Kaelen didn't wait. Rhys's departure felt like a physical tearing—a surgical removal of her safe anchor. Now, exposed and exhausted, she needed to complete the surgery by confronting Elias with the full, raw truth.
She called his personal line, bypassing his assistant entirely. Elias answered on the first ring, his voice low and expectant.
"Seth is fine," Kaelen stated, her voice flat. "The fever broke. I need to talk to you. Alone. Not in Rhys's territory. Yours."
Elias knew the tone. It wasn't surrender; it was a deadly serious ultimatum.
"My apartment, downtown penthouse, one hour," Elias agreed instantly. "No cameras. No staff. Just us."
Elias's Penthouse
Elias's apartment was the antithesis of Rhys's sleek, impersonal modernism. It was massive, dominated by dark wood, leather, and walls of floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the entire cityscape—a view that mirrored the scope of his ambition. It felt like standing inside the mind of the city's ruler.
Kaelen walked straight past the velvet sofa, choosing to stand near the window, her back to the towering lights. She didn't want to be comfortable.
"Rhys is gone," she began, her voice brittle. "He's moved out of the penthouse. Our arrangement is over."
Elias stiffened, absorbing the news. He allowed a flicker of triumph, but quickly masked it. "I'm sorry, Kaelen. That arrangement served its purpose, but it was unsustainable."
"It was a lie," Kaelen corrected, turning to face him. "And I'm tired of lying. I'm here to give you the full truth, without lawyers, without witnesses. Just you and me. You want to know them? You need to know exactly what you abandoned."
Elias stood motionless, his hands tucked into his pockets, bracing himself for the confession he'd spent five years dreaming of.
"Start with the paternity," he commanded, his voice tight.
"You already know," Kaelen sighed, closing her eyes briefly. "Yes, they are yours. Silas and Seth. Twins. Conceived three weeks before you told me you were choosing the business deal and leaving the country."
The confirmation was an electric shock. Elias felt the air rush from his lungs. It was official. He wasn't just obsessed; he was a father.
"Silas... and Seth," Elias repeated, committing the names to memory. "And Rhys? He knew they were mine?"
"No," Kaelen said firmly. "Rhys only guessed that they were yours when you showed up at the airport. He chose to raise them without questioning the date. He chose me."
She took a shaky breath, preparing for the hardest part—the piece of the truth that was pure, deliberate venom.
"You guessed one of their names at the airport, Elias. You shouted Silas," Kaelen continued, her voice hardening with the memory of the betrayal. "You were right. But you only got half the truth."
She stepped forward, forcing him to meet her accusatory gaze.
"Silas's full name is Silas Elias Vance."
Elias staggered back a step, colliding with the edge of his massive desk. The name—his name—had been hidden inside his son's identity all along. It was a secret, constant tie to the life she had fled.
"You named him after me?" Elias whispered, the shock overriding every other emotion. "You hated me, and you named him after me?"
"I loved you," Kaelen retorted, the tears she'd held back finally stinging her eyes. "I hated what you did, but I loved you, and I was going to give you one chance. If you had shown up, if you had chosen me, he would have been Silas Thorne. I kept the name, Elias, as my secret weapon. It was my last plea to the man I thought I knew."
She paused, letting the devastating weight of the confession settle. This was the final, critical reveal.
"And his twin, Seth?" Kaelen continued, her voice low and broken. "His full name is Seth Alistair Vance."
Elias looked confused. Alistair was a strong, common aristocratic name. "Alistair? Who is Alistair?"
Kaelen forced the name out, the venom she intended for him catching in her own throat. "Alistair is the name of your father, Elias. The man who sat me down and told me to leave you, because you were choosing the Thorne legacy over me."
The silence in the penthouse was deafening.
"I named the other twin after your father," Kaelen repeated, her voice shaking with the intensity of her pain and rage. "I named one after the man I loved, and one after the man I hated, to remind myself every single day why I had to run. Every night, when I tucked them in, I heard both names. It was my punishment, and it was my fortress."
Elias Thorne, the powerful, manipulative CEO who controlled empires, was completely broken. He saw the depth of her passion, the extent of her pain, and the incredible risk she had taken. She hadn't just run; she had built a memorial to their failure, naming her children after the two most important, opposing forces in his life.
"Kaelen," he choked out, finally moving, reaching for her.
"Don't touch me," she warned, pulling away. "That's the truth. Now you know. You know my weapons. You know my pain. The fortress is gone. What do you do now, Elias? Do you fight me, or do you finally stand up to the one who taught you to walk away?"