Dark Lord Seduction System: Taming Wives, Daughters, Aunts, and CEOs novel Chapter 523

Chapter 523: Reclaiming Her Lost Self

The sentence hit the office harder than any slap.

Richard’s face twisted—shock, disbelief, panic, the whole emotional slot machine cycling at once. His hands gripped the desk like he needed the wood to keep him upright.

"You can’t." It was a plea.

"Oh, I can," Patricia said. "And I am."

He moved toward her again, instinctively, but she recoiled so violently she hit the wall. Hands up like he was a threat—which he was.

"Don’t touch me!"

That stopped him dead. Not out of respect, but out of realization. She meant it.

"I can’t stand your hands on me," Patricia whispered. "Not when my real man just did."

She swallowed hard. Straightened.

"I belong to someone else now," she repeated, quieter but firmer. "Body and soul. And I’m not letting you poison that."

Richard’s lips curled into something almost like a sneer. "This is about the affair. Whoever you’ve been—"

"No," Patricia said. "This is about years of being slowly erased. HE just reminded me I was still in the world."

His businessman brain flicked back on, hands slicing through the air as he paced.

"Do you know what this will do to Morrison Constructions? The Delgado merger—Patterson—BioLa—the stadium contract—"

"I don’t care."

"You should!" he snapped. "Jack’s future depends on this. His reputation. His Stanford applications—"

"There it is again," Patricia said coldly. "The longest speech you’ve given me in years and every word was about contracts and future investors. Not one word about loving me. Not one word about wanting me."

Richard’s mouth opened. Closed. Glitched.

"Patricia, I—of course I care—"

"Then tell me one real thing about me." She stepped closer. "One thing. Anything. Prove you’ve actually seen me these past years."

Silence.

A big, ugly, echoing silence.

Patricia felt something in her chest unclench.

"You can’t," she said softly. "And that tells me everything."

"Patricia, listen—divorce at your age, you’ll lose your lifestyle—"

"I’d rather lose my lifestyle than my life," she said. "Because that’s what this marriage has been: a slow death with designer curtains."

Richard flinched. Actually flinched.

"For once," Patricia said, her voice sharp enough to cut open the air, "I’m choosing me. Not Morrison Constructions. Not your reputation. Not Jack’s Stanford résumé."

She opened the door.

"And if your mergers fall apart?" Her voice was ice. "Good. Maybe you’ll both learn something."

She stepped out into the hall.

Jack was there, leaning against the wall like he’d been punched in the gut mid-eavesdrop. His cheek was still red.

"So that’s it?" Jack snapped. "You’re just blowing up the family? Making Dad look like a joke? Making me the kid from a broken home?"

Patricia studied him. Really studied him. Saw the arrogance. The entitlement. The cracks underneath.

"You’re doing that yourself," she said quietly.

Jack scoffed. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means," Patricia said, voice suddenly sharp, "you learned from him perfectly. How to treat women like furniture. How to value image over humanity. How to think love is something you control instead of something you give."

"Jesus Christ—"

"You’re eighteen, Jack." Her voice softened—just barely. "You still have time to become someone different. But right now? Right now, you are your father’s son."

Jack’s jaw clenched.

"And that," Patricia finished, "terrifies me."

Jack’s face was so red he looked like a malfunctioning traffic light.

"Good!" he barked, voice cracking like it forgot puberty was supposed to be over. "Because you know what? I’d rather be like Dad than like you! At least he has power! At least people respect him! You’re just... you’re nothing! You’ve always been nothing! Just the woman in the background, trying so hard to matter, and nobody cares!"

Classic Jack. All volume, zero self-awareness.

A month ago, those words would’ve folded Patricia in half. Destroyed her. Sent her into one of those quiet breakdowns mothers are supposed to have in laundry rooms.

"You’re right," she said, voice soft in a way that made the anger drain right off him. "I was nothing. For a long time. I let myself be nothing. Let your father make me nothing. Let you treat me like I was nothing."

The secret rose in her throat again—that secret, the one she’d kept buried for years. The one that could drop a nuclear bomb on everything Jack thought he knew.

Oh, she wanted to say it. God, she wanted to watch his smug face glitch when he realized—

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