The black card felt heavier in Nicholas's pocket as he stood outside Olivia's office, its weight a constant reminder of transactions that might already be his undoing. Each cryptocurrency transfer it represented now felt like a chain link in his shackles—digital breadcrumbs leading straight to his destruction. Twelve hours ago, he'd thought he was hunting Lizzy. Now, walking into what should have been familiar territory, he wondered if he'd been the prey all along.
Some things are more complicated than you think. The words had carved themselves into his sleepless night, accompanied by that whispered male voice—a voice that had introduced variables he couldn't calculate. Outside his window, London's financial district had flickered endlessly, each light a cold eye watching from glass towers, indifferent to the human dramas playing out within. The city's pulse felt different now—not the rhythm of opportunity, but of approaching reckoning.
The elevator's mechanical hum felt amplified, each floor a countdown to confrontation. Even the hallway seemed charged with unspoken tension, fluorescent lights casting harsh shadows that seemed to shift with his footsteps.
Olivia's office smelled of cold coffee and accumulated tension, underscored by anxiety's metallic tang. Rain drummed against the windows in an irregular pattern, matching the staccato rhythm of distant typing from neighboring offices. Everything remained precisely aligned—every surface gleaming, every document in its place—but the air itself had changed, thick with the weight of secrets about to be revealed.
She looked up as he entered, her fingers pausing mid-keystroke. What he saw wasn't relief. It was the measured gaze of someone testing the waters whose depths she already knew.
"Well, she's certainly made our job easier." Olivia gestured to the newspapers spread across her desk, but her tone carried no satisfaction. Only calculation. The headlines seemed to mock them from their neat arrangement—Tech Heiress Announces Engagement sitting beside Market Volatility Concerns.
Nicholas settled into his chair, hyperaware of how the familiar space now felt foreign. The leather creaked differently, and the air conditioning hummed with an ominous undertone. His pulse quickened—not from anticipation, but from the animal instinct that sensed a trap. The black card seemed to burn against his chest, radiating heat like a brand.
"Twelve percent drop in after-hours trading," he said, his voice steadier than he felt. "Even Patterson's asking questions about executive judgment."
"I've been fielding calls all night." Olivia's fingers drummed once against her desk—a nervous habit he'd never seen before. A crack in her armor. Her usually immaculate appearance showed subtle signs of strain: slightly smudged mascara, a coffee stain on her sleeve she hadn't noticed. "Nicholas, about last night—"
"The complications you mentioned?" He leaned forward, his instincts sharpening like a blade. "And the voice I heard."
Olivia stood, walking to the window. She pressed her palm against the glass, watching the rain streak down in rivulets. When she turned back, something had shifted in her expression—cautious excitement mixed with uncertainty, and something else. Fear? Or was it anticipation?
"There are developments you don't understand. Things that changed after Lizzy's announcement." She paused, seeming to gather courage. "The voice you heard—that was Rex Holloway."
The name hit Nicholas like ice water. Rex Holloway. Young, ambitious, and currently occupying a position far below his aspirations. The eager assistant who brought coffee and took notes. Not exactly the heavyweight ally he'd been hoping for.
"Rex?" Nicholas felt his brow furrow. "What does he have to do with this?"
A longer pause. Olivia returned to her desk, her movements careful, deliberate. "He saw the Instagram post. Lizzy's engagement hit him harder than any of us expected." Her voice dropped to barely above a whisper. "Nicholas, they were more than colleagues. Rex thought it was love."
The room went completely still. Even the rain seemed to pause. Nicholas felt his understanding of the situation shift, like tectonic plates grinding against each other. The implications cascaded through his mind—access, information, betrayal layered upon betrayal.
"She let him that close?"
"Define it however you prefer. Rex called it love." Olivia's laugh was bitter, hollow. She sat heavily, suddenly looking older. "He showed up at my door near midnight, soaked from the rain, looking like a man who'd seen his future crumble. Said it started casually—stolen moments, late-night calls, secret meetings. But somewhere along the line, he convinced himself it was more. That there was a future."
She gestured to her phone, still lying face down on her desk. "Then came the engagement announcement. He didn't even know who David Zhang was. Found out about her fiancé the same way the rest of the world did."
Nicholas absorbed this, his mind racing through implications. Rex Holloway wasn't a major player, but he was positioned close to Lizzy. And proximity to power could be more valuable than power itself. The black card seemed to pulse in his pocket—if Rex had access to Lizzy's private communications, her plans...
"What does he want to do?"
"He wants revenge." Olivia's voice carried both opportunity and warning. "And Nicholas, he has the means to get it."
The silence stretched between them, filled only by the rain's rhythm and the distant hum of the city. Nicholas felt the weight of Sebastian's photograph in his mind's eye, sitting on his desk across the city, watching with those knowing eyes. What would the old man think of this twist—his daughter's lover becoming her destroyer?
"What kind of means?"
"Rex has been collecting evidence. While Lizzy's been conducting her internal audit of our operations—expense reports, transaction records, communication logs—she's been building a case." Olivia opened her desk drawer, pulling out a folder that hadn't been there before. "Against us."
The blood drained from Nicholas's face. The black card burned against his chest, each transaction it represented suddenly feeling like a signature on his death warrant. "A case against what?"
"Against the cryptocurrency transactions, the coordination with other companies, the short positions." Olivia's voice was steady, but he could see the tension in her shoulders, the way her hands trembled slightly as she handled the documents. "Rex has been feeding her information, but also copying everything for himself. Insurance, he called it."
Nicholas felt his world tilt. The moral weight of what they were about to do settled on his shoulders like a lead blanket—they were going to weaponize a man's heartbreak, turn love into ammunition. The thought should have disgusted him. Instead, it felt like survival.
"And you trust him?"
"I trust his motivation." Olivia's voice carried the weight of someone who'd been thinking about this all night, turning it over like a stone in her palm. "A man who breaks his vows for a fantasy doesn't forgive easily when that fantasy betrays him. Rex doesn't just want to hurt Lizzy professionally—he wants to destroy her personally."
She pulled out several documents from the folder, spreading them across her desk like tarot cards revealing an inevitable fate. "And he has the ammunition to do it."
Nicholas stood, moving to the window. Outside, London's financial district pulsed with its eternal rhythm, but now it sounded different—more dangerous, layered with the kind of personal betrayal that could either save them or destroy them all. The rain-slicked streets reflected the building lights like scattered diamonds, beautiful and cold.
"What kind of evidence are we talking about?"
"Transaction records showing the correlation between our cryptocurrency payments and stock movements. Communication logs that establish coordination." Olivia's voice was clinical, but he could hear the underlying tension. "Rex has been Lizzy's eyes and ears, but he's also been making copies of everything that passes through her hands."
"And he's willing to give us access to all of this?"
"He's willing to give us access to Lizzy's audit findings, her timeline for action, and her planned presentation to the board." Olivia sat back down, her expression grim. "But more than that—he's willing to help us discredit the evidence before she can use it."
Nicholas felt a chill run through him. They were walking into a partnership with someone whose primary motivation was revenge, and revenge was notoriously difficult to control. Like trying to direct lightning—powerful, but unpredictable.
"What's his timeline?"
"He wants to move fast. He knows Lizzy is planning to present her findings to the board soon—possibly as early as next week." Olivia's voice carried new urgency. "Rex thinks her engagement announcement was a smokescreen, a way to make us think she's distracted while she prepares to strike."
"And you think he can deliver?"
"I think Rex Holloway is a man who's been betrayed by someone he loved, and he has access to information that could save us or condemn us." Olivia's expression was grim. "The question is whether we can trust him not to use that same information against us once Lizzy is gone."
Nicholas stood up, straightened his jacket with a practiced tug, and let his gaze linger on the folder Olivia had left open. The documents seemed to pulse with potential energy—the power to destroy or be destroyed.
"Keep everything off the network. No emails. No cloud shares. If he sends you anything, I want a copy burned to disc and stored physically. Understood?"
Olivia nodded, but Nicholas was already turning toward the door, his mind calculating probabilities and risks.
"And Olivia," he added, pausing at the threshold. "Don't get too comfortable thinking Rex is only her problem. People betrayed once don't always stop at one target. Especially when they still think they deserve more."
Back in his flat, the silence carried new weight. Nicholas placed the black card next to Sebastian's photograph on his desk—two objects that seemed to watch each other across the mahogany surface. The picture had accumulated a thin layer of dust on one corner, making Sebastian's calculating eyes appear softer, more human. Yet the expression remained the same: knowing, patient, inevitable.
Had Sebastian known about his daughter's affair? Had he suspected the very betrayals that were now coming to light? The thought settled into Nicholas's bones like winter cold.
His phone buzzed—a text from an unknown number: I know what she's planning. Tomorrow. Come alone. - R
Nicholas stared at the message, then at Sebastian's photograph. Something about the text felt wrong—too direct, too urgent. Men consumed by heartbreak didn't usually think this clearly, this quickly. The timing felt orchestrated, almost professional.
In the window's reflection, he could see his face superimposed over the city lights. But for a moment, he wasn't sure it was his. The eyes were too cold. Too familiar. Too much like Sebastian's.
The boy who'd loved Lizzy was about to become the man who destroyed her.
Or was he?
Someone was going to bleed. Nicholas just wasn't sure whose blood would be spilt first.