“Got it. I know someone who fits the bill. What’s next?”

“The marriage between Alyssa and Jeff. They must have filed the paperwork by now, but there’s a chance it can be invalidated.”

“What do you mean?”

“Legally, Jeff was still my fiancé. Marrying someone else while engaged might not qualify as bigamy, but it is a civil offense, grounds for a substantial damages claim. Plus…”

I paused and stared out at the dark sky.

“Their real target is my company. They’ll throw everything they’ve got at me. Social media slander, pressure on our partners, but I’ll turn every move against them.”

“Lucy, you’re different. Like someone else entirely.”

“That’s right. The kind-hearted Lucy Brown died yesterday. What’s left is my father’s daughter, a CEO ready to fight.”

After hanging up, I headed to my study.

From the back of the safe, I retrieved an old leather-bound journal and a black USB drive secured with a heavily encrypted password, both left to me by my father.

In his journal, he had written:

The Owen family’s methods are reckless and dangerous. They’ve never built, they’ve consumed and destroyed. Jeff carries that legacy in his blood. If anything happens to me, I can only hope Lucy sees him for what he truly is. The final trump card is on this USB.

The final trump card.

I gripped the USB tightly. I didn’t have the password yet, but I would find it.

Jeff, Alyssa, you started this game. I’ll be the one to finish it.

No rules.

No mercy.

The next morning, the world turned its fangs on me.

When I opened my phone, my face was plastered across the top of every news site.

Breaking. Rising star designer Lucy Brown accused of embezzling company funds and fleeing abroad. Sources say jealousy over sister’s marriage to her fiancé drove the act.

Sources.

I tapped the article. A video began to play. Alyssa was crying as she gave an emotional interview.

“My sister, she’s always been the type who had to have whatever she wanted. When she found out Jeff and I had feelings for each other, she forced herself between us. I guess the company was struggling too, but I never imagined she’d steal from it. I just can’t believe it.”

An award-worthy performance.

Teary-eyed, fragile, the picture of a tragic heroine. And next to her, Jeff was holding her gently like a wounded dove.

The comment section was a flood of vitriol.

What a disgrace, homewrecker.

She let success go to her head.

At the same time, the company phones wouldn’t stop ringing.

Partnerships terminated, banks revisiting our loans, panicked employees demanding answers.

Is this true?

What’s going to happen to us?

Jeff’s assault was brutal, swift, and precise. He wasn’t just trying to humiliate me.

He was trying to annihilate me.

Everything I’d built, everything my father had entrusted to me. It was all falling apart.

That afternoon, I sat alone in my office, staring at my father’s portrait.

The sky outside was thick with dark, churning clouds.

Maybe this really was the end.

Dad, I’m sorry. I couldn’t protect your company.

At the very moment despair wrapped around my heart like a chilling mist, there was a gentle knock at the door.

“It’s Kevin.”

I opened it to find Kevin, our veteran head of accounting, standing with concern etched across his face. In his hands was a thick file.

“Please don’t carry this alone. We believe in you just like we believed in your dad.”

“Kevin, these lies, they won’t stand.”

“And more importantly, take a look at this.”

He opened the file. Inside were detailed accounting records, meticulously organized.

Several pages were marked with red tabs.

“Jeff signed multiple shady consulting contracts over the past month, totaling about $500,000, but the firms he’s dealing with, paper companies, no real operations.”

“And where the money’s going?”

He pointed at a document, a list of private investors currently buying up Atelier Lumiere stock.

“I looked into them. All of them are Jeff’s old college friends or shell employees from Apex. He’s using our company’s money to secretly buy out our own shares.”

“He’s embezzling our funds to steal our company.”

“Yes. And at this rate, he’ll have majority control by next week’s emergency shareholders meeting.”

A rush of blood thundered in my ears.

Jeff was using my company’s money to launch a hostile takeover.

“Kevin, thank you. This is exactly the evidence we need.”

“We’re with you until the end. That’s a promise I made to your dad.”

His steady words reignited a fire inside me.

I wasn’t alone.

That night, Sandra called.

“Lucy, that investigator you asked for, he’s incredible. Code name Zero. Former white-hat hacker. There’s nothing in the digital world he can’t find.”

“Can he start immediately?”

“He already has. He’s inside Apex Corporation servers as we speak. And he’s found something juicy.”

Sandra sent over an image through a secure encrypted app.

It was an internal Apex document. Confidential financial data.

“Look at this. The Owen family is drowning. Years of reckless investments, massive debt. The banks are cutting them off. This is why they want Atelier Lumiere so badly. Your company’s clean assets and high credit rating. They’re desperate for it.”

“So that’s why they pushed so hard.”

“Exactly. And here’s the real bomb.”

Zero had sent over another file and audio recording, secretly captured from an Apex board meeting.

Jeff’s voice.

“The Lumiere acquisition is proceeding on schedule. Lucy’s probably still dreaming in Italy. By the time she returns, she’ll have no place left to come back to.”

His dad’s voice.

“Don’t mess this up, Jeff. That company is our last lifeline. Do you have any idea how hard it was to remove Lucy’s father? That stubborn old man.”

“I know, Dad. He conveniently dropped dead from overwork. His daughter will follow the same fate if she resists.”

That was it.

I stopped breathing.

My father’s death wasn’t just exhaustion.

They planned it.

“Sandra, this…”

“Yes. This isn’t just a hostile takeover anymore. This is a crime. We should call the police.”

“Wait.”

I cut her off, my voice trembling.

“Not yet. If we want to destroy them completely, socially and legally, we need something bigger. And we need to save Alyssa.”