Shackled To The Enemy King

Chapter 208: No Time For Games

A few moments after Fitzgerald’s call, Maximilian’s phone rang. He glanced at the screen.

Timothy Rathbourne.

He answered.

"Will I be invited to the wedding?" Timothy’s voice came, smooth, almost amused. "I did get the permit for your future wife. I should at least be allowed a dance with my future wife too, Max."

Maximilian’s expression hardened almost instantly.

"Is your brother not near you?" he asked, his tone sharp, cutting through the pleasantry.

There was a pause.

Timothy’s brows must have drawn together on the other end, because when he spoke again, his voice had lowered, the humor gone. "What did he do?"

Maximilian didn’t soften.

"You keep forgetting something, Rathbourne," he said, each word deliberate. "I don’t have time to play games with your family."

And then he ended the call.

Silence settled in the room.

Maximilian lowered his phone, his jaw still tight.

"Timothy doesn’t know," he said.

Catherine, who had been leaning comfortably against his chest, straightened slightly, her eyes widening as she processed that.

"You’re saying Fitzgerald isn’t working with Timothy?" she asked.

Maximilian exhaled slowly, his hand absentmindedly brushing along her arm. "They do this," he said. "Divide and conquer. No matter which side wins... the Rathbourne family wins."

Catherine leaned back again, but this time there was tension in her posture.

"So they don’t stand for anything?" she asked, her tone edged with disbelief. "No principles at all? Just... family?"

She had seen families like that before, alliances shifting like sand, loyalties bending wherever profit pointed, but she had never respected it.

In her mind, power came with responsibility. With choice.

You picked a side.

You believed in something.

This... felt slippery.

"Money," Maximilian said simply.

He didn’t romanticize it.

"Fitzgerald is ruthless when it comes to money. If I had to guess..." His gaze darkened slightly. "Dorian brought him in because he’s betting Jonathan will figure out the Alzheimer’s cure."

Catherine let out a slow breath, her fingers curling slightly against his shirt.

"To be honest..." she admitted quietly, "I’m scared." That wasn’t something she said easily.

"I don’t know what part he figured out."

That uncertainty... it was worse than knowing.

Maximilian turned her toward him, his hands coming up to cup her cheeks, grounding her. He understood the weight of it. This wasn’t just about pride or competition.

It was timing. Precision. One wrong move, one delay... and everything she had worked for could slip out of her hands.

"I’ll find a way," he said, with the kind of certainty that didn’t leave room for doubt.

Catherine searched his face for a moment, then nodded faintly, leaning into his touch.

He pressed his forehead briefly against hers.

Behind that calm exterior, though, his thoughts were already moving.

Fitzgerald.

Dorian.

Jonathan.

Pieces shifting on a board that was getting crowded far too quickly.

Maybe it was time to remind the Rathbourne family exactly who they were dealing with... with something far more effective.

A warning they wouldn’t be able to ignore.

-----

Timothy strode down the long hallway and shoved the door open without knocking, the force of it echoing sharply against the walls. "What have you done?" he demanded.

Fitzgerald was lounging by the window, idly turning an apple in his hand. He paused, glancing up at his brother with mild curiosity, as though he had been interrupted in something far more interesting. "Your felicitation wasn’t accepted?" he asked, and then let out a quiet scoff. "Say the word. I’ll bring that woman and your child and drop them at your feet."

Timothy’s face twisted, anger rising fast and unrestrained. "That’s all you can do, you fucking psychopath!" he snapped. "What else can you do—feel? No, you can’t. Fine. But at least understand who you’re dealing with. Do you have any idea how much power he holds? He can change the decision of a foreign government if he wants to. I’ve spent years maintaining a balance, never crossing his path—and you think that’s just because of my child?"

His voice rose, sharp and cutting, the restraint he usually carried shattering piece by piece. "If I wanted to, do you think I couldn’t have taken them myself? You think I don’t have the means? You have no idea how far he’ll go for what he cares about. You’ll never understand that instinct, that need to protect. You don’t understand anything—you just ruin things and walk away from the consequences!"

The words spilled out of him, heavy and breathless, filling the room with a tension that refused to settle.

Fitzgerald simply stared at him.

There was no flicker of irritation, no trace of offense. Only that same detached stillness. After a moment, he lifted his little finger and lazily pressed it into his ear, as if clearing out noise.

"Geez," he muttered. "Do you have to scream like that?" freeωebnovēl.c૦m

The dismissal landed harder than any retaliation.

Timothy exhaled sharply, dragging a hand over his face as the anger drained into something duller, heavier. He turned away, poured himself a glass of water, and drank it in one go, grounding himself. A flicker of guilt passed through him. Fitzgerald was still his older brother. Diagnosed or not. And standing there now, with that empty calm, he looked... almost pitiful.

"What do you have against Whitmore?" Timothy asked, quieter this time.

"Nothing," Fitzgerald replied, shrugging lightly as he took a bite of the apple.

Timothy’s brows knit together. "Then why?"

Fitzgerald chewed slowly, unbothered, and swallowed before answering. "I don’t like that Preston."

This time, the reaction was immediate. Timothy turned to him fully, disbelief and anger flaring all over again. "How did you even cross paths with her? What did she ever do to you?"

Fitzgerald didn’t answer right away. He took another unhurried bite, the crisp sound deliberate in the silence. Then he finally looked at Timothy, his gaze steady, almost thoughtful.

"Not me..." he said. "Someone else."

Timothy froze, the words settling in slowly, unease creeping up his spine. "Fitz...?" His voice dropped, uncertain now. He searched his brother’s face, trying to find something—anything—that would make sense of it. Someone important enough for Fitzgerald to act like this? Someone who could provoke this kind of fixation?

"Who is it?" he asked.

His mind ran through possibilities, rejecting each one just as quickly. A lover didn’t make sense. Fitzgerald wasn’t capable of that. Not in any way Timothy understood.

Then what?

Fitzgerald turned his face away, as though the conversation had already ended. He took another bite of the apple, slow and deliberate, and said nothing.

The silence that followed felt far louder than Timothy’s earlier shouting.

Timothy watched him for a long moment, searching his brother’s face for something—guilt, irritation, even amusement—but there was nothing there except that same distant calm that had always unsettled him.

"You’re going to get us into trouble," Timothy said finally, quieter now, the anger in his voice settling into something heavier. "This isn’t one of your games. This is Maximilian Whitmore."

Fitzgerald tilted his head slightly, as though considering the name, rolling it around in his mind like a flavor he couldn’t quite place. Then he took another slow bite of the apple, the crisp sound echoing in the room.

"That’s exactly why it’s interesting," he said.

Timothy exhaled sharply, dragging a hand down his face. There was no reasoning with him when he got like this. There never had been. He had seen it before, this quiet fixation, this detached curiosity that drove Fitzgerald to push boundaries just to see how far they would stretch before snapping.

"You don’t understand consequences," Timothy muttered. "Or maybe you do, and you just don’t care."

Fitzgerald didn’t respond. His gaze had drifted somewhere else entirely, as though the conversation had already ended for him.

Timothy stood there for another second, then shook his head and turned away, already pulling out his phone. If Fitzgerald wouldn’t stop, then he would have to prepare for whatever came next.

Behind him, Fitzgerald leaned back in his chair, the apple resting loosely in his hand.

"Preston..." he murmured again, softer this time, almost thoughtful.

And this time, there was the faintest hint of something in his eyes.

Recognition.