My Milf Conqueror System novel Chapter 146

Chapter 146: The Woman in Gloves

[Jake’s POV]

Nia’s idea of a medical scan involved too many wires and not enough respect for personal dignity.

She dragged me into the private medical suite two floors below the executive level and made me sit on a narrow examination bed while she attached sensors to my chest, neck, wrists, and temples. The room smelled like disinfectant, expensive equipment, and the kind of quiet that only existed in places where rich people paid to pretend bad news would arrive politely. Darius stood by the door with his arms folded, making it very clear that if I tried to leave, the wall had a better chance of escaping than I did.

"I am beginning to feel like a hostage," I said.

Nia pressed a cold sensor against my collarbone. "Hostages usually have fewer opinions."

"I have always been difficult."

"You vanished for two years and came back with the medical profile of a haunted scarecrow. Difficult is no longer the word."

Ethan was sitting in the chair by the wall, despite the fact that he had been ordered to rest. He had a blanket over his lap and a cup of soup in his hands, which made him look like a wounded grandmother with a gun under his jacket. Claire stood near the counter, flipping through the Margot file while pretending she was not listening to every word of the scan.

Cassandra sat beside Nia, swallowed by her oversized grey sweater, staring at the monitor like it might bite her. Every few seconds, she adjusted the sleeve over her hand and leaned closer to the readings. She did not speak much, but when she did, everyone listened. There was something unsettling about the way she noticed patterns no one else even knew were there.

"His nervous system is exhausted," Nia said, reading the screen. "Not failing. Exhausted. There is a difference, though I am beginning to believe he would argue with both."

"I like being involved."

"You like being impossible."

Cassandra’s voice came softly from beside her. "There are gaps."

The room quieted.

Nia looked at the monitor again. "Memory gaps?"

"No. Not exactly." Cassandra pulled her sleeves tighter around her fingers. "More like pressure scars. His brain adapted to something heavy, and now that the weight is gone, the structure is still bracing for it."

I looked at her.

She immediately dropped her gaze.

"Sorry," she whispered.

"For what?"

"For saying it out loud."

I leaned back against the examination bed, feeling the paper sheet crinkle beneath me. "I have heard worse medical reviews."

Ethan lifted his soup slightly. "You once got called clinically arrogant."

"That doctor lacked imagination."

Claire looked up from the file. "You fired him."

"He called me arrogant while misreading my chart."

"You bought the clinic."

"That was unrelated."

Nia did not even look surprised. "Of course it was."

A blue screen appeared in front of me.

**[Ding!]**

**[Daily Task Progress: Medical scan completed.]**

**Reward: Reduced chance of sudden collapse.]**

**Penalty Avoided: Looking like a divorced substitute teacher.]**

I stared at the screen.

Then another line appeared.

**[Bonus Penalty Applied!]**

**Reason: Host mocked medical professionals in memory.]**

**Penalty: Slightly cold left hand for 30 minutes.]**

My left hand went cold.

I flexed my fingers and sighed.

Claire noticed again.

She always noticed.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing."

"That word is becoming suspicious."

Ethan looked between us. "Everything he says is suspicious. That’s part of his brand."

Nia removed the last sensor from my wrist and pointed at the small bed in the adjoining recovery room. "Sleep."

"No."

Darius moved one step away from the door.

I looked at him. "You are enjoying this."

"Yes."

"I have work."

"Sleep is work."

"That sounds like something a person says when they have no imagination."

Darius stared at me.

I went to sleep.

Not because I was afraid of him.

That would be ridiculous.

I woke up three hours later with a blanket over me and the strange, humiliating awareness that nobody had tried to kill me in my sleep. For a second, I did not know where I was. The ceiling above me was white. The room was quiet. My left hand was warm again. Somewhere outside the glass door, voices murmured softly.

Then I remembered.

Apex Tower.

Home.

I sat up slowly, expecting my head to split open, but it only throbbed in a dull, manageable way. The old part of me wanted to reach for information, for patterns, for the clean certainty of knowing what had changed while I was unconscious. Nothing came. Just silence, and the faint hum of the air-conditioning.

I stood, fixed my shirt, and stepped into the operations room.

Claire was asleep at the table with her head resting on one folded arm. Her other hand still held a pen. A stack of printed files sat beside her, half marked with notes. Ethan was asleep on the couch, mouth slightly open, blanket pulled up to his chest. Cassandra had curled into an office chair beside Nia’s station, knees tucked up, oversized sweater covering most of her hands. Darius was awake by the door, because of course he was.

Nia was also awake, typing quietly with one hand while holding a coffee cup in the other.

"You slept," she said without looking up.

"Don’t sound so surprised."

"I had money on Darius having to choke you unconscious."

Darius said, "I considered it."

"I am loved," I muttered.

Nia turned the screen toward me. "Margot Delacroix is not real."

I walked closer, careful not to wake Claire. "That was fast."

"She is real enough for invitations and bank compliance, which means rich people are very easy to fool if the stationery is expensive. But there is no childhood, no school record, no early employment, no medical history, no tax presence before the last few years."

"A ghost."

"A well-dressed ghost with gloves."

Cassandra stirred in the chair, blinking sleepily. "Not a ghost. A function."

We both looked at her.

She sat up quickly, embarrassed. "Sorry. I mean, people like that are usually built for a purpose. If Margot exists only where pressure needs to be applied, then she is not a person in the normal sense. She is a role."

Nia nodded slowly. "A social weapon."

I looked at the photo on the screen. Dark blonde hair. Half-hidden face. Black gloves. A smile polite enough to make people ignore the knife.

"Where does the role go next?" I asked.

Nia pulled up an invitation list. "Harrington Winter Reception. Forty-eight hours from now. Marianne can get us inside without raising alarms, but Margot has not confirmed attendance."

"She will."

Nia looked at me. "You sound sure."

"She used Marianne’s charity to pressure Richard. If Marianne appears scared, isolated, and trying to preserve the foundation, Margot will come close enough to make sure the leash is still tight."

Darius looked toward Marianne’s temporary holding suite on the security feed. "And if she does not?"

"Then we make the leash worth checking."

Claire’s voice came from the table. "You are planning something stupid."

I turned.

She was awake now, pushing herself upright, hair slightly loose around her face. Her eyes were tired, but sharp.

"I am planning something elegant."

"That usually means stupid with better clothes."

Ethan groaned from the couch. "Can we define stupid before breakfast?"

"It is afternoon," Nia said.

"Then I am even more injured than I thought."

Claire walked to the wall screen and looked at Margot’s picture. "If we push Marianne too hard, Margot will smell a trap."

"We do not push Marianne," I said. "We let her be what she already is."

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