---- Chapter 16 Eliza POV: The courtroom erupted into chaos. Catherine' s denial was a high-pitched, hysterical shriek that was swallowed by the roar of the press. Flashbulbs went off like machine-gun fire, capturing every angle of Cash Robinson' s public castration. | didn' t stay to watch the fallout. It was a circus, and | was done with clowns. As Dane and | walked out into the cool Hong Kong air, he glanced at me, a question in his eyes. "Was it satisfying?" he asked quietly. | thought for a moment. Seeing Cash's world crumble, piece by piece? Watching Catherine's mask of perfection shatter? "Yes," | said, and | was surprised by the cold finality in my own voice. Cash became a recluse, a ghost haunting the city that had once been his kingdom. The Robinson name was now synonymous with scandal and ruin. He was a tragic figure, a cautionary tale whispered at cocktail parties. He arranged a deal. He convinced Catherine to plead insanity. In exchange for her cooperation, he would ensure she was sent to a private psychiatric facility instead of a state prison. ---- It was a twisted act of mercy, or perhaps, a final act of control. She was diagnosed with a severe personality disorder and committed indefinitely. They put her in a sterile white room, where the days bled into one another. They gave her electroshock therapy, which smoothed the sharp edges of her memory and her personality, leaving behind a placid, empty shell. | visited her once. She was sitting in a chair, staring at a blank wall, a thin line of drool trickling from the corner of her mouth. She didn't recognize me. "Your father was sentenced to twenty years," | told her, my voice calm and even. "Your company was dismantled and sold for parts. Your son, Elias, has been placed in foster care. No one from either family wanted him." Her vacant eyes flickered. A low, animalistic growl rumbled in her chest. She launched herself at me, her nails bared like claws. Dane, who had insisted on coming with me, pulled me back just in time as orderlies rushed in to restrain her. "Do you hate me?" | asked her screaming, thrashing form. "Do you hate me as much as | hated you when you pushed my mother down those stairs?" ---- | turned and walked away, a single, hot tear escaping my eye and tracing a path down my cold cheek. | had done it. | had avenged my mother. | had destroyed everyone who had wronged me. | had expected to feel a sense of triumph. Of release. Of peace. Instead, all | felt was empty. "The past is a ghost, Eliza," Dane said softly as we drove away from the hospital. "You can't kill it. You can only learn to let it 90." "| don't know how," | whispered. It felt like in my quest for revenge, | had burned away a part of myself. The part that knew how to love, how to hope, how to feel anything other than rage and grief. That part was gone, and | didn't know if | could ever get it back.