Free Web NovelChapter 55: Chapter 55 The beginning of the end
_Rowena’s POV_
Alaric was many things.
Both powerful and intelligent. The kind of man who moved pieces on a board three steps before anyone else noticed there was a game being played.
But he wasn’t as unreadable as he thought he was. Not to me.
The last time we had dinner, I sat across from him and listened to everything he said. I nodded in the right places. I smiled when it was appropriate. I was gracious and warm and exactly what the moment asked for.
And the entire time, I was watching the gaps between his words.
He cared. That part was real. I didn’t doubt that. The texts, the guards he’d moved through the network, the way he’d handled Kaelen’s meeting without me ever asking him to. Yes, he told me that part. And that wasn’t performance. That was genuine.
But there were things he wasn’t telling me. Things he was managing from his end without looping me in, probably because he thought he was protecting me. Probably because he was used to handling everything himself and hadn’t quite adjusted to the fact that I wasn’t someone who needed to be shielded from information.
I filed it away. I wasn’t angry about it. I just noted it and moved on.
Because right now I had my own board to manage.
Rita had been held long enough.
That was the thought I kept coming back to on the drive home. Rita was somewhere she shouldn’t be, being used as a pressure point by a woman who had been causing quiet damage for far too long. Alice didn’t fight cleanly. She never had. She worked through other people, through fear and leverage. She kept her hands visible and let everything dirty happen at a distance.
That distance was the problem.
I couldn’t touch Alice directly. The moment she felt threatened she would pull everything back and disappear into the network of people she hid behind. I had tried the direct approach before, early on, and it had taught me nothing except that Alice was very good at making herself untouchable when she wanted to be.
So I wasn’t going to go at her directly.
I was going to open a door and let her walk through it herself.
I called Kasper that evening.
He was already in the city, which was either good timing or the result of him paying closer attention to things than he let on. With Kasper it was usually the second one.
“Rita,” I said when he picked up.
“I’ve been thinking about that too,” he added.
“I want to move her. But I want the information to travel first.”
A short pause. “You want Alice to hear about it before it happens.”
“I want Alice to hear about it with just enough time to do something stupid,” I said. “She’ll see it as a closing window. Rita becoming unreachable, possibly talking, possibly becoming a problem. Alice doesn’t sit still when she thinks a problem is about to get bigger.” freewebnøvel.coɱ
“She’ll send someone,” Kasper said.
“She’ll send someone,” I agreed. “And I need you in position before that happens.”
He was quiet for a moment. I could hear him thinking through it, running the angles the way he always did.
“How many people do you trust for this?” he asked.
“On our side? You pick them. Nobody outside our circle. Nobody who has any connection to Alice’s network, even a distant one.”
“Understood.” A pause. “And when we have whoever she sends?”
“Everything on them,” I said. “Phones, messages, anything they’re carrying. I want documented evidence. Clean and undeniable. The kind that doesn’t leave room for lawyers to maneuver.”
“You’re not just going after Alice,” he said slowly.
“Alice is one person,” I said. “She has people above her and people around her and people who have been benefiting from everything she’s been doing. I want the whole structure. Not just the one branch I can see.”
Another pause. Then, quietly, “Alright. I’ll get into position.”
“Be careful, Kasper. I mean it.”
“Always,” he said, and hung up.
Vicky picked up on the second ring.
I could hear Miriam in the background, which made things easier because it meant I only had to make one call.
“I need both of you,” I said. “Put me on speaker.”
A shuffling sound. Then Miriam’s voice, cautious. “Rowena?”
“Listen carefully,” I said. “You’re going to receive instructions about Rita’s transfer. Timing, route, details. I need you to help me follow them exactly. Don’t improvise, don’t adjust anything, don’t ask questions until it’s over.”
“What’s happening?” Miriam asked, seeming scared.
“The beginning of the end,” I said. “But only if the next forty-eight hours go exactly the way they need to go.”
Vicky spoke up. “Is this about Alice?”
I didn’t confirm it because I didn’t need to. The silence was enough.
“Miriam,” I said. “I know you don’t love being kept in the dark. I know that’s uncomfortable for you. But right now the less you know about the full picture the better, because if Alice’s people ask you anything, your answers need to be honest.”
Miriam was quiet.
“Can I trust you both?” I asked.
“Yes,” Vicky said immediately.
A beat. Then Miriam. “Yes.”
“Good,” I said. “Stay close to your phones.”
I sat at my desk after the calls and went through it again from the beginning.
Every step. Every point where it could fall apart. Every variable I could control and every one I couldn’t.
The thing about a plan like this was that it required patience above everything else. I couldn’t rush it. I couldn’t adjust it mid-way because something made me nervous. I had to build it correctly and then let it run and trust the people I’d placed inside it.
Alice would hear about Rita. She would feel the window closing. She would move fast because she always moved fast when she was frightened, and frightened people made mistakes.
And when she made hers, Kasper would be there.
And everything she’d been hiding would finally have somewhere to land.
I turned off my table lamp and sat in silence for a moment.
It was in motion now.
All I had to do was wait.
