"No, it's not like that. Listen to me, Chloe was all alone in a foreign country, I was just worried she wouldn't have money to live on. That's all. As for the hotel, that was just a coincidence, I swear I didn't know she would end up there—"
"Enough, James. Do you even believe the words coming out of your own mouth?"
"I'm not a child."

"Every single second I spend with you now makes me feel sick to my stomach."
"Every time I close my eyes, all I can see is my mother, dying."
My words were like knives, and with each one, the color drained from James's face.
His hand, which had been reaching for me, fell limply to his side.
"I'm… I'm sorry."
I laughed, but tears streamed down my face.

"Sorry? What good is your sorry? Can it bring my mother back to life? Can it make Chloe face the punishment she deserves?"
"Don't ever come near me again. Seeing you just reminds me of how stupid I was."
With that, I walked away, not giving him another chance to speak.
James didn't show up again.

Three days later, a piece of news from New York shook the entire underworld.
He had voluntarily called a meeting of the Commission.
There, in front of the heads of every major family, he confessed that the peace treaty from three years ago was a forgery, signed in my name without my knowledge.
He declared the treaty null and void.
The investigation into my mother's fatal car crash was officially reopened.
Without the treaty's protection, Chloe Smith's fate was sealed.
To save their own skin, the Johnson family publicly disavowed all ties with her.
It was the final nail in her coffin.
James then filed a lawsuit to reclaim every dollar he had ever sent her.
Their confrontation in court was brutal, and the details quickly spread through every corner of their world. Everyone cursed Chloe for her venomous heart.
She couldn't pay the money back.
In the end, the Commission stripped her of all her assets and exiled her to Siberia, never to return.
And the Wilson family, its reputation completely shattered, was abandoned by its allies and attacked by its enemies.
After a month, the once-great Wilson empire crumbled into dust.
And with that, the man who had been a part of my life for twenty years vanished completely.
On the day Chloe was taken away, I started a new job in Europe.
It was an ending, and a new beginning.