At my divorce hearing, the judge ruled that I would walk away with nothing. My husband wrapped his arm around his mistress, wearing the smug smile of a man who thought he had already won. “Let’s see how you and that baby survive without me,” he sneered. I lowered my head and swallowed the humiliation—until the courtroom doors burst open. A billionaire stepped inside, eyes locked on me. “Without you. My daughter and my grandchild will live like royalty.” In one second, my husband’s smile disappeared.

Chapter 5: The Birth of a Dynasty

The aggressive, flickering hum of the fluorescent lights in the county precinct holding cell was maddening.

Miles away, Jacob sat on a steel bench, wearing a coarse, oversized orange jumpsuit.

He stared at his trembling, manicured hands, his one phone call to Brenda having gone straight to a disconnected number; she had fled the moment the federal raid hit the news.

His high-priced defense attorneys refused to represent him without a six-figure retainer he no longer possessed, his assets entirely frozen by the legal siege.