The Harding bodyguards were well-trained, but standing across from a pack of men who'd built their lives on the edge of a blade, their confidence crumbled in an instant.

I stepped over Harold's body, shielding Brick and Amy as we pushed toward the exit.

Georgia screamed behind us, hysterical: "Call the police! Call the police right now! Have these thugs arrested!"

I didn't even turn around.

The moment we cleared the Harding Estate, the SUV roared to life and tore out of there.

"Our private hospital! Now!" I shouted from the back seat.

Amy lay across my lap, her face white as paper, her breathing so faint I could barely feel it.

I'd already cast a Divine Sigil in secret, channeling a thin thread of divine energy into her body to protect her heart meridian.

But in the mortal world, a celestial's power was severely constrained.

If I overused my abilities, it wouldn't just invite heavenly punishment. It would accelerate the collapse of her mortal body.

By the time we reached the Dunn Group's private hospital, the top medical team was already waiting at the entrance.

Amy was rushed straight into the ICU.

I sat on the row of chairs in the corridor, both hands still covered in her blood.

A rapid set of footsteps echoed from the far end of the hallway.

My father, Nelson Dunn, strode toward me in a loose traditional jacket, flanked by several of his lieutenants.

The man who commanded fear across every corner of the city looked nothing but frantic.

"Pansy! Are you okay? Are you hurt?"

He grabbed my arms and looked me over head to toe.

I shook my head and pointed at the sealed ICU doors. "I'm fine. But Amy's barely hanging on."

Nelson's expression darkened.

"Those animals. Their own flesh and blood, and they'd go that far."

He squeezed my shoulder. "Relax. This hospital is ours. The doctors are the best money can buy. They'll bring her back."

But things were far worse than I'd imagined.

Two hours later, the attending physician emerged drenched in sweat, his face grim.

"Mr. Dunn, Miss Dunn... Miss Harding's condition is extremely critical."

"She's had an excessive amount of bone marrow forcibly extracted. Her hematopoietic stem cells have sustained catastrophic damage. She needs an immediate blood transfusion and emergency medication."

"However..." The doctor swallowed hard.

"However what? Spit it out!" I snapped.

The doctor's voice shook. "Ten minutes ago, every unit of compatible blood in our hospital's bank was requisitioned by the Health Department. And the supplier for the medication we need just called to unilaterally terminate our contract. They're refusing to deliver."

My head went blank, like a bomb had gone off inside my skull.

"Who did this?"

Nelson's phone rang.

He answered, listened for two seconds, and his face turned to iron.

He hurled the phone into the floor. It shattered into pieces.

"The Hardings."

Nelson's jaw clenched so tight the muscles in his neck stood out. "That old bastard Myron Harding gave the order. They've pulled every political and business string they have. They didn't just cut off our medical supplies. They've rallied several of the major families to launch a full-scale assault on every legitimate business we've been building."

The Hardings moved fast.

Less than half a day.

The internet was already on fire.

#CriminalGangInvadesPrivateHome#

#HeiressAndMobPrincessBeatTheirOwnParents#

#BoycottDunnGroup #ShutDownOrganizedCrime#

The posts were plastered with security camera stills of me and my crew smashing through the Harding Estate gates, alongside interview footage of Georgia and Lena sobbing in a hospital, faces wrapped in bandages.

In the video, Georgia wailed like her heart was being ripped from her chest: "We just wanted Amy to come home! But she blamed us for favoring Lena, and she brought gangsters to destroy our house! She tried to kill her own brother! Where is the justice?!"

Lena looked even more heartbreakingly fragile on camera. "As long as my sister is willing to come home, I'll give her back the position of eldest daughter. I don't want anything for myself..."

The comments section below was a cesspool of vicious abuse. The public had been whipped into a frenzy, demanding that the police launch a full investigation into the Dunn family.

The Hardings were using the media and their political clout to back us into a corner with no way out.

"Boss! We've got a problem!" Nat burst out of the elevator.

"Harold's here with police and Health Department officials! They're claiming we've been illegally holding Amy captive and they're demanding to search the hospital by force!"

"And there's more. There's a whole squad of mercenaries surrounding the building. Our guys can barely hold the line!"

I walked to the window and looked down.

The hospital courtyard was packed wall to wall with armed officers and black-clad bodyguards.

Harold sat in a wheelchair, bandages wrapped around his head, holding a megaphone aimed at the upper floors.

"Pansy Dunn! You're surrounded!"

"Hand over Amy Harding and come out with your hands up! Otherwise, today is the end of the Dunn family!"

Nelson grabbed my arm. "Pansy, don't go out there. Let me handle them. Worst case, we go back to the old ways and fight this out!"

I looked at the gray streaking my father's temples, and something twisted in my chest.

Mortals, even underworld bosses, were still impossibly fragile when pitted against the kind of power that came with real money and real connections.

But I wasn't mortal.

"Dad, stay here and watch over Amy."

I peeled off my blood-stained jacket and rolled up my sleeves.

"The Hardings want to destroy me? Today I'll show them who's really in charge."

I shoved open the corridor window and, before anyone could stop me, launched myself out.

Three stories straight down.

BOOM.

I landed square on the fountain sculpture in the hospital courtyard, the impact sending a shockwave through the stone.

But within seconds, over a dozen gun barrels swung toward me in unison, black and hollow.

Foreign mercenaries. Harold had paid top dollar for them.

Harold sat in his wheelchair, and the moment he saw me land, a flicker of manic satisfaction crossed his eyes.

"Pansy Dunn, I'll give you this much. You've got guts."

"Unlawful imprisonment. Assault with a deadly weapon. Grievous bodily harm. And let's not forget the Dunn family's lovely criminal history."

He sneered up at me. "You're going to rot in prison for the rest of your life."

Lena wheeled him forward, wearing a pristine white sundress, the picture of delicate innocence.

She stepped in front of him and let out a theatrical sigh in my direction.

"Pansy, why does it have to be like this?"

"Just hand Amy over to me. Let me take a tiny bit of bone marrow to treat my illness. I promise the Harding family will drop every single charge."

"You don't want your father, at his age, taking a bullet alongside you, do you?"

The words had barely left her mouth when the courtyard's iron gates groaned open.

Several officers dragged in a familiar figure.

Dad.

He must have come downstairs at some point. They had him pinned face-first against the ground.

"Get off me! You spineless dogs, licking the boots of the rich!" Nelson thrashed against their grip, but it was useless.

Harold looked down at him from his wheelchair and nudged my father's face with the toe of his shoe.

"Boss Dunn, times have changed. Money and power run the world now. That street thug code of yours? Take it to the gutter where it belongs."

"Go to hell!" Nelson spat a mouthful of bloody foam at him.

Harold's expression twisted. He raised his hand in a sharp gesture.

"Beat him."

A group of bodyguards closed in and laid into my father with fists and boots.

"Stop!" I roared, lunging forward.

Click.

Three submachine guns pressed against my temples, cold steel biting into skin.

The lead mercenary spoke in stilted English. "Miss Dunn. Don't move. Bullets don't have eyes."

Harold watched me pinned down and laughed, wild and unhinged.

"Pansy! Thought you were tough? Thought you could fight?"

"Go on, then. Hit me again. I dare you."

He hauled himself out of the wheelchair, limping toward me one agonizing step at a time, and raised his hand high.

"That slap from earlier? I'm paying it back tenfold."

His hand came down.

But the slap never landed.

Because I caught his wrist mid-swing.

Harold froze.

The mercenary beside me jammed his barrel harder against my skull. "Let go! On your knees!"

The Harding bodyguards, the police, every single person in that circle stared at me like they were watching a dead woman walk.

In their eyes, I was an ant at the end of the road, seconds from being crushed.

Power. Money. Firepower. Public opinion.

Every weapon the mortal world had to offer was stacked on top of me in that moment, layer after suffocating layer.

I looked at Harold's face, drunk on his own triumph, dripping with sanctimonious cruelty.

I looked at Lena, hand over her mouth in a performance of horror, eyes glittering with barely concealed excitement behind the act.

I looked at my father, pinned to the ground under boots and batons.

And I laughed.

Louder and louder.

In the dead silence of that armed circle, the sound was unnerving.

Harold yanked his wrist free, skin crawling. "Have you lost your mind? What the hell are you laughing at?"

I stopped laughing. Slowly raised my head.

Glanced at the overcast sky.

"I'm laughing because you're pathetic."

My voice was quiet.

"You throw around some dirty money, pull a few strings with the right people, and you think that makes you gods?"

"You're mortals. You're nothing."

"I am the Storm Goddess."