Chapter 87 Ghost Blade
Dandelion.
He was gone when I woke up. Again.
I stared at the empty space beside me, my hand resting on the bedsheets that had long gone cold. The sun was barely up with light filtering through the curtains, and Alex had already left.
Ghost Blade.
Those words or should I say name echoed in my mind like a warning bell I couldn't silence.
I sat up, pushing the covers aside. My body felt heavy with exhaustion, but my mind was racing. I barely slept after returning to bed last night. Every time I closed my eyes, all I heard was his voice on that phone call.
His dangerous voice that mentioned, Eliminating something Permanently.
Who talked like that? Or gave orders like that?
Definitely not a businessman or a CEO. Rather it's someone else, someone I didn't know anything about.
I went to shower and got dressed quickly, pulling on a simple jean and a white blouse. My hands trembled slightly as I tied my hair to the back. I needed to calm down and think clearly.
But I just couldn't.
I left the bedroom and walked down the hallway, my footsteps were quiet on the plush carpet. The estate was still mostly quiet, even the usual staff weren't close by yet.
Good. Because I didn't want anyone asking questions.
I found myself moving toward the stairs to the third floor.
My heart started pounding before I even reached the first step.
The third floor of Alexander's wing was where his study is, and it was off limits. I had never questioned it before. After all it was his home office, but that was before last night.
I climbed the stairs slowly, my hand gripping the railing. With each step, my pulse quickened. This was crazy and I was being paranoid, there was probably nothing up here but old family documents or things that were completely boring and normal.
I reached the third floor and went straight to the study door, I pushed the knob slowly and it opened, I breathed in relief. It's a good thing he didn't lock the door, he probably thought I wouldn't be curious enough to invade his study.
Inside the study was darker, natural light was completely blocked off by thick dark curtains, only the dim lights were on. The study was just like any other study, with documents neatly arranged by the side, in fact everything looked normal and perfect, nothing was out of place.
But there's something odd about the structure of the study, because it had three doors inside it and they were all closed. What if one is used as a bathroom I wondered.
I walked to the first door and tried opening it.
It opened instantly, and just like I had predicted it was a bathroom, prob for when he would work overnight in his study.
I tried the second one and it also opened easily. Inside it was also exactly what I'd hoped to find. A storage room filled with old furniture and boxes of documents, things that clearly hadn't been touched in years.
See? It a normal study. I sighed in relief.
But my relief died when I reached the third door. It looked slightly different from the others. It looked heavier, like it was made of reinforced steel instead of wood. And it had a digital lock instead of a regular handle.
My brows narrowed, Who puts a digital lock on a storage room?
I stood there for a long moment, staring at that door. Every rational part of my brain screamed at me to turn around. Go back downstairs. Pretend I'd never come here.
But of course I didn't, the curious part of me Couldn't, My hand was already reaching into my hair, pulling out the bobby pin I'd used to hold my hair back.
"This is insane," I whispered to myself, but continued with my invasion. I bent the pin straightening it out the way I had learned on set three years ago. When we filmed a spy thriller, and the technical advisor had taught me basic lock picking for a scene. I had to practice for weeks to get it right.
I never thought I'd actually use it.
The digital lock was too advanced, but there was a manual override keyhole beneath it. Probably for emergencies.
I inserted the pin slowly. This is wrong, I scolded myself, absolutely wrong, This is--
Click.
The lock disengaged, my breath paused. I pushed the door open slowly. As expected the room was dark just like the others, I fumbled along the wall until I found a light switch.
The lights flickered on.
A gasp escaped my lips almost immediately, I felt chills run down my spine, from what was in front of my eyes.
The walls were lined up with weapons, not one or two. Dozens.
Guns of every type, mounted in careful rows. Handguns, rifles, things I didn't even have names for. Then there were silver knives displayed like artwork. And a lot of other gadgets or should I say weapons I didn't even know existed.
This wasn't a collection. This was an arsenal.
"Oh God," I breathed, my hand shakily covering up my lip.
My legs felt weak, but I forced myself to step inside. The room was larger than it looked from the doorway, by the corner stood a desk of monitors, all showing live feeds.
Surveillance cameras.
I moved closer, swallowing the lump that formed in my throat. The screens showed different areas of the estate. The gates, the gardens, the main entrance. Even the staff quarters.
He was watching everything and everyone. The desk was covered in files, thick folders, each one labeled with what looked like code names.
My hands shook as I reached for the nearest one.
: CARDINAL. TERMINATED.
I opened it, inside it were photographs of a man I didn't recognize, and the documents were in multiple languages. A red stamp was across the front page that said COMPLETED.
I dropped it quickly like it burned my hand and grabbed another document.
VIPER. TERMINATED.
Another one.
FALCON. TERMINATED.
They were all the same. Different people with weird names and different locations. But all with that same red stamp, that stated,Terminated.
"What are you?" I whispered into the empty room, panic quickly spreading through my heart.
Then I saw something else. It was a file separate from the others, it looked larger and marked with a name I immediately recognized.
GHOST BLADE - TERMINATED CONTRACTS.
My entire body went cold, I picked it up with trembling hands. The folder was heavy, and stuffed with papers. I opened it slowly, almost afraid of what I would find.
The first page was a list of names. Dozens of them, maybe hundreds.
Each one had a date beside it. And a location. And one single word that made my heart pound harder.
Eliminated.
Eliminated.
Eliminated.
It repeated down the page like a death march, these weren't business competitors, these were people.
People who were dead.
"No," I whispered in disbelief, This couldn't be real. This had to be some kind of elaborate security file right?
But the next page destroyed that hope, It was a detailed mission brief describing exactly how to eliminate a target named Viktor Romanov. The method. The timeline. The cleanup protocol, And at the bottom, a signature.
Ghost Blade.
The folder slipped from my hands, the papers scattered across the floor along with photographs spilling out. I saw faces, locations and....Blood. So much blood.
My knees buckled, and I caught myself against the desk.
This was a hit list. Alex had a hit list.
Which meant he was an--
The door slammed open behind me, I
spun around in shock, swallowing the lump in my throat.
Alexander stood in the doorway.
He was still in his workout clothes, sweat dampening his shirt like he been at the gym. But there was nothing casual about his expression now.
His eyes were wild and underneath that fury, something else.
Fear.
"Dandelion." My name came out like a curse. "What the hell are you doing?"
I couldn't speak or move, heck I could barely breathe. His gaze dropped to the scattered papers at my feet. To the open file. Then to the photographs of dead men lying in pools of blood.
"I can explain," he muttered slowly, like he was trying to choose his words wisely.
But I didn't want any explanations, I wanted to run. He took a step into the room towards me, I automatically took a step back, my spine hitting the desk.
His eyes tracked the movement, and something in his expression cracked.
"Angel don't," he said in a low tone as if I had stabbed one of the knives into his chest, "Please don't look at me like that."
"Like what?" My voice came out as a whisper.
"Like you're afraid of me."His eyes narrowed with hurt.
But I was. God help me, I was terrified, from the pieces I put together, the man standing in front of me wasn't just Alexander Graham the billionaire CEO.
He was someone else entirely, someone who had killed people. A lot of people. But why?