He Didn’t Kidnap Me. Not Exactly novel Chapter 323

He Didn’t Kidnap Me. Not Exactly

Chapter 323

Baisy’s POV)

I stared at Lillian, and some small, exhausted part of me kept waiting for this to stop being real.

It didn’t. It just kept being exactly as real as everything else tonight, sharpened by the specific cruelty of her smile.

“I know you’re confused, she said, practically glowing with it. “All the why and how sitting in your head right now. So let me just put it to you plainly.

Something manic lived underneath her voice. Not performed–crazy. Actually unhinged, in a way that made my skin crawl worse than any gun pointed at me

tonight had managed.

“I’ve always chased power, she said. ‘Craved it more than anything else in this life. I came from nothing, you know. Everyone who ever looked at me saw joke. Sad, sure. But it taught me something useful that power isn’t given. It’s hunted.”

She smiled wider.

“So I tasted a little of it off DeLuca, back when he first climbed the ranks of popularity in high school. And when Volkov’s offer came, I didn’t hesitate for a second. And tonight, once I saw the battle tipping toward Nico’s men, I switched sides again, fed them everything they needed to round up Volkov’s remaining forces.” She gestured proudly around us. “And here we all are. Me, on the winning team. You, standing there wounded but alive, which tells me i

read this correctly.”

Right about what?” Aria snapped.

“Right about Volkov dying tonight. Lillian let that sit in the air a beat before continuing. Watching that cold rage in your bleeding hero over there—” she nodded at DeLuca -I had a feeling he might actually manage it. And honestly, being close to Volkov’s operations these past few days taught me something nobody expected me to learn. He had power. Chains, systems, loyalty bought and paid for. But personally? He’d gone soft at the core. Age stripped the real coldness out of him years ago. So the second I heard DeLuca was hunting him, I knew it was possible. Even against everything else standing in his way.”

She tilted her head, almost proud of herself.

That’s why I switched. That’s also why I sent word out to every connected platform that Volkov was already dead, before I even had confirmation.” A short laugh. “Turns out I was right anyway. But the point was speed – any allies thinking of rushing in as reinforcements would hear it first and scatter, or arrive already believing there was nothing left worth fighting for. No name left to defend. The empire falls, and everyone loyal to it falls with it. And me, allied with the empire actually still standing? I get a seat at that table. A real one.”

The room – if you could still call open, ruined ground a room – went quiet.

I stared at her, horror curdling into something close to grief, and somewhere underneath both of those, a small, exhausted voice in my head going of course. Of course this is also a thing that’s true tonight. I was running out of shock to actually feel. My body kept producing it anyway, like a factory that hadn’t gotten the memo to shut down for the night.

This was the same person who’d sat cross–legged on my bed at two in the morning, laughing about nothing, trading stupid theories about our professors, complaining about the vending machine on our floor eating quarters. The same bright, occasionally exhausting presence that had made my first year of college feet survivable.

1 couldn’t reconcile the two versions of her standing in front of me. I didn’t think I ever would. I wasn’t sure I even wanted to try.

5 regist ever meeting you. I said. And I hope your death is cruel.”

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15:03 Fri, Sep 4 M

Chapter 323

“Na–uh–uh,” Lillian wagged a finger, entirely unbothered. “That’s not how this goes. If you’d actually been listening, you’d know there’s an order of ser ice now. But since you’re clueless, let me walk you through it.”

She gestured broadly at the space around us.

“Right about now, every ally still loyal to Volkov who heard the news is either scattering or racing here to confirm it. When they arrive, they’ll find out it’s true. Meanwhile, we take over. Power. Supremacy. Everything shifts in our favor from here.” She paused, tilting her head. “Oh-

Her expression shifted, listening.

‘I can hear vehicles. Faster than I expected.”

I heard it too, a second later – engines, multiple, closing in fast.

My heart slammed against my ribs, dread pooling cold and heavy in my stomach.

Comments

R Sherry Fulayter

1 Comments >

Good,now kill them!! But your to soft you wont instead you’ll say ” Wait! I don’t want this..no no please” smh…l can already see it happening

7 days ago

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15:03 Fri, Sep 4

He Didn’t Kidnap Me. Not Exactly

Chapter 324

The vehicles arrived in a wave of noise and dust, doors slamming, men pouring out fast enough that it felt less like reinforcements and more like a flood I

had no way of swimming against.

At the same time, a handful of Volkov’s own men staggered out from the base itself – survivors, bloodied, moving like the last several hours had taken everything out of them and left the bill unpaid. The two groups met somewhere in the open ground between us, tension crackling instantly between them, and I stood there gripping DeLuca, watching two separate armies size each other up like we weren’t even standing close enough to matter.

A big man at the front of the newly arrived group stepped forward. His voice, when he spoke, came out hoarse, worn down like he’d been shouting orders

into a headset all night.

“Where is he? Where is Volkov?”

One of the survivors from the base

“The boss is dead.”

The hoarse–voiced man went still.

older, exhausted, blood dried along one temple answered him flatly.

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