A Woman Worth Billions Dated the Wrong Brother novel Chapter 387

Amber POV

Mr. White hadn't brought Jason here to stay.

He'd brought him through here.

The camp was a waypoint.

A place hidden so deeply underground that nobody had expected it to be discovered, connected to a network of tunnels my own family hadn't known still existed.

I stared into the darkness beyond Marcus's flashlight.

The evidence we'd found could expose crimes spanning generations. It could identify missing children, connect victims to families who had spent decades searching for them, and prove exactly how the Vincents had maintained their power.

But at that moment, I cared about only one thing.

Jason wasn't there.

Which meant he was still somewhere ahead.

"Keep going," I whispered.

Marcus heard me.

"We will."

I looked at the dark tunnel leading farther beneath Sum.

Mr. White had spent his entire life hiding behind other names, other families and other people's suffering.

Now his secrets were being dragged into the light one room at a time.

And somewhere beyond that camp, he still had my husband.

A week passed.

Seven days without Jason.

Seven days of waking up and reaching toward the empty space beside me before remembering he wasn't there. Seven days of calling his phone even though I knew it was useless. Seven days of watching search teams disappear into the mines and return exhausted, dirty, and empty-handed.

The doctors eventually allowed me to leave the hospital, but only under conditions that made my home feel suspiciously like a private medical facility. My blood pressure had stabilized, the twins were doing well, and I was under strict instructions to remain on bed rest at the castle. After what happened the last time I ignored those instructions, even I wasn't stupid enough to argue too much.

Mostly.

Oscar remained in custody. Everything he'd told us about Mr. White was being investigated, and every piece of information he gave opened another door into a life none of us had known existed. Alexander Vincent was still undergoing trial, simultaneously admitting his involvement and trading names for whatever consideration prosecutors across several countries were willing to give him.

Meanwhile, the island I had never asked for and still couldn't get rid of was being torn apart based on the word of an eleven-year-old boy who had already gone through more hell than most adults could survive.

Noah and Daniel were there with investigators.

They had found more underground structures.

Not victims.

Not yet.

But Oliver had been right about the island having secrets we hadn't discovered the first time.

So the search continued.

Everything continued.

Except Jason hadn't come home.

The mines had given us more evidence than anyone could process quickly. Records of kidnapped children. Photographs. Videos. Transfer logs. Names of families we had never connected to the network before. Evidence of crimes spanning generations.

But after finding Jason's watch, his trail disappeared.

There had been blood in the underground camp, but preliminary testing hadn't given us the answer I wanted quickly enough. The unconscious guards couldn't—or wouldn't—give investigators anything useful.

The tunnels went on for miles.

Some collapsed.

Some flooded.

Others split into passages that weren't recorded on any map the Ember Association possessed.

The Vincents had built an entire world underneath Sum.

And somewhere inside it, Jason had vanished again.

I hated that word.

Again.

Because this had happened to him before.

He'd been a child then.

He wasn't now.

I held onto that.

Jason was trained. Intelligent. Ruthless when necessary. He had spent years building Chronos into something even governments occasionally struggled to understand. If anyone could survive Mr. White, it was Jason.

But seven days was a long time.

Too long.

That afternoon, I was lying in bed with Alice curled beside me drawing while Rose sat on the floor with a book. Alex and Iris were in the adjoining sitting room, and Mrs. Sun had gone downstairs to argue with someone about dinner.

Grandpa was somewhere in the castle.

Jasmine was outside my bedroom door.

Pamela had finally gone to shower after I threatened to have security physically remove her if she didn't sleep for at least four hours.

For the first time all day, the room was quiet.

Then my phone rang.

I glanced at the screen.

Unknown number.

I froze.

Every instinct I had screamed at once.

I picked it up.

"Hello?"

Nothing.

I sat straighter.

"Hello?"

Still nothing.

But the line was connected.

I could hear something.

Breathing.

Faint.

Uneven.

My heart started pounding.

I gently moved Alice away from me.

"Sweetheart, go get Jasmine."

Alice looked at my face and didn't argue.

She ran.

I pressed the phone harder against my ear.

"Who is this?"

Breathing.

That was all.

Someone was there.

"Can you hear me?"

Nothing.

I reached for my laptop with my free hand.

The door opened.

Jasmine came in with Alice behind her.

I raised one finger.

Quiet.

Jasmine immediately understood.

She took Alice's hand and moved her toward Rose.

I activated my tracking system.

Unknown number.

Weak connection.

The signal bounced strangely.

Not cellular.

Not entirely.

Something routed through an emergency connection.

"Please," I whispered. "Say something."

The breathing stopped.

My heart stopped with it.

Then—

"Amber."

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