Beneath the Billionaire Mask - Chapter 10: Chapter 10

Upper West Side — 8:13 PM
The world outside Adrian’s penthouse looked unchanged—streetlights glowing soft halos on the sidewalk, yellow cabs slicing through evening traffic, city life thudding along like it hadn’t just exploded at their feet.
But inside, everything had shifted.
Elena stood at the window, phone in hand, screen glowing with dozens of missed calls and messages.
Julia: “Are you okay? Elena, please call me.”
Her old station: “Exclusive rights? Call now.”
Blocked Number: “Interesting footage. You always were photogenic.”
She turned the phone over.
The press wasn’t chasing the story anymore. They were chasing her.
Behind her, Adrian was pacing—silent, simmering.
“They’ve weaponized your face,” she said finally, not turning around. “That photo… it’s everywhere now. Twitter, Reddit, gossip forums. They’re calling me your mistress, your whistleblower, your co-conspirator. One blog said I’m your accomplice in blackmail.”
He stopped pacing. “I can make it go away.”
“No,” she said, sharper than she meant. “You don’t get to erase me. That’s what they do. I’m not your shadow, Adrian.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
Elena turned, anger flaring beneath the fear. “Then how did you mean it? Because right now I feel like I’m standing in a war zone I didn’t even know I walked into—and suddenly every sniper’s aiming for my name.”
He approached her, voice lower. “You wanted the truth.”
“Yeah. I didn’t know it would come wrapped in surveillance, murder, and a media bloodbath.”
Adrian didn’t respond.
The silence between them stretched until it ached.
Elena dropped into a chair, burying her face in her hands.
“I wanted to take you down,” she said into her palms. “And now all I want to do is figure out how to stop them from gutting you. And me. And Evelyn’s memory.”
He crouched in front of her.
“Elena,” he said quietly, “you’re not the only one being used. Marcus tried to spin my grief into guilt. And now Veritas—whoever they are—is turning both of us into players in a game we don’t control.”
She looked up at him. “Then we take control.”
He nodded slowly.
“Starting now.”
Adrian’s Private Archives — 9:22 PM
They entered his encrypted server room—hidden behind a panel in the study.
Elena had never seen this part of his world. Not even in her wildest theories.
Walls lined with locked drawers. Shelves of redacted contracts. Drives marked with codenames.
He tapped a biometric scanner. A drawer opened.
Inside: a black case with a single white card inside. The logo was unmistakable.
Veritas.
“What is this?” Elena whispered.
Adrian’s voice dropped. “A file Evelyn hid before she died. One I didn’t even know she had access to.”
He opened the case.
A flash drive. And beneath it, a letter.
Elena leaned over and read:
“If anything happens to me, and Veritas resurfaces—don’t trust the government, and don’t trust the board. This goes deeper than Marcus. They used us. And if they come back… it means someone higher up gave them permission.”
— Evelyn
Elena looked at Adrian.
“Someone higher than Marcus?”
He nodded grimly. “The Foundation isn’t the only thing being used.”
Midtown — Unknown Location — Same Time
A woman stood in front of a wall of monitors.
On them: Adrian. Elena. The penthouse. The safehouse. The warehouse.
Every angle. Every word. Every secret.
She picked up her phone and pressed a button.
“It’s time,” she said. “Phase Two begins at midnight.”
Adrian’s Private Archives – 9:43 PM
Elena stared at the letter Evelyn had written. Her handwriting was steady. Measured. But there was something in the curve of the final sentence—a hesitation, maybe. A fear.
“‘Don’t trust the board,’” Elena read aloud. “You think she meant your board of directors?”
Adrian’s voice was quieter now. “Some of them were brought in after the rebranding. After Evelyn’s death. Marcus might not be the only rot.”
He was already pulling files from the drawer—bios, contracts, foundation payouts. He moved with the urgency of someone who’d spent years ignoring whispers, and now couldn’t afford not to listen.
Elena caught a name at the top of one file.
Julius Grant.
A finance executive. Foundation board member. Approved several overseas donations marked classified.
She blinked. “Wait—he’s the one who first reached out to me at the gala. Said he’d been following my reporting back when I exposed the Parallax shell firm.”
Adrian’s head snapped toward her. “You never told me that.”
“I thought he was just a power-hungry donor trying to flirt.”
Adrian opened the file.
Grant’s name appeared on half a dozen correspondences with Marcus over the last two years—coded messages masked behind shipping agreements.
And worse…
A wire transfer.
To an off-shore account. Dated two days before Evelyn died.
Elena’s stomach turned. “She knew.”
“She tried to stop them,” Adrian said darkly. “And they silenced her.”
For a long, trembling second, neither of them spoke.
Then Elena whispered, “Adrian… what if this isn’t just about Marcus anymore?”
He looked at her. “It’s not.”
Veritas – Control Node | Undisclosed
The woman stepped away from the monitors.
A man was waiting in the shadows of the command room.
“She took the bait,” the woman said.
“Elena?” the man asked.
She nodded once.
“And Blackwood?”
“Predictably protective. Predictably blind.”
The man smirked, stepping forward. His face came into the light.
Julius Grant.
“Good,” he said. “It’s almost time they learned the real story. The one Evelyn never got to tell.”
Blackwood Penthouse – 10:02 PM
Adrian returned to the main floor just as Elena ended a call with Julia.
“She’s worried about me,” Elena said. “Apparently my name is trending now. Not for my writing. Not for anything I’ve exposed. Just for being ‘the billionaire’s shadow.’”
Adrian reached out and gently touched her wrist.
“You’re not in my shadow, Elena. You’re standing right beside me.”
She looked up at him, and the heat between them simmered just beneath the surface.
“We’re running out of time,” she said. “Marcus is quiet. Too quiet. And Veritas is already pulling strings inside your company.”
“I know.”
Adrian crossed to the bar, poured a glass of water, and downed it in a single motion.
“I need to confront the board,” he said. “On record. With evidence.”
“And what if one of them tips off Marcus?”
He hesitated.
“Then we’ll flush them all,” he said. “One by one.”
Elena smiled grimly. “You really are a bastard when you’re cornered.”
Adrian met her gaze. “Only when I have something to lose.”
For a second, the room stilled.
The world outside blurred. But inside, something sharp and real settled between them. Not just fear. Not just strategy.
Trust.
Broken. Fragile. Still holding.
Elena nodded once.
“Then let’s burn the lies down. Together.”
Blackwood Penthouse – 11:04 PM
The city lights shimmered through the floor-to-ceiling windows, but the mood inside had grown darker. Elena sat cross-legged on the edge of the sofa, laptop open, sifting through a dense spreadsheet of off-shore wire transfers—each one a breadcrumb in a trail that Evelyn died trying to expose.
Adrian stood near the far wall, speaking quietly into his earpiece.
“Yes,” he said. “Have them monitor every device that pings near the tower. No, I don’t care who it belongs to—friend, staff, guest. We’ve been breached.”
He ended the call and turned to her.
“Elena,” he said, tone tight. “Julius Grant has disappeared. His driver dropped him off at a private airstrip in Westchester two hours ago. The plane was corporate. Leased under a shell name.”
Her heart stuttered.
“He’s running,” she said.
“No,” Adrian replied. “He’s repositioning.”
He crossed the room and pulled something from the inner pocket of his jacket—a slim silver keycard, slick and cold. He held it out to her.
“Elena, I need you to go to Evelyn’s safe deposit box.”
She blinked. “You said it was sealed.”
“It was. Until two days ago.”
“You think Julius or Marcus tried to access it?”
“I think Evelyn knew one day the house of cards would fall. And that she didn’t trust either of us to face it until we were desperate enough to look.”
Elena closed her laptop.
Tension buzzed between them. She took the keycard from his hand, fingers brushing his.
Neither of them pulled away.
“You trust me with this?” she asked softly.
His gaze didn’t waver. “You’re the only one I trust right now.”
A silence deeper than comfort settled between them.
Then he added, low and raw, “And if something happens to me—”
“No,” she said immediately, stepping forward. “Don’t finish that sentence.”
“Elena—”
“You’re not dying,” she said fiercely. “Not for this. Not for them. Not for me.”
He looked down, jaw clenched.
“I already have,” he whispered.
Her breath caught.
But before either of them could say what came next, her phone buzzed.
Blocked number.
One image.
A photo of Evelyn. In an alley. Meeting someone cloaked in shadows.
The timestamp?
Three hours before her death.
A second image followed.
The same alley.
But this time, it wasn’t Evelyn.
It was Elena.
Today.
Same spot. Same angle. Taken without her knowing.
Beneath it, one sentence:
“You’re walking the same path. Let’s see where it ends.”