The silence in the basement of The Sector was broken only by the low hum of the servers and the steady, terrifying click of the Auditor's pistol. He stood by the elevator, his face illuminated by the blue light of the digital archives. The man we had trusted to clean our books was now the one holding a silencer to our dreams.
"The book, Alexandra," the Auditor said, his voice as cold as the air-conditioned room. "Don't make this messy. I've spent ten years hiding your father's 'arrangements.' I think I've earned the right to own them."
The Ice Queen stepped in front of me, her eyes flashing with a mix of heartbreak and fury. "You were his friend. You sat at our table for Christmas dinner while you were secretly cataloging his sins for Catherine?"
"Catherine is a small-minded vulture," the Auditor sneered, taking a step closer. "She wanted the company for the money. I want the company because it controls the people who make the laws. With that book in my hand, I don't just own the Billionaire's legacy—I own the country."
I felt the weight of the leather-bound book in my hands. My mind was racing. We were trapped fifty feet underground in a soundproof vault. No security was coming. No police could hear us. It was just us, a greedy man with a gun, and the secrets of The Sector.
I looked at the glass pedestal, then at the heavy silver filing cabinets. I noticed a small red lever near the ventilation shaft—the emergency fire suppression system.
"You think a piece of paper makes you a king?" I asked, stepping out from behind the Ice Queen. I held the book up high, teasing him. "I grew up in places where paper was only good for starting fires. In the street, we don't follow kings. We follow the man who survives the night."
"You're a nobody," the Auditor spat, his aim shifting toward my chest. "A contract husband who got lucky. Give me the book, or I'll leave your wife to explain to the Board why her hero is bleeding out on the floor."
"I'm a nobody who knows how this building works," I whispered.
With a sudden, violent motion, I slammed my fist into the emergency red lever.
Immediately, a deafening siren filled the room, and thick, white fire-suppression powder blasted from the ceiling. The vault was instantly swallowed in a cloud of blinding white dust.
Puff! Puff!
The Auditor fired twice, the silenced shots thudding into the metal cabinets. I didn't wait. I dropped to the floor, pulling the Ice Queen down with me. "Stay low! Crawl toward the server racks!"
In the chaos and the fog, the Auditor was blind. He was a man of numbers and logic, not a fighter. He started coughing, the chemical powder filling his lungs. I moved like a ghost through the white mist, my boots silent on the floor. I didn't need to see him; I could hear his panicked breathing.
I looped around the back of the server racks, coming up behind him. As he turned to fire into the shadows, I lunged. I grabbed his wrist, twisting it upward until the gun fired a harmless shot into the ceiling.
"The contract is over!" I roared, driving my knee into his midsection.
The Auditor gasped, the pistol clattering to the floor. I didn't stop. I delivered a sharp hook to his jaw that sent him spinning back into the glass pedestal. The glass shattered, the sound echoing through the vault like a final bell.
The Ice Queen emerged from the mist, her face covered in white dust but her eyes burning with triumph. She picked up the fallen pistol and aimed it steadily at the Auditor, who was now groaning on the floor.
"Call Chinedu," she commanded me, her voice as sharp as a razor. "Tell him we found the mole. And tell him to bring the shredder. This book doesn't leave The Sector."
I looked at the book, then at her. "Are you sure? This is your father's history."
"My father is gone," she said, looking at the platinum ring on her finger. "And I'm building a new history. One where we don't need secrets to keep our throne."
I grabbed the Auditor by his collar, dragging him toward the elevator as the sirens continued to wail. We had survived the boardroom, the hospital, and the vault.
But as the elevator doors began to close, I looked back at the monitors in The Sector. One of them was still flashing. It wasn't a fire alarm. It was a countdown.
"Alexandra," I whispered, pointing at the screen. "What is that?"
The countdown was at 00:59... 00:58...