Tiffany watched as the elderly woman remained motionless, her own heart sinking with unease.
Just as her thoughts began to spiral, grandma Calvin suddenly stood and strode toward the door.
The light in Tiffany's bright eyes dimmed instantly.
Though Grandma Calvin had always claimed not to care about family background—so long as Calvin was happy—marriage was a different matter.
It was only natural she'd have second thoughts.
"Grandma, where are you going?"
"I'm getting my phone!
I need to share the good news right away—we have a wedding to plan!
Oh, and I must tell grandpa Luther too!"
Grandma Calvin hurried out, her excitement barely contained.
"Ah yes, mustn't forget Grandpa Luther" she added with a delighted laugh.
"Just the other day, he was bragging about becoming a great-grandfather soon.
Well, now I don't have to envy him anymore."
Calvin tightened his grip on Tiffany's hand, gazing at her with a tender smile.
"Grandma can be a bit impulsive sometimes.
Don't take it to heart."
Tiffany shook her head lightly.
Just then, Grandma Calvin bustled back into the room, taking Tiffany's hand in hers.
"Almost forgot—I secretly prepared a dowry for you a while ago, meant for your wedding day. Might as well show it to you now."
She knew all too well about Tiffany's family circumstances, which only made her heart ache more for the girl.
This dowry had been ready for a long time. She wanted Fanny to know that she wasn't just her future mother-in-law—she was her family now, too.
"Grandma—"
Overwhelmed by the old woman's enthusiasm, Tiffany could only follow along, flustered.
It had been ages since Calvin had seen his grandmother this happy.
With an amused shake of his head, he trailed after them.
Calvin wondered how Sinclair and Taylor would react when they found out he had overtaken them in life's race—settling the biggest milestone before they even had a chance.
In a desolate warehouse near the coastline of the City...
"Sinclair," The E-country man in a black leather jacket gulped, his face drained of color as he stared in terror at the approaching figure.
"Was this all your scheme?!"
His complexion turned ghostly pale.
"You're despicable!
All you San Francisco people are despicable!!"
After Sinclair had dealt with the Harrison family and the Algrea clan, they had received orders to detain this San Francisco man.
The man had feigned weakness, hastily leading his men into this hideout.
Only when they pursued him did they realize it was a trap—one meticulously laid by San Francisco operatives.
Their own men hadn't even had time to react before being gunned down by Sinclair's forces.
Dozens of them... now reduced to just these few survivors.
Truly... terrifying!!
Tsk.
Ramsey curled his lips, his frosty gaze laced with even deeper scorn as he studied the man in the jacket.
What was that saying again?
Shamelessness knows no bounds.
* Truly living up to his bandit bloodline. "Despicable?"
Sinclair halted his steps and turned to face the man in the leather jacket.
His strikingly handsome features, half-shrouded in shadow, took on an inscrutable edge.
"So, by your logic, if I'd just stood there and let you kill me, that wouldn't have been despicable?"
His deep, magnetic voice was undeniably captivating—yet laced with an icy detachment.
"W-well..."
The moment the leather-jacketed man met Sinclair's gaze, his heart plummeted as if plunged into an ice cellar.
A bone-chilling dread, mingled with suffocating pressure, seized his chest, making each breath a struggle.
Calvin stumbled backward, his boot accidentally catching on a corpse behind him.
Regaining his balance only heightened his panic.
"O-of course not, Mr. Luther! Honestly, we never intended to kill you.
This was all just... a misunderstanding."
"Was it?"
A faint smile touched Sinclair's refined features, but the sharp, frosty glint in the corners of his eyes remained.
Thinking he'd bought the excuse, the man nodded eagerly.
"Absolutely!
A total misunderstanding."
The dozen or so remaining E-country men behind him mirrored his expression, bobbing their heads in frantic agreement.
"Right, exactly!
We were just here to... observe the situation."
"Indeed, as God is my witness, we are neither from the Harrison family nor the Algrea family. ...
All they needed to do now was stall for time, waiting for reinforcements to arrive from above.
A misunderstanding?
Ramsey let out a cold snort.
If the timing weren't so critical, he'd have loved to ask them whether they even believed their own words.
"I believe you," Sinclair's lips curled into a faint smile, his tone laced with ice.
"Unfortunately, no matter who you are, I have no intention of letting you leave here alive."
His strikingly handsome face bore a subtle smirk, but his gaze was cold and imperious as it swept over the men before him, delivering their fate with deliberate calm.
"It's getting late.
Camilla will start to worry.
Ramsey."
"Understood!"
Ramsey knew exactly what Sinclair meant.
Without hesitation, he acknowledged the order and raised a hand, signaling the men behind him.
"Kill them all."
"Yes, sir!"
The dozens of mercenaries behind them immediately raised their guns, cocking them with practiced efficiency.
The inky black muzzles were all trained squarely on the man in the jacket and his companions.
"Wait, wait—"
The jacket-clad man suppressed the venom in his eyes, staring at Sinclair with a complicated expression, as if he had made some resolute decision.
"Sinclair, we work for the Earl," he said, forced to play his final trump card.
"If you dare kill us, the Earl will never let you get away with it!"
For him, survival was the priority.
Everything else could wait—if he still had a life to bargain with.
The men behind him exchanged uneasy glances, their eyes brimming with terror.
It was unclear whether their fear stemmed from the threat of death or the exposure of their identities.
"Hah."
The curve of Sinclair's lips deepened, his long, narrow eyes—dark and fathomless—holding nothing but cold-blooded intent.
"And what makes you so sure," he said, his voice chillingly composed, "that it's him who won't let *me* go, and not the other way around?"
The sheer indifference in his tone made it clear that he didn't give a damn about the Earl—or anyone else, for that matter.
"Sinclair, have you lost your mind?
You dare oppose Earl?!"
The man in the leather jacket couldn't believe the sheer audacity of the man before him.
His voice trembled with a mix of shock and fury.
"Don't forget—this is E Country, City, not your damn San Francisco!
Behind the Earl stands Princess Luna herself! You ignorant—"
*Bang!*
The bullet tore through his body before he could finish.
His sunken eyes widened in disbelief, fixed on Sinclair, his ashen face contorted with the raw terror of impending death.
"You—"
*Bang!* *Bang!*
A rapid volley of gunfire followed, bullets ripping through the leather-clad man and his companions.
Blood mist sprayed into the air, painting the scene in grotesque crimson.
The stench of iron and death thickened in the warehouse, clinging to the air like a suffocating shroud.
The floor, littered with lifeless bodies, resembled a waking nightmare—a hellscape carved from flesh and blood. It was over.
Sinclair surveyed the carnage with icy detachment, his dark eyes fathomless, like the still surface of a frozen abyss.
After a long moment, he pulled out a handkerchief and meticulously wiped the blood from his fingers, his movements deliberate, almost elegant.
Then, with effortless grace, he strode toward the exit, his long legs carrying him past the devastation without a second glance.
"Leave no trace."
"Yes, sir."
Ramsey turned and issued orders to the mercenaries accompanying him.
"Search thoroughly. Leave no one alive."
"Sir!"
The mercenaries immediately sprang into action, inspecting the corpses on the ground and preparing to dispose of the evidence.
But just then—
A pitch-black gun barrel suddenly emerged from between two bodies, trembling as it aimed straight at Sinclair's tall, imposing figure.
"Die, you devil!!"
Without hesitation, the trigger was pulled.
**Bang—**
Everything happened in an instant—too fast for anyone to react.