Chapter 10

Nathan Pov

I sat in the short-term rental and watched the city lights come on through the thin curtains.

The place was clean, paid for in cash, and registered under a name that was not mine. No doorman. No cameras in the hallway. Just a bed, a table, a kitchen that barely worked, and a laptop that held everything I still needed. It was not comfortable. It did not need to be. Comfort was for people who planned to stay.

I opened the laptop and checked the accounts first.

The money had moved the way it was supposed to. The early transfers were already sitting in places that would take time to follow. The larger ones had done their job. They had put Adrian’s name on enough paper to make him look guilty. That part had worked cleanly. Adrian was careful with numbers at work, but at home he had trusted me. Trust made everything easier.

I checked the company systems next through the back ways I still had. Adrian’s login was locked. His accounts were frozen. The internal review had started on schedule. The criminal referral had gone through this morning. On paper, it looked like a junior accounts officer had helped move money that was not his.

For a few hours, it had looked perfect.

Then Alexander Blackwood had stepped in.

I sat back in the chair and stared at the short news note Victoria Shaw’s office had filed. Material witness. Temporary protection. Alexander had put himself between Adrian and the police. That was not part of the plan. Adrian was supposed to be alone. Scared. Easy to leave behind. He was not supposed to end up in a private car with the one man who still had enough power to dig.

My phone buzzed on the table. Evelyn’s number.

I let it ring twice before I answered.

“You said he would be isolated by now,” she said. No greeting. No waste of time.

“He was. Alexander changed the order.”

“Then fix it. The longer Adrian stays close to my son, the more questions get asked. I do not want questions. I want the board focused on Alexander’s failure, not on old procurement codes.”

“I’m working on it.”

“Work faster. Sebastian is already nervous. Nervous people make mistakes.”

She hung up.

I set the phone down and rubbed my eyes. Evelyn Blackwood was useful. She had money, influence, and a clear goal. She also had no patience and no interest in anyone else’s problems. As long as I delivered what she wanted, she would protect the parts of the trail that led back to her. If I failed, she would cut me off without a second thought.

Sebastian was the weaker piece.

I called him next. He answered on the fourth ring, voice low, as if someone might be listening.

“We have a problem,” he said.

“I know.”

“Alexander has the override data. Or he will soon. Victoria Shaw is already pulling records. If they trace the codes back to my team—”

“They already can,” I said. “That was always a risk. The point was to make Adrian’s credentials look like the main event long enough for the board to act. The board acted. Alexander is out. The rest is cleanup.”

“Cleanup is not working. He has Adrian.”

“Then we make Adrian less useful.”

Sebastian was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, he sounded younger than he was. “My mother says if the Omega becomes a problem, we remove the problem.”

“Your mother says a lot of things. Some of them are smart. Some of them create more noise than they solve. Killing him now would bring attention we do not need. There are quieter ways.”

“Like what?”

“Like making sure the police do not lose interest. Like making sure any story Adrian tells sounds like a man trying to save himself. Leave the rest to me.”

Sebastian did not argue. He never did for long. He wanted the chair and the respect that came with it. He did not want to be the one who got caught holding the knife. That made him easy to guide and dangerous when he panicked.

I ended the call and sat in the quiet.

The plan had been simple at the start. Evelyn needed a way to weaken Alexander. She needed money moved in ways that would look bad under his watch. I needed money and a future that did not look like my father’s. Adrian had the login that could finish the chain. He also had four years of trust that made the login easy to use.

I had not planned to stay with him this long. At the beginning, the relationship had been real enough. He was steady. Kind. Easy to live with. Then the opportunity grew, and the steady kindness became a tool. By the end, the tool was all that was left.

I did not feel guilt. Guilt was for people who had other options.

I opened a hidden folder on the laptop. It sat behind two layers of protection and a name that meant nothing to anyone but me. Inside were the scans.

My father’s notes.

Thomas Reed had been a careful man. Even after the company forced him out, he had kept records. Handwritten pages. Old transaction lists. Small comments in the margins. Some of the pages still carried Richard Blackwood’s own writing—short notes, questions, marks beside numbers that had bothered him. My father had saved them like proof that he had not been the only one who saw the problem.

Evelyn had ruined him anyway.

I had kept the scans for years. At first they were only a reminder. Later they became insurance. Now they were leverage. The notes did not prove everything. They proved enough to make the right people nervous if they ever came to light. Richard Blackwood had been looking at Evelyn’s early moves before he died. The pages showed it. If Alexander ever got them, the story would get bigger than a few million in missing transfers.

I closed the folder and locked it again.

Outside, the city kept moving. Adrian was somewhere in it with a man who did not trust him and still needed him. Alexander was digging. Evelyn was pushing for speed. Sebastian was sweating.

The frame had held long enough to remove Alexander from the chair. That part was done. The next part was keeping Adrian from giving Alexander a clear path back.

I poured a glass of water and drank it slowly. The rental apartment stayed quiet. No one knew where I was. No one would know until I decided to be found.

I looked at the closed laptop and the dark window.

Adrian should have stayed quiet. He should have taken the blame the way the paper trail was written. Instead he had gotten into Alexander Blackwood’s car and started answering questions.

That made him a problem.

It also made Alexander a problem.

I opened a new message window on the clean phone and typed a short line to the contact who still handled quiet work for me.

The message was simple.

Keep pressure on both. Do not get close enough to be seen.

I sent it and deleted the record.

Then I sat back in the chair and waited for the next piece of news to arrive.

The game had changed shape, but it was still mine to finish.