Eleanor stepped onto the grand marble terrace to admire her new kingdom, the sound of clinking champagne glasses echoing from the ballroom behind her. She was finally untouchable.
Until she looked down.
Standing at the bottom of the grand staircase was a ten-year-old boy. His brown hair was a tangled mess, a fresh scratch marking his dirt-smudged cheek. He wore a stained, ragged t-shirt, looking like a stray who had somehow slipped past the estate gates.
But his eyes—cold, piercing, and terrifyingly familiar—made Eleanor’s blood freeze.
“My grandfather sent me,” the boy stated. His voice was eerily calm, carrying effortlessly in the quiet air. “This is my house.”
Eleanor quickly recovered her poise, letting out a sharp, arrogant laugh. She looked down her nose at him, her fingers brushing her heavy diamond necklace. “We don’t take beggars,” she sneered dismissively. “He’s dead.”
The boy didn’t flinch. He didn’t cry. Instead, he reached out a small, filthy hand, offering a weathered brown envelope clamped shut with a blood-red wax seal. The Sterling family crest.
“He said you’d lie,” the boy replied flatly.
Before Eleanor could swat the trash away, the towering bald man standing just behind her left shoulder—her own handpicked Head of Security—stepped forward. His black leather gloves creaked as he swiftly snatched the envelope from the boy’s hand.
“What are you doing? Throw him out!” Eleanor snapped.
The man ignored her. He cracked the red seal, his eyes scanning the heavy parchment inside. A chilling silence fell over the terrace. When he finally looked up, his expression was absolute ice.
“He is the sole heir,” the man announced, his booming voice echoing off the marble. He calmly walked down the steps, turning his back on Eleanor to stand dutifully behind the young boy. “Vacate the premises.”
Eleanor gasped loudly, her jaw dropping in absolute horror as the realization hit her. She hadn’t hired her own security. She had blindly hired Alexander’s most dangerous, loyal shadow—planted inside her inner circle to wait for the true king’s return.
Leo Sterling wasn’t a ghost anymore. And her fifteen-minute reign was over.