The Heiress Gambit-Chapter 52- Dizzing Truth

AUTHOR

The penthouse was silent, a stark contrast to the storm of theories swirling in Paige’s head. She found him not in his study, but in the bedroom, sitting on the edge of the unmade bed.

The dim light from the en-suite bathroom carved out the sharp lines of his profile. He was still in his suit trousers and a white dress shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his phone dark in his hand as he stared at nothing.

A wave of relief washed over her. "Thank goodness you’re here," she breathed, the words tumbling out in a rushed exhale.

She didn’t wait for a response, crossing the room and starting to pace in front of him. "I’ve been thinking all day. I hit a wall with the data—it’s too clean, Reomen. It’s professionally done. And it has to be personal, right? To target my deal? So I started thinking about who would want to hurt us both, and it kept circling back..."

She laid it out, her theory about the Rimestones. About a potential mole. Her words were sharp, logical, fueled by days of frustration and a desperate need to fix what was broken.

She talked about her mother’s calculated cruelty, her father’s resources, Payton’s petty jealousy.

He sat there, a statue. His face was a mask of impassive granite. He didn’t interrupt. He didn’t ask a single question.

He just listened, his dark eyes following her pacing, giving a slow, single nod every now and then. An acknowledgment, but nothing more.

The energy began to leach out of her. Her pacing slowed. The confident stream of words dwindled to a trickle, then stopped.

The silence she had filled so noisily rushed back in, thick and heavy. It was then she truly saw him. The absolute stillness. The way he held his phone, not like a tool, but like a weight.

Her brow furrowed. The intellectual fervor faded, replaced by a cold trickle of unease.

She took a tentative step toward him. "Reomen?"

He didn’t move.

"What’s wrong?" she asked, her voice suddenly small in the vast, quiet room.

He gave a slow, careless shrug, the movement dripping with a sarcasm that felt like a physical barrier. "Well, since you’re so full of theories," he began, his voice a low, flat drawl, "here’s a new one for your puzzle. The investigator just called. The leak was traced back to your office computer."

Paige froze. Every muscle in her body locked. The frantic energy that had propelled her into the room evaporated, leaving a cold, hollow shell. Disbelief, washed over her features.

"What?" The word was a breath, a plea.

He looked up at her, his expression unnervingly unsurprised. "I’m not."

The simple, cold statement was a knife. She mistook his icy calm for indifference, for an accusation already decided.

"I didn’t," she whispered, her voice cracking. The strength she’d mustered to share her theory was gone, replaced by a tremble she couldn’t control. "Reomen, I would never—"

"It was your computer, Paige." His voice was relentless, a hammer driving the nail. "The access key. The timestamps. It’s all there."

She was falling apart right in front of him. She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to hold herself together, but her eyes were wide with a desperate, building panic.

She was trying to be strong, but the foundation was giving way.

He watched her crumble, his own jaw tight. "But the time," he said, the words dropping into the tense silence like stones. "The transmission time. It doesn’t click."

The words hung in the air for a single, suspended heartbeat.

Paige’s frantic breathing hitched. Her eyes, wide with hurt and confusion, sharpened. The pieces—his lack of surprise, his cold delivery, this final, crucial detail—suddenly snapped together.

The realization didn’t dawn; it detonated.

Her face went pale. The defensive posture melted away, replaced by the stark clarity of a horrifying truth.

It was her. It was her computer.

But it wasn’t her.

The realization clicked into place with the sickening finality of a trapdoor swinging open. A joke, a cruel, cosmic joke. She had combed through every server log, every access record, every digital footprint in the entire company.

Except her own.

Reomen continued, his voice still that awful, flat calm, as if he were reading from a coroner’s report. "The transmission was sent the night of the Rainbow Room party. Timestamped at 9:03 PM."

Her mind flashed back. The stifling crowd. The desperate escape to the bathroom. The assault in the hallway. Him, finding her. The blood in her mouth. The silent car ride. The dentist. His arms around her all night.

"I was with you," she whispered, the words a testament to her innocence, but her voice was thin with dawning horror. If she was with him... then who?

"Yes. You were."

The implication hung in the air, poisonously clear. Someone had used her machine, her access, during the one window of time her alibi was rock-solid, provided by the man now staring at her with eyes that saw every devastating angle of this betrayal.

"Who?" The question was a sharp, desperate plea. "Who was it, Reomen? Who did this?"

He looked away, a muscle ticking in his jaw. "The immediate problem has been solved. The breach is contained. That’s all you need to know."

The dismissal was a slap. After everything—the shared plans, the late nights, the intimacy, the violence endured together—he was shutting her out. Putting her back in the box marked ’asset’ or ’liability,’ but not ’partner.’

"That’s bullshit!" The words erupted from her, fueled by a torrent of hurt and fury. She took a step forward, her hands clenched at her sides. "We are in this together! This is my revenge too! My life! Tell me!"

"The company is fine," he deflected, his tone shifting to the bored cadence of a CEO in a boardroom, a wall she hated. "We’ll issue a press release tomorrow morning. The stock will stabilize."

"A press release about what?" she pressed, her voice rising. "Who did they find?"

"It’s irrelevant."

"Irrelevant?" A harsh, disbelieving laugh escaped her. He was evading, and it was pissing her off, overshadowing the cold fear the situation warranted. "How can the traitor be irrelevant? How do you expect the company to just recover from a blow like this? How, Reomen?"

"We’ll pull through." The answer was infuriatingly vague, arrogantly confident, and utterly devoid of the specifics she demanded.

"Reomen!"

His name was a cry, a question, a demand all at once. What’s wrong with you? Why are you handling me? Why are you shutting me out?

It was the final push. The carefully constructed dam of his control, already strained by days of fury and the gut-punch of the investigator’s call, shattered.

He snapped

He spun around, the movement violent and sudden, his eyes blazing with a fury so raw it seemed to scorch the air between them. "How the fuck do you want me to tell you, Paige?" he roared, his voice cracking with the strain. "What words do you want me to use? How should I break it to you that it was Denki? That the man who has had my back for a decade, my best friend, my brother, is not who we think he is? That he’s Denki fucking Rimestone!"

The world stopped.

The air was sucked from the room.

Paige froze. Completely. Utterly. It was as if every nerve in her body short-circuited at once. The name hung in the air, not just a name, but a condemnation, a re-writing of their entire history.

Denki.

The reliable confidant. The charming, unassuming shadow. The man who had driven her, protected her, shared quiet jokes with her.

Rimestone.

The blood drained from her face so rapidly she saw spots, a dizzying wave of vertigo threatening to buckle her knees. Her hand flew out, bracing herself against the cold wall.