Chapter 30
The corporate headquarters of the Parston family was a monolith of glass and steel rising forty-three stories above the financial district.
A monument to three generations of wealth built on aggressive real estate development, strategic corporate raids, and the kind of ruthless business practices that skirted the edge of legality.
But inside the top-floor executive suite, the atmosphere was one of decaying desperation that no amount of expensive furniture or original artwork could disguise.
While Remy was building a new life with Lyra, Nyx, and Indigo, planning futures and navigating the complicated dynamics of their unconventional relationship.
The remnants of the old guard were plotting his downfall in desperation.
Thomas Parston sat behind a desk of Brazilian rosewood that had cost $85,000, a man who had built his wealth on the backs of others and saw no reason to change his methods now.
He was seventy-two years old, silver-haired and distinguished-looking in the way that powerful men often are.
With the kind of face that inspired confidence in boardrooms even as it concealed decades of calculated cruelty.
He looked at the digital monitor mounted on his wall, watching his company's stock prices with the intensity of a general watching his army retreat.
Parston Real Estate Group had lost 34% of its value in the twelve weeks since Victor's arrest.
Partners were pulling out. Development projects were stalling. The SEC investigation that had started with Victor was expanding to include the entire company's practices.
Everything Thomas Parston had built over forty years was crumbling, and it was all because of one college kid with golden eyes and apparently supernatural market predictions.
"Who is this boy?" he growled, his voice a gravelly rasp from decades of cigars and expensive scotch.
He slammed his fist on the rosewood desk hard enough to make his three advisors flinch.
"Remy Beaumont. Twenty years old. No family connections. No educational pedigree. No history before he showed up at that community college six months ago.
And somehow he appeared out of nowhere and dismantled a decade of our planning in a week."
"We've been investigating, sir," offered Marcus Brennan, a nervous advisor in his forties who'd been with the Parston family for fifteen years and was desperately hoping to survive this crisis.
He adjusted his glasses with shaking hands. "His trading patterns are... unusual.
It's like he knows our trades before we even place them. It's like he can see market movements before they happen.
The SEC is actually looking into it, but they can't find evidence of insider trading because there doesn't seem to be any inside source. He's just... right. Every time."
"Luck," spat Thomas, but even he didn't believe it. Nobody was that lucky.
"What about the Castellane investment? Can we challenge it? Claim undue influence? Financial manipulation?"
"The documentation is airtight," said Jennifer Hawthorne, the company's general counsel, a sharp woman in her fifties who was already updating her resume in case this ship went down completely.
"Market-rate terms, proper disclosure, clean money trail. There's nothing illegal about it. Remy Beaumont gave the Castellanes $20 million and took a minority stake. It's textbook corporate investment."
"Then we make it not about legality," Thomas said, his eyes narrowing with the calculation of someone who'd been playing dirty for decades.
"We make it about optics. The harem scandal, the mysterious wealth, the too-good-to-be-true success. We paint him as a con artist, a fraud, someone dangerous.
We pressure the university to investigate. We leak to the media. We create enough smoke that everyone assumes fire."
"That could backfire," Jennifer warned. "If he has evidence of our activities, and he clearly does, given what came out about Victor, he could retaliate.
This could become mutually assured destruction."
"Let him try," Thomas said coldly. "We have resources, connections, lawyers. He's a twenty-year-old with a sports car and some lucky trades. We'll crush him."
---
Three blocks away, Remy sat in his Audi R8 parked in a public garage, his eyes closed.
The engine was off, the car silent except for the ambient sound of the city filtering through the insulated cabin.
To any observer, he might have been sleeping or meditating.
But behind his closed eyelids, the golden light of Foresight surged with an intensity that would have been blinding if anyone could see it.
He wasn't just looking at the next twenty-four hours of stock charts, though he could see those too, every tick, every fluctuation, every opportunity for profit.
No, he was watching something far more important: the Parstons' final desperate attempt to reclaim their power.
He saw the future unfolding with crystalline clarity:
Tonight at 11:47 PM, a team of three hackers hired by the Parston family through a shell company in the Cayman Islands and would launch a coordinated cyber-attack on the Castellane Real Estate Group's servers.
Not to steal data, but to destroy it, wiping transaction records, deleting client information, and corrupting backup systems.
The goal was to cripple the company so thoroughly that Lyra's father would have no choice but to accept a "rescue" buyout from Parston interests.
Which would bring the Castellanes under their control and effectively force Lyra into the arranged marriage that had been Thomas's plan all along.
At 6:30 AM tomorrow, anonymous tips will be sent to three different financial journalists, all suggesting that Remy's wealth came from criminal activities and that his relationship with the three women was actually a form of financial exploitation.
At 9:00 AM, Dr Richard Harrington would receive a call from Thomas Parston himself, offering to help "protect" Nyx from the "predatory influence" of Remy Beaumont in exchange for support in destroying Remy's reputation at the university.
At 2:00 PM, the coordinated media assault would begin, with articles dropping simultaneously across multiple platforms, all painting Remy as a dangerous figure who needed to be investigated.
It was comprehensive. It was vicious. And it was doomed to fail because Remy had seen every move eighteen hours in advance.
"They never learn," Remy whispered, opening his eyes. The golden glow faded slowly, like embers cooling.
"They think wealth and connections are enough. They don't understand that I can see them coming."
"Greed is a blindfold, Remy," Grandpops' voice echoed in the car.
The ghost appeared in the passenger seat, his translucent form flickering with a solemn energy that spoke of grave matters.
Silas's 19th-century face was serious, his eyes, so similar to Remy's own, filled with both pride and concern.
"They see the gold, but they don't see the cliff. Thomas Parston has been playing this game for forty years.
He's won every time because he's been willing to fight dirtier than his opponents.
But he's never faced someone who could see his moves before he made them."
"It's almost sad," Remy mused, pulling out his phone. "He could just accept the loss, rebuild, and move on.
But his ego won't let him. He has to win. Has to crush the upstart who embarrassed his family. So instead of cutting his losses, he's going to lose everything."
"Empathy for your enemies is a virtue," Silas observed. "But don't let it make you hesitate.
Thomas Parston would destroy you without a second thought. He's trying to destroy Lyra's family tonight. You need to stop him decisively."