Chapter 275: Sisters at War

For reasons even Liora Voss could not fully explain, after she finished her shower and changed into sleepwear, she took one look at Serena’s message, turned around, and changed again.

The garden was only a short walk away.

Still, she put on a complete outfit before leaving her room.

By the time she stepped outside, the night air had settled over the Blackwood residence like a dark sheet. The ground beneath her shoes was soft from the sprinkler system, damp enough to give slightly with each step. The smell of wet soil rose around the trimmed hedges and flower beds.

Liora shivered without warning.

It was not cold.

Not really.

But the tremor ran through her body all the same, small and sharp, as if something inside her had already heard the verdict before Serena spoke it.

She lifted her head.

Serena stood not far away.

Half of her body had melted into the dark. Her long hair was loose over her shoulders, and her face, pale under the garden lights, looked almost unreal. Beautiful, still, and full of the kind of silence that made the night feel watched.

Like a beautiful ghost who had come to collect a debt.

Under normal circumstances, Liora would have laughed and said something like, "It’s late. Why are you standing out here pretending to haunt the place?"

But looking at Serena now, Liora’s heart gave a faint jump.

The unease that had been coiled inside her all night reached its peak.

There was no road left to retreat down.

So she stopped a few yards away and met Serena’s gaze.

"What’s wrong, Sis?"

Serena spoke without moving.

"Liora, when did you come to my house?"

Liora drew in a slow breath.

"Fifteen years ago."

Serena nodded slightly.

"Fifteen years ago."

Her voice was calm. Too calm for the hour, for the garden, for the way she had called Liora out here like a sentence being delivered in private.

"Fifteen years ago, your parents had their accident. Because my parents were close to yours, they brought you into our home. From that day on, you became my sister."

Liora did not interrupt her.

Serena kept looking at her, eyes fixed, unblinking.

"To be honest, everything you have now is something you deserve. Voss Holdings became part of Blackwood Group. Even the portion that belonged to your family would have been enough to keep you comfortable for the rest of your life."

The Blackwood residence was silent behind them. Not asleep, never that. A house like this was staffed, monitored, secured. But in the garden, the night seemed to hold its breath.

Serena’s voice stayed steady.

"But I’m not saying that to tell you I treated you well because of Voss Holdings. I treated you that way because I truly considered you my sister."

Her gaze did not shift.

"After my parents died in their own accident, it was only the two of us left. Two sisters depending on each other, surviving the darkest years together."

Liora gave a slow nod.

"Yes."

What happened when two girls who were not yet adults found themselves sitting on top of a massive corporate empire?

Wolves gathered.

Eyes watched from every side.

Directors, relatives, family friends, old enemies, predators wearing legal smiles. Women who had once bowed to their parents suddenly tested the locks. Men who had once been harmless became informants. Every board meeting was a battlefield, every condolence call carried a price, and every helping hand had fingers curled around a knife.

Even now, Liora did not know exactly how she and Serena had survived those years.

She did not want to remember too clearly.

They had no blood between them. That was true.

But for a long time, they had trusted each other more than real sisters did. More than family. More than anyone with an inheritance lawyer and a shared last name ever could. Theirs had been the kind of bond where one life could be placed in the other’s hands.

That was why Liora had let Serena take the helm of the entire Blackwood Group without fear.

She had never worried Serena would quietly erase her.

She knew Serena would not.

They were sisters beyond blood.

But at this hour, in this place, with Serena calling her into the garden to say all this, it could not be simple nostalgia.

Liora’s arms began to tremble beyond her control.

The shiver came from somewhere deeper than the skin. It dragged through her body until even her breathing felt too loud. She held herself still by force.

Then Serena’s tone finally cooled.

"So," Serena said, "Liora Voss, my little sister. Tell me what made you think you could touch your sister’s man."

Liora slowly exhaled.

The shaking in her body stopped.

The unease had found its source at last.

"It really is accurate," Liora said, and let out something close to a laugh. "Even this time, it wasn’t wrong."

She raised her eyes to Serena.

The faint smile at her mouth faded by itself.

She could not keep smiling.

The air between them stiffened into something frightening. It felt as if one heated breath could ignite all the gunpowder waiting in the dark.

Liora parted her red lips.

She seemed about to say something.

Then the words reached her throat and stopped.

The corner of her mouth lifted faintly instead, barely there.

She rolled one shoulder with lazy resignation.

"Sis," she said. "Hit me."

She did not know how to fix this situation.

So there was nothing to do but fight.

The words had barely fallen before pain exploded across her cheek.

Serena’s fist landed before Liora could dodge. There had been no warning in the movement, no dramatic windup. Just one hard, brutal hit that snapped Liora sideways and sent her down onto the damp ground.

Heat flared through her face.

The pain hit her brain a second later, fierce and immediate. Her brows tightened, and real suffering rose into her smiling eyes.

Even then, she could still laugh.

Blood colored the split at the corner of her mouth.

"So it failed this time."

Serena had struck her once.

She did not continue.

She only looked down at Liora and said coldly, "Get up. I want you to look a little more dignified when you leave the Blackwood family."

Liora froze for a beat.

Then she placed both hands against the damp earth. One knee came under her first, then the other. Slowly, she rose and settled into a fighting stance.

She did not explain.

She did not say Elias was acting. She did not say he had been lying to Serena all this time. She did not say two sisters did not need to fall to this point over a man.

Not one word.

This was the road she had chosen. Naturally, she had known where it could end.

Besides, part of her had lost reason too.

The pain in her cheek chewed at the tight string called control. Every throb pulled it closer to snapping.

Most importantly, Liora did not think she owed Serena anything.

The debt of being taken in had already been paid by Voss Holdings. If that was not enough, then after they finally secured their position inside the company, Liora had given up power without hesitation. All of it added together should have been enough to repay what she owed.

Her life was not a receipt Serena could keep pulling out whenever the balance displeased her.

Liora moved suddenly.

She stepped in and punched Serena in the face.

An eye for an eye.

Under the gentle moonlight, two women who were elegant and sensual in front of nearly everyone else attacked each other in silence in the garden.

Sisters turning on each other.

For a boy.

It was the kind of ugly, bloody plot that belonged in cheap late-night television, something viewers would mock for being too dramatic and too absurd. Yet here it was, playing out for real beneath the trimmed trees of the Blackwood residence, with wet soil under their shoes and security too far away or too well trained to interfere without an order.

Thankfully, some final scrap of reason remained between them.

They still remembered the sisterhood of so many years. Neither struck to kill. For reasons neither of them would have been able to explain, they also did not aim for each other’s faces again after that first exchange.

Instead, they held back just enough to keep the damage from crossing a line they could not return from.

That did not make it gentle.

Fists landed against shoulders, ribs, arms, stomachs. The clean lines of their bodies, usually dressed for boardrooms, charity dinners, private clubs, and expensive photographs, became blunt instruments in the dark. Long legs that looked made for walking through rooms people hurried to clear became weapons, each kick forcing the other woman back several steps.

No one spoke.

That was worse.

No screaming. No accusation. No sobbing. Only breath, impact, the scrape of shoes against damp soil, and the occasional broken sound that escaped before pride could crush it.

Serena fought like a woman who had spent years learning that every room belonged to her if she entered it first. Direct, forceful, controlled by fury but not lost to it. Every strike carried the arrogance of ownership.

Liora fought differently.

She gave ground when she needed to, shifted angles, took hits she could not avoid, and answered with a cold precision that grew meaner the longer the fight went on. Her eyes had lost their usual lazy amusement. What remained was something Serena had not seen in years.

The girl who had survived beside her.

The sister who had learned to smile while choosing which wolf to poison first.

At some point, Serena caught Liora by the shoulder and shoved her hard enough that she nearly fell against the low stone border of a flower bed. Liora twisted, caught herself, and returned with a kick that struck Serena’s thigh with a sound dull enough to make both women pause for half a breath.

Then they were on each other again.

The garden took the damage quietly.

A crushed flower head near Liora’s heel. Mud smeared across Serena’s sleeve. A broken branch. A trail of bent grass where one of them had slid after a hit landed too cleanly.

No staff came.

Perhaps the cameras saw everything.

Perhaps the security team had already been trained to wait.

Perhaps everyone in this house knew that when Blackwood sisters fought in the garden at night, survival depended on pretending the walls had no eyes.

No one came.

The fight went on until even anger could no longer provide enough air.

No one knew how much time passed before they finally stopped.

Serena and Liora stood facing each other.

Their hair was a mess. Strands clung to their cheeks and the corners of their mouths, held there by sweat and blood. Their clothes were wrinkled and streaked with damp soil. The elegant lines of their outfits had been ruined, dragged down into something rawer and far less polite.

Serena looked particularly wrecked.

The sheer black stockings on her legs were torn badly, exposing large patches of pale skin. One section showed a red mark already forming where Liora’s kick had landed. The expensive fabric had split around it, delicate and useless now.

Liora wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand.

Then she opened her mouth and spat out a strand of hair that had fallen between her lips.

So this was the surprise Elias had brought her after leaving the country?

Really.

What an overwhelming delight.