His Invisible Architects Revenge

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Natalie pov

I did not sleep at all that night.

After I left Elias's office, I went straight back to my hotel room, locked the door, and collapsed onto the bed but my mind refused to shut down. I stared at the ceiling for hours, watching the shadows stretch across the walls.

The reality of the supernatural world was crushing me, Adrian was an Alpha, he was royalty. He had endless money, deep political connections, and the power to destroy a person's life with a single phone call. I was a wolf-less Omega, I had a brilliant mind and a decent bank account, but how was I supposed to navigate a world that bowed to him? How could I build an empire when the king had officially banned me from buying the bricks?

I tossed and turned, my anxiety burning in my chest, I spent the entire night wondering how I could outsmart a man who held all the cards. It was only when the sky outside my window started to turn a pale, morning blue that my exhausted eyes finally fluttered shut.

I felt like I had only been asleep for five minutes when a sharp, loud ping woke me up. I groaned, rubbed my face, and rolled over to grab my phone from the bedside table. The bright screen burned my tired eyes, it was a news alert from the supernatural business network.

LIVE NOW: Alpha Adrian Blackwood addresses the public regarding the gala scandal.

I scrambled out of the bed, grabbed the television remote, and turned on the flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. I switched it to the news channel and turned the volume up.

Adrian was standing at a podium set up right outside the Blackwood headquarters, Dozens of microphones were shoved in front of him. The flashing lights of hundreds of cameras lit up his handsome face. Standing right behind him, keeping her head bowed, was Scarlett. She was dressed in a plain white dress, with zero jewelry, looking small and traumatized.

"For the past week, the Blackwood Group has been the subject of vicious rumors," Adrian said into the microphones. He sounded so sincere that if I did not know him, I would have believed every single word.

"I have remained silent until today," Adrian continued, looking directly into the cameras with a pained expression. "I gave the person responsible for this scandal a grace period of one week. I hoped that, for old times' sake, she would realize the magnitude of what she had done, return what she stole, and apologize but sadly, she has chosen to hide."

I sat on the edge of my bed, my hands gripping the sheets tightly. "The woman who claimed ownership of our five-year expansion plan is Natalia Ernest," Adrian announced."Natalia was not a strategist, she was a lowly administrative assistant in our records department. She was a wolf-less woman whom I took pity on, I trusted her. I gave her full access to my personal files because I believed she was a loyal employee."

He paused, letting out a heavy, dramatic sigh. He reached back and gently squeezed Scarlett's hand. "But unfortunately, Natalia developed an unhealthy, delusional obsession with me," Adrian lied, "When I announced that I had found my mate, Lady Scarlett, Natalia suffered a severe mental break. Out of bitter jealousy, she abused my trust. She logged into our private servers, stole the expansion strategies that I had personally written, and rushed to file a fraudulent patent under her own name just to humiliate my Luna at the gala."

"You lying bastard," I whispered to the television, my blood turning to boiling fire.

"We have evidence of her instability," Adrian stated boldly. He gestured to a large screen set up next to the podium. My breath caught in my throat as the screen lit up, Adrian was displaying screenshots of my text messages to him from the past three years. Then, a video played, it was a clip from the security camera inside Adrian's office from a year ago. It showed me fast asleep on his leather couch, wrapped in his suit jacket. In the video, Adrian walked over, touched my hair, and I leaned into his hand like a pathetic, love-starved dog.

"She was deeply unwell," Adrian told the flashing cameras, shaking his head. "She stole my intellectual property out of jealousy and before she ran away, she intentionally crashed our secondary servers in a desperate attempt to embezzle pack funds. She is a dangerous, unstable thief, and she will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of supernatural law."

I could not breathe.

I shot up from the edge of the bed. A wave of blinding anger washed over me so hard my vision actually blurred. I stormed across the hotel room, grabbed my winter coat off the chair, and shoved my arms into the sleeves. I grabbed my room key and my phone.

I was going to march down to the Blackwood headquarters, push my way through the barricades, and scream the truth into every single microphone. I reached the door of my hotel room, I grabbed the handle and yanked it downward.

But suddenly, I froze.

The door opened an inch, letting a sliver of hallway light into the room, but my feet refused to step across the threshold. I stood there, panting heavily, my chest heaving with rage.

I stared at the door handle.

Why did he tell those specific lies? I asked myself.

Adrian knew I was a genius, he knew I protected my intellectual property fiercely, and how much pride I took in my work. He told these ridiculous, outrageous lies on live television today because he wanted to provoke me.

If I ran down there right now, screaming, crying, and yelling about how much he used me, what would the cameras see?

They would see exactly what Adrian just described. They would see an unstable, obsessed, angry woman throwing a public tantrum. His pack guards would tackle me to the ground on live television, and Adrian would look at the cameras with a sad, pitying smile and say, 'See? I told you she was crazy.'

He had set a massive, emotional trap, and I was about to walk right into it. I let go of the door handle and pushed the door shut, the deadbolt clicking back into place. I let out a long, shaky breath."Nice try, Adrian," I whispered. "But you cannot play me anymore."

I refused to give him the satisfaction of my tears, I refused to give him my anger. I was not going to fight his public relations stunt with screaming. I was going to prove him wrong the only way that mattered by building an empire so massive and powerful that it would eclipse his entirely.

I took off my winter coat and threw it back onto the chair. I walked over to the TV and pressed the power button, cutting off Adrian's lying face, throwing the room back into quiet peace.

Suddenly, my cell phone started ringing on the desk.

I looked down at it, the caller ID simply said: Unknown Number. I was still buzzing with leftover adrenaline and deep annoyance, I reached out and pressed the red decline button.

Two seconds later, the phone started ringing again. I declined it again, my jaw clenching, it immediately rang a third time. Something inside me snapped, I snatched the phone off the desk, pressed the green button, and brought it to my ear.

"Who the hell is this?" I snapped. "I do not care if you are the Moon Goddess herself, or one of Adrian's little spies!" I yelled into the receiver. "Do not call my phone again!"

I pulled the phone away from my ear, ready to hang up and block the number. Before my finger could hit the red button, a low, dark chuckle came through the speaker. It was a rich, dangerous sound that made my hand freeze in mid-air. I slowly brought the phone back to my ear.

"I assure you, little wolf," the deep voice said, heavily laced with amusement. "I am not one of Adrian's spies, my name is Cassian Voss."

The air in my lungs vanished.

The anger drained out of my body instantly, replaced by a shock so cold it rooted my feet to the floor. The name rang in my head.

Cassian Voss.

The ruthless Alpha of the Voss Dominion, the most feared businessman in the western territories. He was the only man in the state that Adrian Blackwood was actually afraid of.

"Cassian Voss?" I asked slowly, my voice dropping to a cautious whisper. "Of the Voss Dominion?"

"Yes," the deep voice replied. "And we have a lot to discuss, Natalia."