HADES POV

The courtroom was quiet, it was too quiet and I could hear the judge flipped pages. The creak of the wood under my chair and the heartbeat ringing in my ears. The world felt still, but inside me, everything was loud and heavy.


I didn't look at Jane and haven't since yesterday, it was not because I couldn't. But because I didn't want to.

The woman I spent years chasing and the woman who haunted my dreams and now cursed my reality. She sat straight, and. was still, cold like a statue. Like she was carved out of stone. There was no pity and no forgiveness.

The judge cleared his throat. "Will the defendant please rise?"


I stood and my legs felt like metal. It was cold and my hands behind my back were sweating. I heard whispers in the crowd. Journalists, protesters and some supporters, and some not, They have all come to see a monster.

I don't flinch. I don't blink.


The words hit like bullets.

"Guilty."

I didn't gasp and I didn't cry. I smiled, just a slight smile because I saw this coming, I saw the betrayal and the staged testimonies. The alliance was dark.

I glanced at Jane now. Her lips pressed together, but her eyes didn't move and there were no tears and no victory smirk. It was just that emptiness I used to find fascinating and now I found it frightening.

The judge kept talking, legal terms, sentencing language. "Eighteen years in federal prison... no parole for ten..."

My knees locked and I kept breathing.

My lawyer touched my elbow but I ignored him, the officers approached and the handcuffs were cold and my wrists burned. As they pulled me toward the exit, I turned my head one last time and Jane looked up. Our eyes met★¹ and then I whispered.

"This isn't over."

____

The ride back to the holding cell was quiet, my lawyer tried to speak but I waved him off.

I sat on the metal bench and the cell door slammed shut. My body shook, not from fear, but from rage, from disbelief and from everything boiling beneath the surface.

I closed my eyes and I remembered Jane and her laughter once. Her eyes were full of fire and the way she used to look at me with challenge, not hate.

I remembered the night she was in my arms, her perfume and her softness. The way she melted and how sweet she tasted. She was mine for a moment. Finally but now she was the reason I was in chains.

The betrayal cuts deep, deeper than anything, but I was not finished, even from the cell, I could think, I could plan and

I could destroy.

Let her think she has won, let her enjoy the silence, because silence was where storms began and mine was coming.

—

Mr. Thomson (Hades' Father)

I sat in the back of the courtroom, hidden behind dark glasses and a heavy coat, though the room was warm, the judge's voice echoed, cold and sharp, delivering the verdict that broke our family name in two. "Guilty."

The word hit me in the chest like a bullet. My son, Hades, once the pride of this family, stood motionless, his jaw clenched and his eyes hollow. I didn't recognize him anymore. He was not the boy I raised and not the man I molded.

I lowered my head, around me, cameras clicked and journalists scribbled. The world was watching us crumble, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. My wife sat beside me, stone-faced and her hands trembled in her lap. She was always better at hiding things, including disappointment.

When the sentence was announced, I heard a gasped, maybe from a reporter, maybe from Jane Grande herself, I was not sure and I didn't dare look at her. I knew the pain in her eyes, because I have seen it before in my wife, years ago, when I cheated her of trust. I knew that pain and I caused it once and now my son has, too.

After the trial, the Thomsons gathered in a private chamber and my brothers spoke in low, angry tones. One says, "He's finished us." Another, "How could you let it get this far?" As if I haven't already asked myself that a thousand times.

And then I sat silent.

It was not just the shame. It was a betrayal and Hades didn't just ruin himself, he also betrayed the bloodline, we built this empire for decades, we fought dirty, we paid debts in silence, and buried scandals. But this, this was different, this was public and this is was disgraceful.

And now the press was digging into everything, our holdings, our trusts, our offshore assets. Investors started pulling out and politicians we greased for years now acted like they didn't know our name.

"We need to cut him off," one of my cousins said and I nodded. What else can we do? Hades made his choices.

We all did.

I called a meeting of the board that night. We vote, unanimous. Hades Thomson was to be removed from all legal and financial associations with the family conglomerate. His shares were frozen. and his access were revoked. His name was erased from the official records, as if he never existed.

I drafted the statement myself: "In light of recent developments, the Thomson family publicly distances itself from the criminal acts of Hades Thomson. The company remained committed to justice, transparency, and corporate responsibility."

I signed it with a steady hand.

Later, alone in my study, I stared at a photo of Hades as a child, smiling carefree and I remembered teaching him to swim, teaching him to lie and teaching him to win. But I never taught him how to lose.

And now, it was too late.


Jane's POV

I sat alone in my room, the curtains drawn and the lights off. The silence was loud, but it was the only thing that felt safe right now. The courtroom cheered the reporters' questions, Emily's voice, they all echoed in my head like ghosts. I was supposed to feel victorious and feel free, but I don't.

I rather felt numb and empty, it was like I lost something I never wanted to give away.

They say Hades was guilty and that justice was served, however justice didn't undo what happened and it didn't erase the night I woke up beside my nightmare. It didn't fix the cracks inside of me.

The media kept calling and my assistant said every outlet wanted an exclusive. They could all rot because I wasn't a symbol, not heroin, I was just Jane.

And I needed time to breathe again, time to remember who I was before all this.

For now, I shut the world out and I didn't even want their applause and didn't want their pity, I just wanted peace even if it comes in silence.