"How was he, Sloane?" Lord Alastair asked.
"I think he would make a good successor," Sloane replied.
Lord Alastair nodded, a weary smile tugging at his lips.
"You have to take care of him for me, Sloane. Teach him what to do."
"Yes, sir," she said quietly.
"Good. Now go. I want to sleep."
---
Damien laid on his bed, staring at the ceiling, replaying the day's events in his mind.
He had ordered someone's legs to be broken.
The man might never walk again.
Strangely, it didn't bother him.
He was surprised—no, shocked—at how numb he felt.
"Maybe I'm more like my father than I thought," Damien whispered to himself.
Just as he was about to drift into sleep—
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Someone knocked on his door, loud and urgent.
"Go away! Don't come back! Don't disturb me! I don't need anything!" Damien shouted.
The knocking stopped.
Silence returned.
Hours later, hunger pulled Damien out of bed. It was way past dinner.
He figured he'd have to either cook something himself or find the chef.
He stepped out of his room—and froze.
He didn't want to believe what his heart was telling him.
Down the hallway, he saw a body covered in a white sheet being wheeled past by medics.
House staff were crying.
Sloane was speaking quietly to a doctor.
"Sloane?" Damien called out, his voice cracking.
She turned around, pale.
"What's happened?" he demanded.
Sloane stayed silent, struggling to find her voice.
"Sloane, I'm asking you—what's happened?!" Damien barked.
Her throat tightened.
Despite all the lives she had taken, Sloane had never been put in the position of telling someone their loved one had died.
Especially not someone she secretly cared about.
"Mr. Damien... your dad... he just passed," she finally managed, stuttering between the words.
Damien wasn't a fool.
He had known deep down the moment he saw the covered body.
He just needed someone to say it aloud to make it real.
Hours ago, he was talking to his father.
Now he was gone.
Damien's knees buckled slightly.
He turned, stumbled into his room, locked the door—and let the grief crash into him.
He cried harder than he had in years.
Not since the day his mother died.
---
A week passed.
The funeral was held.
Lord Alastair Blackthorn was buried with the honors of a king, but like everything in London's underworld, the mourning was short-lived.
People went back to their lives.
Back to their business.
Everyone except Damien.
He wasn't fully healed.
But he was grateful that he and his father had reconciled before the end.
His last memory of his father wasn't an angry one—it was peace.
---
Weeks passed.
Meetings of the Six Pillars—now Five, with Lord Alastair gone—continued.
Damien hadn't yet officially taken the seat.
Sloane stayed by his side, slowly teaching him the intricate operations of the Blackthorn empire—how the laundering worked, who their rivals were, and the true nature of the Five remaining Pillars.
"Your dad said the only way you can find your mum's killer is by getting involved in this business," Sloane told Damien one night.
Damien thought hard.
His heart told him to leave.
His soul told him to avenge.
He made up his mind.
He would step into the business.
Find his mother's killer.
Deal with him.
Then disappear.
But he already knew—it wouldn't be that easy.
---
The next meeting of the Pillars took place at the usual secret location.
The top seat remained empty.
"When do you think he's going to come and take his father's seat?" Diego Montoya Vargas, the Colombian drug kingpin, asked.
"I don't know and I don't care," Rafe Kingston, the Jamaican drug dealer, said.
"My only concern is the money I have stacking up. I need it cleaned."
"Same here," Victor Langford, Lord Alastair's closest friend, added.
"It's been weeks. I need the money to fund my new projects."
"Let the boy mourn," Liang Shen, the Chinese arms dealer, said.
"His father just died. Give him time."
"He's a man, ain't he?" Mikhail Volkov, the Russian arms dealer, muttered.
"He should deal with it. What's he gonna do—cry forever?"
Suddenly—the door to the meeting room flung open.
A light-skinned Black man, dressed sharply in a tailored suit, walked in.
Sloane followed closely behind.
Without hesitation, Damien walked to the top seat—his father's seat—and sat down.
The entire room fell silent.
A new era had begun.
---