Heir of the Mob Reclaims His Glory

1 The blood pact I signed seven years ago finally expired today. Wilson Wilder and I would soon become complete strangers. She was probably still recalling my past fits of rage when I caught her cheating—smashing things, screaming, raising hell. But she didn't know, everything was different now. When I suddenly came home, I walked in on Wilson Wilder having sex with another man in my car. This time, she made no attempt to hide it. Instead, she rolled down the window, leaned out, and gently covered the man behind her with a wool blanket. From the back seat, I heard the rustle of clothes. She shielded the man even more carefully, then turned back to whisper, "Don't be scared." Then she looked at me, a flicker of unease in her eyes, and asked, "Weren't you supposed to be at your MBA class today? Why the sudden return?" ... I yanked open the car door. The back seat was a mess: ripped black stockings, used condoms. A wave of nausea hit me. I gagged uncontrollably. "Why bring someone into this car?" Wilson Wilder calmly buttoned her shirt. She glanced at my car. "It was the most convenient place. Didn't think much of it." "Couldn't exactly bring him home, could I, darling?" The man in the car scrambled out, stumbling pitifully in front of me. "Mr. Wilder, I'm so sorry, I couldn't control myself..." I stood there, arms crossed, unmoving. "Get out." I wouldn't lift a finger for her anymore. But that didn't mean I'd be kind to the man who'd slept with my wife. Even if she wouldn't be for much longer. As he ran off, I gave him a dismissive glance. Early twenties, clean-cut college kid. Her type. Clean background, simple life, high achiever. Everything I wasn't. Which one was this? I stopped counting years ago. I called my butler: "To the garage. Smash the car." Old Thomas smashed it with restraint. His hammer, wrapped in suede, landed with a dull thud, like bone breaking within flesh. Then came the sharp crack of shattering glass. Wilson Wilder got out of the car, pulled me into her embrace, and gently ruffled my hair. Like soothing an agitated cat. I pulled away, leaned against the wall, and lit a cigarette. Didn't smoke it. In the flickering light of the cigarette, the obsidian Bentley became a heap of scrap. She followed me inside. Her hand circled my waist. "Julian, don't be mad. I'll get you a new car?" "My husband didn't hit anyone. That's progress." She pinched my cheek, a hint of surprise in her tone. "Just play nice, and no one can threaten your position." "It's your birthday today. Seven years you've been with me in Kingsport." She magically produced a gift box. Hermès, rare leather. I wasn't surprised. Inside the bag, however, lay a "Python" revolver. Out of instinct, I released the cylinder, pulled back the hammer, and checked the chamber. Empty. I paused, bringing the gun to my nose. No gun oil smell, just an industrial scent. Fake. I tossed the gun back into the bag, my eyes hardening completely. She lay back on the sofa, hands behind her head. "It's just a toy, a memento of your past. Be good from now on, no more playing with weapons." Her tone was light. The glory my past had brought her, dismissed in a single breath. Seven years. My heart had long turned to ash. I pulled out the drafted divorce papers. "Wilson Wilder, sign it." "From now on, we go our separate ways." A fleeting, almost imperceptible panic crossed her eyes. Then she smiled, more relaxed. "Julian, we can't be separated in this life. Have you forgotten?" "I shouldn't have done it in your car. Don't say things you don't mean." She hugged me from behind, her cheek rubbing my forehead. "I've got a birthday surprise for you. Let's go out." She tried to take my hand. I sidestepped, avoiding her touch. She seemed to have forgotten. Back then, she was just a small-time dealer. Wanting to start her own business, she refused my money, then turned around and stole goods from my sister's rival. "Mad Dog" Hayes put out the word. One of her hands, and the debt would be clear. Or, the Wilder family could sign a blood pact. My sister refused. I bit my finger, pressing my blood print onto that pact. By gang rules, she and I could never be separated in this life. A pact that compromised the Wilder family's reputation and dignity, binding her and me together. Until this morning, when Mad Dog Hayes dropped dead in a brothel. As I changed, I sent that text. "Sis, pick me up in Avalon in two days." 2 To avoid complications, my sister and I agreed to keep everything as usual before I left. In the living room, Wilson Wilder took off the shirt still carrying the scent of another man. On her pale, slender body, the dark scar of a gunshot wound on her right shoulder. Like a cigarette burn on snow. My first year in Kingsport, my enemies from Avalon came seeking revenge. She took that bullet for me. When did the woman who'd risked her life for me begin to change? I couldn't fathom it, and I no longer cared to try. Silently, I got into her car. My thoughts drifted back seven years. Hayes's stronghold. Mad Dog Hayes put away the pact. "Gutsy. This matter is forgotten." He smiled at my sister, revealing a mouth full of yellow teeth. "Your brother is bound to that lowlife who stole my goods for life. He's not allowed back in Avalon, not allowed to touch a single cent of your Wilder family money." "The streets are watching, see what kind of trash Eleanor Wilder's only kin ended up with!" That year, the woman I loved to my core wept before me. She trembled all over, yet clutched my hand tightly. She swore I would never regret this decision. But now... "Darling, we're here." The car stopped at Kingsport Maternity Hospital. Outside the patient room, she whispered, "Be gracious in a moment." I had already guessed nine tenths of it. But seeing the tiny pink bundle in the man's arms, my heart still skipped a beat. Adam Schwarz. Her personal assistant. Long-term lover. "Julian, I didn't want to have a child with another man either." Her voice was very low. "You can't have children. I don't blame you. But I need an heir." "The child will call you Dad too. When you're old, he'll be someone to rely on." Adam Schwarz nodded, full of agreement. "Brother, Wilson has always wanted a child. You should let her have this." Mr. Schwarz, Adam’s father, walked in to check on the baby. He was a renowned obstetrician. He held up a miniature Hermès horse toy, teasing the infant in a falsetto voice. Wilson Wilder and Adam Schwarz leaned in, heads together, laughing around their son. I laughed out loud. "Poor folks sure know how to make every penny count, treating designer accessories like treasure." Adam Schwarz caught sight of the rare leather bag in my hand, and his face darkened. Mr. Schwarz, however, remained calm and composed. "Mr. Wilder, I know you were a gangster in Avalon. But this is Kingsport; please show some class." I couldn't be bothered with him. He thought I was tacitly accepting his paternalistic tone. "It's understandable you're ill-mannered, with both your parents gone." Parents gone. A damp, rainy day. Wilson Wilder deliberately avoided my gaze, playing with her son's chubby little hands. I raised my hand and slapped Mr. Schwarz across the face. As he shrieked, I displayed the diamond ring on my ring finger: "As long as I'm still married, your son is still the side piece. Your grandson will always be a bastard." "You, the side piece's dad, are not fit to speak of my parents." Adam Schwarz wailed, clutching his father. Wilson Wilder symbolically pulled me towards the door. Words she had spoken six years ago surfaced. "Julian, you have no mother, no father; you only have me." Barely a year into our marriage, she began cheating. I was inherently proud; I couldn't swallow the humiliation. I was hysterical. But I had nowhere to go. With that sentence, she made me face reality. Now, it was uttered again from my "father-in-law's" mouth. A gust of wind from behind. My scalp prickled with pain. Adam Schwarz rushed forward, grabbing my hair and yanking it back forcefully. He held me, shoving me violently towards the corner of the table. "Bang!" My hip slammed against the table's edge, clenching my insides with pain. Wilson Wilder instinctively leaned forward, wanting to help me. But Adam Schwarz grabbed her arm, fiercely blocking her. "Don't you dare go!" Wilson Wilder didn't step forward. Good. I smiled to myself. Anyway, we were ending this. 3 I had a dream of falling endlessly. I dreamt of being nineteen. I told her that when I was fifteen, I took a knife for my sister from some enemies, the blade piercing my back. I lay in the hospital for half a year. When I got out, my studies were completely ruined, so I dropped out. She trembled as she kissed the snake-like scars on my body. She saved her meal money, running all over the city's bookstores to pick out textbooks for me. In the dim yellow light of our rented room, she held me, teaching me word by word from books I no longer understood. She said I was hers. Inside and out, for life. I dreamt of being twenty-one, on her birthday. I learned from the elders back home, and personally made her a nourishing chicken and fish maw soup. Her office door wasn't fully closed. Soft moans drifted out. I kicked the door open. Wilson Wilder was naked, her long hair swaying. Adam Schwarz was behind her. The chicken soup splattered over both of them. Wilson Wilder was unfazed, helping him wipe off the traces. "Work stress, darling. You understand." I smashed the office to pieces. She didn't even blink. But when I picked up a glass shard and walked towards Adam Schwarz. She shielded him. "Anything, come at me. Adam and those other men are different." Young and hot-headed, I severely beat Adam Schwarz with my bare hands. The Schwarz family threatened to sue me; she used every means, soft and hard, to suppress it. The cost was her not coming home for a year. "Julian, you disappoint me so much." Her betrayal had been foreshadowed. She said I didn't understand her as those other men did. She stopped teaching me long ago, pulling strings to enroll me in an MBA program. I didn't understand those coding algorithms, those capital models. But I once believed so deeply. I understood the weight of two hearts relying on each other. I understood how to bet on a woman before she made her fortune. My biological father died at a card table. Turns out I was just another gambler with poor luck. ... "Sir." Thomas's voice pulled me back. He was covered in wounds. My phone was handed to me. 【WilderTech to be renamed SchwarzTech tomorrow】 【Wilson Wilder convenes board meeting to transfer 10% shares to Adam Schwarz】 I had trusted her, only holding 8%. She ensured Adam Schwarz always outranked me. Thomas pulled out a crumpled invitation. Tonight's gala, official announcement of the change. I quickly bandaged his wounds. Some matters needed to be settled before I left. "Thomas, the Wilder family has a saying." Old Thomas smiled at me. "Today she eats the bitter fish and endures the thirst. Tomorrow, someone else will settle the score with her." 4 I drove straight to the banquet hall. No one dared to stop me. Wilson Wilder looked surprised: "Julian, aren't you supposed to be home recovering?" "Wilson Wilder, you've forgotten where you came from. Forgotten who you relied on to make your fortune." Adam Schwarz linked arms with her, beaming. "What's wrong with Wilson thinking about her child?" His eyes scanned me with a lewd gaze. "My dad says you've taken too many hits, can't have kids?" Wilson Wilder's brow furrowed: "Enough!" He'd hit a nerve, and it only emboldened him. "Julian, everyone says you're the eldest son raised by the Avalon syndicates." "There's no deal you can't close, no woman you can't conquer." "Why cling to Wilson?" "Cling to her?" I looked at him. "What was she, starting her business relying on me? What are you, her side piece?" He paused, then beckoned to the media. "Shoot him! He's a wreck; does he deserve to stand next to Wilson?" A journalist cautiously asked: "He's Ms. Wilder of Avalon's only kin." Adam Schwarz waved his hand: "Who's the Wilder family? A bunch of nobodies crushed by the Hayes syndicate!" That journalist bowed slightly to me and left. Others didn't want to offend Adam Schwarz. All the cameras and mics pointed at me. I calmly looked at Wilson Wilder: "I'm selling off my 8% stake." Her face changed: "Do you know SchwarzTech's current valuation?" "One hundred and fifty million. B-round funding closed last week." They exchanged glances. Adam Schwarz waved his hand: "I'll take it all. Mr. Wilder, you'll be all alone after this, don't regret it." The nanny brought the baby, whose tiny hand waved at the cameras. I instantly saw the strand of sandalwood beads around her neck. My father's keepsake. Lost when I fled at fifteen. My sister turned Avalon upside down after she made her fortune, but never found it. "Met at a private auction last month," Wilson Wilder said airily. "Adam liked it, so he wears it for fun." My father's only memento to me. In their mouths, it was "for fun." "Give it back to me." Every word was gritted through my teeth. "You will pay for this." Adam Schwarz laughed. He unclasped the beads, dangling them in front of me. Like teasing a dog. "You wore them," he said, his eyes curving into a sneer. "Not fit for my child to wear." He let go. Clatter. The beads hit the ground, scattering everywhere. My mind went blank. My hand was already in my bag, pulling out the revolver, pressing it against his forehead. The moment the cold metal touched his skin, he froze. Then tears and snot flowed together, his face crumpling. "You're crazy!" Wilson Wilder rushed over. "The gun's fake!" Fake. But his legs were trembling. A yellowish-white liquid streamed down his pants, soaking a small puddle on the ground. The pungent, stale smell hit my nose. I couldn't hold it in and threw up on him. He screamed. Wilson Wilder pressed a remote. The lights in the entire hall went out. Sudden darkness. I started to tremble. I feared the dark. She knew that. When I was little, my father used to lock me in the closet when he had clients. I'd huddle inside, listening to the laughter and moans from outside. I cried, I screamed, but no one heard. On our wedding night, I told her. She said, "With me, you'll never be alone in the dark." Now she'd turned off the lights. Someone gripped my shoulder. Smack. A slap, my right cheek stung. Smack. Another, my left cheek. Adam Schwarz had hit me. I couldn't see him, but I felt the whoosh of his hand, smelled that stale, pungent scent mixed with perfume. I swallowed the metallic taste in my mouth. "Get out." Adam Schwarz sneered: "Weren't you so tough just now?" Wilson Wilder wiped sweat from my brow. She leaned into my ear, her voice very soft. "About what happened back then, I told myself you did it for me. But every time I think of it, I feel sick." She paused. "In this life, let's just make each other sick." I was trembling more and more violently. Not out of fear. It was cold. A cold that seeped from my bones. I wanted to scream. Wanted to fill the entire hall with my screams. But I couldn't. I started to fall. Back into that closet. The laughter, the moans, surged from all directions. I covered my ears, but the sounds still burrowed in. The person I thought would save me had now personally turned off the lights. She used the thing I feared most to hurt me. The stories I told her had become her knives against me. In the dark, I picked up the scattered beads, one by one. I don't know how much time passed, then a beam of light cut through the darkness. "Julian."