcy. Accounts were frozen. Investors pulled out. The media storm hit. My face landed on the front page of the Financial Times, with headlines like "Ungrateful Son", "Ambitious Snake", "Disgrace of the Family."

I knew—he was pulling the strings.

He cut off all my domestic financial sources and even used his influence to freeze my overseas accounts.

But I wasn't afraid.

We transferred equity under my mother's name, bypassing the trust he controlled. We drew back some old allies and slowly stabilized the situation.

But I never imagined—he had no bottom line.

One night, I came home to find my brother standing by the window, holding his phone with a complicated expression. It was our father's number.

I slammed the door shut. "You contacted him?"

He turned like he'd been burned. "I just wanted to beg him to stop—"

"Are you insane?!" I yelled at him for the first time. "He's a monster! And you're begging him?!"

His eyes turned red. "I don't want you to keep suffering because of me."

I froze.

He lowered his head, almost muttering to himself. "He said… if I agreed… he'd let you go."

Something shattered in me.

"What do you mean agreed?"

"Go back," he said quietly. "Keep dining with those men, drinking with them, going to their rooms…"

I nearly lost control. "You still want to do that kind of thing?!"

He was silent for a moment, then smiled. "You shouldn't have to end up like this. You're the heir of the Pei family. If it weren't for me, you'd be taking over the company by now, not stuck here with me…"

Breathing became difficult.

Everything after that was a blur.

Just one overwhelming anger, one consuming grievance buried deep in my bones—it spread like wildfire and devoured my soul.

I hated him—for not believing me.

He would rather let strangers touch him than believe I loved him. I was desperate to prove he was mine. He had always been mine.

I started digging into the past, my tone hysterical. I said he always treated me like a kid—didn't trust me with the Zhao family incident, tried to handle it himself and nearly got hurt, never told me anything because he thought I'd despise him.

But I never did. I only hurt for him.

He looked frightened.

At first, he tried to stay composed, answering my sharp questions lightly.

But he soon realized I had no intention of calming down.

My body temperature climbed inch by inch—like it would burn through the whole room. Even the air trembled.

His face went pale. He finally sensed something was wrong and tried to comfort me—but he wasn't an Omega. He couldn't emit calming pheromones.

That night, I lost control.

I pinned him beneath me, again and again.

Trying to erase any trace that might've been left on him, even if there was nothing there.

He cried the whole time.

He cried and said he hated this family, hated how our parents never treated him like a real son.

I was his only brother, and even I never truly saw him.

"Everyone," he choked out, "treats me like a toy. Like I'm nothing."

He sobbed so hard he couldn't breathe, eyes tinged red.

Later, his body trembled, and he cried that he'd kill me one day.

I brushed aside his wet bangs, kissed his fevered forehead, and whispered, I'm sorry.

He passed out in my arms, his body limp like water.

My tears fell on the beauty mark at the corner of his eye.

How could I not see him?

My eyes—were full of him. Only him.

It wasn't until later that I realized—I was in heat.

From the start, my pheromones had been wildly unstable—chaotic, aggressive, volatile.

But my brother, as a Beta, couldn't smell it. He had no idea what was happening.

Likewise, I couldn't smell his pheromones, nor could I mark him.

So I kept trying. Again and again, with everything I had—but I couldn't mark him.

Once, he woke in the middle of it, and the first thing he did was beg me for his phone.

His voice was so hoarse it was barely audible. Lips brushing my ear:

"I won't agree anymore," he paused, breath ragged, "just let me go… please…"

"You never should've gone to him…" I said, voice cracking with rage. "This is the punishment you deserve."

His shoulders trembled slightly.

I bit his neck instinctively.

He whimpered—soft, almost inaudible—like a dying kitten. Then he cried again.

He kept begging for the phone.

Eventually, I gave in.

He didn't call. He typed a text.

He couldn't speak anymore.

It took him three hours to finish that message.