He thought he had the upper hand. He thought she was finished.

But Kim Tate — the queen of calculated vengeance, the matriarch of Home Farm, the woman no one dares to underestimate — wasn’t ready to fall.

The evening had all the makings of a ceasefire: a private dinner, a rare invitation from Kim to Eddie, and a quiet toast to “new beginnings.” The table was set. The wine was poured. And the air — laced with something far more volatile than toxins — buzzed with deceit.

When Eddie raised his glass and smirked, he believed victory was within reach. He thought Kim had no clue about his involvement with “The Shepherd,” the secretive and ruthless organization pulling strings from behind the shadows of the village. He assumed his manipulation of Joe Tate, the subtle poisoning of Belle’s credibility, and the fake land deal with Caleb were all invisible to her.

But Kim saw everything.

And that night, Eddie wasn’t poisoning Kim — he was walking straight into her trap.

The glass he drank from wasn’t just wine. It was laced with a slow-acting truth serum, one designed not to kill, but to expose. As Eddie’s grip on consciousness slipped, the cameras hidden in the dining room blinked red.

Kim didn’t speak. She didn’t shout. She simply watched as Eddie began to confess: about The Shepherd’s plan to slowly acquire Home Farm through fake buyers, about the burner phones used to relay instructions to Caleb, about falsified documents designed to implicate Kim in a fraudulent inheritance tax case. He spoke of Ivy. Of a daughter. Of legacy. Of revenge.

Kim let the tape roll.

It wasn’t enough to defeat Eddie. It had to be permanent. Irreversible. And clean.

But what she didn’t anticipate — and what shook her to her core — was the final name Eddie whispered before he passed out.

“Frank… he knew about Ivy.”

That name — Frank Tate — was more than history. He was Kim’s late husband, the man whose shadow still loomed over the estate, and the man Kim once tried to bury, both literally and metaphorically.

What did Frank have to do with Ivy? And why had he written her into the deed of Home Farm?

The next morning, Kim got her answer.

She arrived at the Home Farm legal office to find Ivy Shepherd seated, flanked by two lawyers and a silent personal bodyguard. She wasn’t just there to make a claim — she came with documents.

Frank had indeed signed over 50% of Home Farm to a then-infant child, Ivy, in the event of Kim’s “unfitness or scandalous conduct.” The clause was old. Obscure. But valid. Ivy had the paperwork — and the power.

At first glance, Ivy seemed calm. But there was fire in her eyes. Cold. Focused. Unafraid of Kim.

She spoke clearly: “This land was never just yours. You stole it. Now I’m here to correct that.”

And Kim… blinked.

Elsewhere, the shockwaves were immediate.

Joe Tate, still reeling from Belle’s recent revelation about Eddie’s manipulation, found himself cornered emotionally. Belle had finally admitted that Eddie used her in his plan — that he had recorded her, twisted her words, and threatened to expose her past mental health episodes to discredit her if she didn’t comply. Joe was furious. Not at Belle — but at himself.

He had trusted Eddie. Defended him. Brought him into the business fold.

And now? Everything was spiraling.

Dawn, pregnant and exhausted, had found a burner phone hidden in Joe’s office drawer. It was linked directly to encrypted texts from a contact saved as “S.” She showed Joe — and in that moment, the room spun. “S” wasn’t Shepherd. It was Shane, Eddie’s enforcer, long presumed dead after fleeing a decade ago.

This wasn’t just a land grab. It was a revival of something older. Something darker.

Meanwhile, Lydia — sweet, curious, and so often overlooked — discovered an old envelope Eddie had buried inside his travel bag. It contained a photograph, crumpled and faded, of a woman holding a baby in front of a farmhouse. The timestamp read: 2006. Ireland.

The woman was Lydia’s sister.

Presumed dead. Lost to time.

Suddenly, the case wasn’t about business or revenge — it was personal.

Cain, as always, reacted with fury. When he found out Moira might’ve unknowingly leased part of the farm to a shell company tied to The Shepherd, he erupted. Moira denied knowledge, but the contracts bore her digital signature. Now Cain doesn’t know who to believe — and his instincts scream betrayal.

He’s ready to confront. To tear it all down. But even he knows: if he gets it wrong, he loses his family. Again.

And then, there’s Belle.

Her silence, once a form of survival, is now a haunting echo in every room she walks through. She remembers the night Eddie offered her a drink — just a single glass of wine — and how she blacked out for hours afterward. She dismissed it at the time. But now? She knows. It was a test. A rehearsal for what he planned for Kim.

Belle’s mental health, so delicately balanced, is once again at risk.

And Joe — trying to protect her, to fix his own failures — is spiraling.

But the most shocking twist came that afternoon.

Kim, surrounded by legal chaos, trying to piece together how Frank betrayed her from beyond the grave, was handed a note. Delivered in silence. No signature.

Just five words.

“He isn’t who you think.”

Attached was a DNA report. Joe Tate’s.

The father listed? Not Frank Tate.

And as Kim stood in stunned silence, Ivy leaned in and whispered:

“I know who he really belongs to. And I know what that means… for you.”

In that moment, Kim Tate — woman of steel, survivor of coups, widow of power — felt something she hadn’t in years.

Fear.

Because if Ivy was right, everything — her control, her legacy, even Joe — could slip through her fingers.

And the game, it seems, has only just begun.

So the real question is: will Kim Tate fight her way back to the top — or will Ivy Shepherd become the new queen of Home Farm?