Syndicate

Kira’s POV

Money is the purest form of power.

Sitting in my dark bedroom with a quarter of a million untraceable dollars resting in an offshore account, I finally felt like I had a shield. But a shield was only good for defense. I was ready to go on the attack.

I pulled up a new terminal window on my laptop.

My next target was my adoptive father. The stern patriarch who treated me like a disappointing stain on his perfect family portrait. He was the man who arranged my marriage to Aziel Lockwood, claiming it was a necessary sacrifice to save his fragile favorite daughter, Zara.

In my past life, I believed that lie. I believed he was just a cold businessman trying to protect his favorite child. But as I watched him stand by my burning car, waiting for me to die so he could steal my Peterson family inheritance, I realized something important.

He wasn’t a businessman. He was a monster. And monsters always have dirty secrets.

I cracked my knuckles and typed in the backdoor access codes for the Myles Industries private servers. His cybersecurity was laughable compared to the military-grade firewall I had poked yesterday. I bypassed his main network in less than three minutes.

I dove straight into his personal financial records. I wanted to see exactly how much the Myles family was struggling.

As the spreadsheets loaded onto my screen, I frowned. The numbers made no sense.

Myles Industries was certainly losing market value, but it wasn't bankrupt. However, his private accounts were completely empty. In fact, they were actively hemorrhaging cash. Massive wire transfers were being sent out every single Friday at midnight.

I traced the routing numbers. The money wasn't going to rival companies or legitimate investments. It was disappearing into a shell corporation registered in the Cayman Islands.

I dug deeper, running a decryption script on the shell company's hidden owners.

When the true name popped up on my screen, my blood ran cold.

The Ornate Syndicate.

It was one of the most unforgiving underground casino networks in the world. They catered to billionaires, corrupt politicians, and desperate men.

I stared at the screen, putting the pieces together. The wire transfers. The missing millions. The sudden, desperate push to marry me off to Aziel Lockwood three years ago.

The truth hit me like a physical punch to the stomach.

My adoptive father hadn't forced me into this marriage because Zara was too weak. He forced me into it because he was drowning in illegal gambling debt. Aziel had paid a massive, eight-figure bride-price to the Myles family to secure the marriage contract. He didn't use that money to save the family business. He used my life to pay off the Ornate Syndicate.

He literally sold me for casino chips.

A dark, burning rage ignited in my chest. I took a deep breath, forcing the anger down into a tight ball. Getting mad was useless. Getting even was much better.

"Let's see how you handle a winning streak, Father," I whispered.

I opened a spoofing program. I didn't want to use my newly earned hacker money to frame him. Instead, I created a phantom digital ledger. I manipulated the bank's internal coding to make it look like he had just received a massive, secret deposit of fifteen million dollars into a hidden, undeclared offshore account.

The money didn't actually exist, but on paper, he looked incredibly rich.

Next, I opened an encrypted messaging service. I drafted an anonymous email and sent it directly to the known contact address for the Ornate Syndicate's debt collectors.

Subject: Edward Myles.

Message: He is holding out on you. He has the funds to clear his remaining debt. Attached is the proof of his hidden fifteen-million-dollar account. He thinks you are too stupid to find it.

I attached the forged bank ledger and hit send.

Now, all I had to do was watch the explosion.

I hacked into the Myles family mansion’s security camera system. The high-definition video feeds popped up on my screen, showing the front gates, the luxurious living room, and the sweeping driveway.

I only had to wait forty-five minutes.

On the camera feed, three matte-black SUVs sped up the Myles driveway. They completely ignored the intercom at the front gate, simply driving straight through the metal barriers, snapping them like twigs.

The cars slammed to a halt in front of the mansion. A dozen huge men in dark suits stepped out. They didn't bother knocking. One of them kicked the front doors open, shattering the lock.

I switched the video feed to the main living room.

My adoptive parents were sitting on the expensive white sofas, drinking tea. When the syndicate enforcers stormed into the room, my adoptive mother screamed and dropped her porcelain cup. It shattered on the floor, spilling her favorite hot tea over the imported rug.

The lead enforcer, a man with a thick scar across his jaw, grabbed Edward by the collar of his shirt and threw him onto the glass coffee table. The table cracked under his weight.

Even without audio, the scene was crystal clear. The enforcer shoved a printed piece of paper—my forged bank ledger—directly into Edward’s face. Edward stared at the numbers, his eyes wide with a mixture of shock and panic. He shook his head frantically, waving his hands in the air, trying to explain that he didn't have that money. He was begging.

The enforcer didn't care. He signaled his men.

They began ripping the living room apart. They smashed antique vases, pulled down expensive paintings, and flipped the sofas. Eleanor, my adoptive mother, huddled in the corner, sobbing hysterically. Her perfect, high-society facade was completely destroyed.

The syndicate was sending a clear message: pay up, or the next thing we break is your legs.

I watched Edward crawl backward across the floor, clutching his chest in terror. The powerful, arrogant patriarch who had laughed at my burning car was now reduced to a whimpering coward.

The enforcers finally left, warning him they would be back.

I leaned back in my chair, feeling a deep, satisfying thrill. The Myles family's reputation was officially dead. The loan sharks would hound them constantly. Their wealthy friends would abandon them. Zara’s comfortable, stolen life was collapsing around her.

I took a sip of my cold water, enjoying the victory.

"Time to clean up," I muttered.

I went back to the Myles Industries server to delete the phantom bank ledger. I needed to erase my tracks before a real bank auditor realized the fifteen million dollars was fake.

I pulled up the command terminal and typed in the delete sequence.

I pressed enter.

Nothing happened.

I frowned and pressed the key again. The screen flashed red. An error message popped up in the center of the terminal.

ACCESS DENIED. DIRECTORY LOCKED BY ADMIN.

My hands froze over the keyboard. That was impossible. I had completely bypassed Edward’s security. I was the admin.

Suddenly, a new line of code appeared on my screen, and it wasn't my code. It was moving incredibly fast, scanning the network directories and downloading massive packets of Myles Industries data.

Someone else was inside the server.

I watched the green text scroll down the black terminal. The coding language was ruthless, aggressive, and highly advanced. This wasn't a random virus or a simple corporate spy. This was a predator.

And they were currently locking the doors, trapping my phantom ledger inside the system.

If I didn't delete that fake ledger, the digital trail could eventually be traced back to my entry point at the Lockwood estate. I would be exposed.

My heart hammered against my ribs. I sat up straight, cracking my knuckles one more time.

Whoever this mysterious hacker was, they had just walked into the wrong server.

I placed my fingers over the keys and launched my counter-attack. The real battle was just beginning.