The morning after the terrifying, synchronized pain—the first flicker of the Fate Link—felt less like dawn and more like the anxious twilight before an ambush. Neither Julian nor Eliza had slept. They stood on the precipice of their largest corporate war yet, but their focus was entirely internal, consumed by the terrifying knowledge that they were no longer completely separate.
"It has to be the adrenaline, the residual stress from the fire," Julian insisted, his clinical training fighting a losing battle against instinct. He became restless that he walked around, his pacing all sharp edges and anxious energy, and you could practically feel the tension locking his jaw shut. "Our nervous systems are both operating at an unsustainable frequency. When you described the fire, your fear became so real, my brain mapped that trauma onto my own most significant pain memory."
Eliza watched him, her arms wrapped around herself. "It's too perfect, Julian. That night, I died from suffocation, terror, and the failure of my own defense. Last night, you felt suffocation and the crippling agony of an old wound that wasn't even there. You felt my death. I felt your history. We are bleeding into each other's reality."
The realization hung heavy in the air: they couldn't treat this as a psychological curiosity. It was a ticking clock. If the link triggered at the wrong moment especially in public, under scrutiny—it wouldn't just expose their secret; it would destroy Julian's image of untouchable corporate certainty."
We have to go to the Board meeting," Julian stated, his voice tight. "Arthur Sterling will be monitoring every delay. We show weakness now, and Operation Overlord dies before it starts."
Eliza nodded. She knew he was right. Hesitation was the first nail in a CEO's coffin.
They swapped their normal street clothes for the stiff, heavy uniforms of the top executives.
For Eliza, that slate-gray suit felt like more than just cloth—it was like pulling on an invisible suit of armor she really needed.
Julian was different. Under his custom-made uniform, he looked almost too thin. He was fighting some silent war, and Eliza was the only one who noticed the little shake in his hands.
**The Boardroom's Message**
The Titan Boardroom was built to feel huge and scary. The ceiling soared three stories above a table built from dark, centuries-old wood, surrounded by the steely gaze of eleven people who wanted Julian's chair more than anything in the world. They were not investors; they were rivals in waiting.
Julian began the presentation on Operation Overlord—the strategic, aggressive acquisition of Arthur Sterling's Asian infrastructure holdings. He spoke with the cold, measured brilliance of a man who saw the market not as chaos, but as mathematics. For twenty minutes, the plan was unassailable.
Then, Director Cho spoke. Cho was an old guard director whose loyalty was famously negotiable and whose face carried the perpetually smug satisfaction of a man who believed he deserved more."
The financial projections are sound, Mr. Titan. As expected," Cho began, leaning back, deliberately injecting skepticism into the room. "However, this plan relies entirely on the information provided by Mrs. Rhodes. Given the recent trouble in her personal life and the rumors about her past, I must question if her input is based on objective data or on a personal, emotionally charged desire for revenge against Mr. Sterling."
It was a perfectly calculated attack. Cho wasn't challenging the numbers; he was challenging Julian's judgment in marrying and empowering Eliza. He was trying to hit the dead center of the story they'd worked so hard to build.
For Eliza, a wave of suffocating embarrassment hit her hard. That old, nagging shame returned: being brushed off as just some overly emotional woman, her genuine hurt twisted around for someone else's gain. Her heart started banging hard. She instantly flashed back to the moment her life blew up, feeling that familiar, burning helplessness—like she was just a piece being moved around on a board. I am not worthy. I will ruin him. I deserve to be silent.This sudden, crushing surge of despair and worthlessness was the trigger.
On the other side of the table, Julian was mid-sentence, describing the value-added metrics of the Manila Port Authority. Then, it hit him.It was not a memory, but an invasion. Total panic took over. It locked him in place. He couldn't breathe; his lungs just froze up, and the breath he was about to take turned into a desperate, choking sound, like he was drowning in his suit .
He wasn't thinking about his business—no ports or numbers now. He was suddenly, crystal clear, living through the exact second Eliza died. He could suddenly smell the smoke and feel the heat, like a physical shove. That heavy, terrible thought hit him: he was going to die totally alone. His neat, controlled world just broke apart into a messy, frantic struggle to pull in air.
His focus just went blank. The clear look he always had was instantly replaced by a panicked stare. His hand jumped, knocking over the glass of water right in front of him. Then, without even thinking, his hand shot out to the empty space where Eliza sat. He was desperately reaching for anything to grab hold of in the middle of this terrible feeling. He didn't know why he was so terrified; it was her fear, stuck deep in his mind..
Director Cho, seeing the display of raw vulnerability, leaned forward wanting to see more drama happen. "Mr. Titan? Are you unwell? Perhaps we should table this discussion until you can focus."
Julian could only manage a choked sound, fighting to resurface from the psychological abyss. The mask of the CEO was not just cracked; it had fallen entirely away, revealing a man terrified and lost.This was the moment of complete exposure.
But Eliza was no longer the pawn Director Cho assumed her to be. The shame she felt was instantly replaced by a cold, furious focus when she saw Julian's collapse. She knew how to fail; he didn't. He took her pain, and now she had to keep him safe.
She stood up and her voice came out loud and clear it instantly shut down the noise in the room. She didn't look at Julian, who was still breathing hard to avoid showing any signs of weakness instead She stared hard at Cho.
"Director Cho, stop pretending this is about my husband's 'focus' and start talking about the facts," Eliza snapped. She had stepped right into the power Julian couldn't hold anymore.. "Your objection isn't about risk; it's about Morningstar Capital."
She didn't wait for him to protest. With a swift movement, she pulled up a secondary screen. It wasn't the acquisition proposal; it was a complex diagram showing the ownership structure of Cho's holding company, Morningstar, and its secret, parallel investments."
While you sit here questioning our judgment, you fail to disclose that Morningstar has covertly sunk its own capital into Arthur Sterling's rival bid for the Jakarta rail project," Eliza announced, stating a future event as if it were a current-day crime. "Operation Overlord's success means your private, undisclosed investment fails, leading to a projected loss of ninety million. Your loyalty is not to Titan. It is to your own fragile, deeply compromised financial interest."
The air left the room. Cho's face, moments before smug, paled instantly. The Board members, who thrived on discretion, instantly recoiled from the public exposure. Eliza had just used her perfect, terrifying future knowledge to destroy a powerful director's career in seconds.
She gave a curt, dismissive gesture. "This is a clear conflict of interest. Your vote is invalid, Director Cho. The rest of you: Operation Overlord guarantees a thirty percent ROI over the next two years. Those in favor of ratifying this acquisition, state 'Aye.' All who vote 'Nay' should be prepared to explain to external auditors why they chose to protect a disgraced Director over shareholder value."
The power had shifted completely. The votes followed instantly: a cascade of frightened, deferential "Ayes."
The acquisition was ratified.
Back in the penthouse, Julian remained silent for a long moment, staring out at the city he ruled, but which had just nearly consumed him. He finally turned to Eliza, the raw, profound shock still visible in his eyes.
"I felt the end, Eliza," he whispered, his voice hoarse.
"I felt the crushing weight of having fought everything and lost the final battle. It was your soul—your fear—flooding my mind. I was completely lost."
Eliza came close, resting her forehead against his chest, feeling the frantic, residual rhythm of his heart beneath the expensive fabric. "And you took my shame. When Cho attacked, I was collapsing into the self-doubt that killed me once. But you were the target. Your power, your composure, it drew the worst of my emotional debris."
The terror had solidified into a horrifying, yet undeniable, truth: the Fate Link was not a coincidence. It was a weapon activated by their proximity and extreme emotional pressure, forcing them to experience each other's most profound psychological weaknesses. They had fought fate to survive, and fate was now punishing them by erasing the borders of their minds.
Julian gently pulled back, his eyes now alight with a cold, terrifying resolve that was fully his own.
"We can't fight Arthur Sterling until we master this," he declared. "We cannot be ambushed by our own minds. I'm canceling every meeting I can and bringing in my most secret brain and gene experts. We're turning this place into a lab, now."
He held her gaze. "We're going to study this Link. We'll find out why it works, or how to shut it down. "You and I are the only proof that matters," he finished. "We're going to start a dangerous test that we have to survive."
Julian wasn't acting like a boss anymore. He was acting like a person trying to solve a huge problem, and the subject was Eliza. They had to force themselves into a strange, uncomfortable closeness, where they would intentionally push the panic buttons to learn how the power worked.