Monster In Silk

⚜️ Hunting Together

Blackwood Global at midnight was a different animal.

No assistants, no phones ringing, no coffee carts. Just glass and steel and the low hum of servers that never slept. The 42nd floor — Finance & Compliance — was supposed to be locked after 10 p.m. Adrian had the master code. He always had the master code.

"You sure the night guard is gone?" Cassie whispered, clutching her laptop bag. She wore all black — black leggings, black sweater, black sneakers she had bought for stakeouts. Adrian, beside her, wore a black Henley and black pants that made him look like a very expensive burglar. He had not shaved. The stubble made him look younger and more dangerous.

"Silas paid him to take a long dinner break. We have forty-seven minutes," Adrian said, punching in the code. The door clicked. "You remember what you're looking for?"

"Any ledger entry around October 2023 with Van Alen initials, silk purchase, or wire to a shell company ending in S. And anything with Julian's initials. You remember you promised not to touch me in a workplace?"

"Clause 9.1 does not apply to criminal trespass. It only heightens it."

He said it with a straight face. Cassie bit back a smile despite her nerves.

The finance archive was a cold room of filing cabinets and a single terminal that was not connected to the cloud — Marcus Thorne's paranoia. Marcus had kept a physical shadow ledger, Silas had told them. If the $`47M had been moved, it would be there.

Adrian went straight to the cabinets, fingers moving fast, finding the one labeled THORNE, M — PERSONAL. It was locked.

"Do you have a key?" Cassie asked.

"No." He pulled a small leather tool roll from his pocket. "But I have a childhood hobby my mother hates."

"You pick locks?"

"I pick everything."

It took him twelve seconds. The drawer slid open. Inside, not files — a black silk pouch, and a small, battered Moleskine notebook.

Cassie reached for the pouch. Adrian caught her wrist.

"Gloves," he said, pulling two pairs of latex from his pocket. "Marcus was old school. He might have left prints on purpose."

They gloved. Cassie opened the pouch. Inside, a single black silk handkerchief, identical to the one in her photos, but this one was clean. Embroidered in silver: S.H.

Selene Hart.

Her breath stopped. "Adrian. It's her initials."

Adrian was already flipping through the notebook. Pages of numbers, dates, wire transfers. Then a name, circled three times: S. HART — CONSULTING FEE — `$150K — INTRODUCTION TO VAN ALEN.

"She didn't just pick up the handkerchief," Adrian said, voice low. "She was paid to introduce someone. She was the broker."

"Broker for what?"

"For the merger that never happened. My mother wanted me to marry Elise Van Alen to get Van Alen's port access. Marcus found out Van Alen's ports were bankrupt. Someone paid Selene to make the introduction happen anyway, to push the merger through and hide the debt. The $`47M was a bridge loan to Van Alen, disguised as a consulting fee. Marcus threatened to expose it."

Cassie felt the pieces click, horrible and elegant. "So Selene introduced Elise to your family? And took `$150K?"

"And then took $15K to leak our contract. She's not just a gold-digger. She's a fixer for people who don't want to get their hands dirty."

He closed the notebook and put it in his own bag. "We need to photograph this and leave it exactly as it was."

Cassie pulled out her phone to take photos — and froze.

Footsteps. Outside in the hallway. Two sets. And a woman's laugh she knew too well.

Selene's laugh.

"Oh my God, Julian, this building is so creepy at night, are you sure your brother won't be here?"

Julian's voice, drunk, slurred: "Adrian never comes here at night, babe, he's too busy f*****g his fake wife -"

Adrian's eyes went black. He grabbed Cassie, pulled her behind the row of cabinets, into the narrow space between the wall and the metal, pressing her back against the cold wall, his body in front of hers, shielding.

The door to the archive opened.

Light flooded in.

Selene and Julian stumbled in, Julian leaning on Selene, Selene holding a keycard — Eleanor's keycard.

"See? I told you my friend Eleanor gave me access," Selene was saying, looking around. "Marcus kept his little black book here. If we find it, we can sell it to Van Alen for way more than fifteen grand. Then we can leave, babe. Go to Bali."

"You stole my mom's keycard?" Julian laughed. "You're crazy, I love crazy -"

They were three feet away from the cabinet where Adrian and Cassie hid. Cassie could smell Selene's perfume — too sweet, too strong. She could feel Adrian's heart hammering against her chest, or maybe it was hers. His hand was over her mouth, gently, to keep her silent. His other hand was on her waist, pressing her tighter to the wall.

Selene bent down to the exact drawer Adrian had just opened. Her red nails — the same red nails from photo #944 — reached for the handle.

It was locked. Adrian had relocked it.

"f**k, it's locked," Selene hissed. "Julian, do you know how to pick a lock?"

"Babe, I can barely pick a restaurant -"

Adrian's lips were at Cassie's ear, his breath hot. "Don't breathe," he mouthed.

Cassie nodded, eyes wide, her lips under his palm. She could feel the hard line of his body against hers, the tension coiled in him like a spring. This close, she could see the faint scar on his lower lip, the one she had never noticed.

Selene kicked the cabinet. "Whatever. Let's check his computer. There has to be something."

She moved to the terminal. Julian followed. Their backs were turned.

Adrian seized the chance. He removed his hand from Cassie's mouth, took her hand, and pulled her soundlessly toward the side emergency exit — a door that led to the stairwell. It required no code from inside.

They slipped out. The door closed with a soft click behind them just as Selene turned around.

In the stairwell, darkness, concrete, the sound of their breathing.

Cassie was shaking. Adrian pressed her against the wall again, but this time not to hide — to steady.

"You okay?" he whispered, hands on her shoulders, searching her face.

"That was Selene. She has Eleanor's keycard. Your mother is working with her."

"I know." His forehead touched hers, a brief, desperate contact. "And Julian is too stupid to know he's being robbed by his girlfriend."

They stood like that for five seconds, ten, breathing together in the dark.

Then Cassie whispered, "You locked it again. How did you know to relock it?"

"Because I always leave a crime scene cleaner than I found it," Adrian said, and for the first time, he smiled in the dark, a real smile. "It's a Blackwood family trait. My mother taught us."

He took her hand again and led her down forty-two flights of stairs, because the elevator had cameras.

By the time they reached the garage, Cassie was laughing, breathless, adrenaline making her giddy.

"We just committed corporate espionage," she said.

"We just proved your step-sister is embezzling from my company to fund her Bali escape with my brother," Adrian corrected, unlocking his car. "And we have the ledger."

He opened the passenger door for her. Before she got in, he stopped her, one hand on the door frame, caging her.

"Cassie," he said, his voice low, rough from the stairs and the fear.

"Yeah?"

"You were magnificent in there. You didn't make a sound."

"I was terrified you would kiss me to keep me quiet like in the movies."

Adrian's eyes dropped to her mouth. The stairwell light flickered.

"I considered it," he admitted. "Clause 9.1 would not have survived."

Cassie, emboldened by adrenaline and the way he looked at her in that black Henley, stood on her tiptoes and pressed a quick, hard kiss to the corner of his mouth — not quite a kiss, more than a peck.

"Next time," she whispered, "consider it less and do it more."

She got in the car and closed the door, leaving Adrian standing in the garage, staring at her like a man who had just had his entire house rules rewritten.