Chapter 79 You're 20 Minutes Late

Chapter 79 You're 20 Minutes Late
As soon as he stepped out of the studio's large teak door, Elijah immediately entered the rear cabin of the black Rolls-Royce Phantom waiting in the dark corner of the street. Inside the car, Marcus handed over a digital tablet displaying a live audio recording from the private restaurant on the Upper East Side.

In the recording, Silas Blackwood's voice sounded very sharp and full of thick cunning, speaking with Eleanor Vance.

"We must destroy Elena Vance's reputation before she manages to submit that tiara draft to Victoria," Silas hissed, his cunning grin clearly audible.

"If Elena succeeds in obtaining legal protection from the main clan, my nephew Elijah will become increasingly difficult to drag out of New York, and Maximillian's inheritance assets will fall into their hands. Find a way to infiltrate her studio, steal her design drafts, and destroy her reputation as a plagiarist!"

Hearing the recording, Elijah leaned his tall body back against the car's leather seat, crossing his long legs with the calm of a supreme mastermind ready to execute his prey. His sapphire blue eyes glinted with cruel absolute dominance.

"Uncle Silas seems to have grown bored of seeing his port shares worth trillions of dollars," Elijah said, his low, deep baritone voice flowing so stiffly yet laden with absolute death threats.

"He thinks he can use garbage clans like the Vances to touch the perimeter of my little paradise?"

"Young Master, what are your orders?" Marcus asked with military alertness from behind the front steering wheel.

"Let them move, Marcus," Elijah commanded, a very cruel predator's grin beautifully etched on his handsome face.

"Let them bribe or infiltrate. I want to see how far the Vance clan's stupidity can go under Apex Sovereign's radar."

"The moment their hands touch the SoHo studio's security system, I myself will ensure that by tomorrow morning, the entire Vance family's financial assets in Manhattan will be reduced to ashes, and Uncle Silas will crawl at my feet begging for mercy."

Elijah turned off his tablet screen, staring out the car window at the snow-covered night. His three-year charade as a poor man in front of Elena still had two and a half years remaining, and he would not let even a single pebble ruin his woman's happiness.

The highest law in New York had been written in Elena Vance's name, and anyone who dared to violate it was merely delivering their own soul into the hell created by the highest Blackwood dragon.

Night grew deeper in Manhattan. The raging snowstorm outside the SoHo townhouse windows seemed to reflect the invisible turmoil being prepared by the highest Blackwood dragon.

Inside the rear cabin of the black Rolls-Royce Phantom, Elijah did not immediately return to The Azure apartment.

He let the car engine remain quietly running, while his sapphire blue eyes stared sharply at the encrypted digital device screen that lit up again. His long fingers moved in a steady rhythm, tapping the device's glass surface, activating military-grade layered defense protocols on Apex Sovereign's system embedded throughout Elena Vance Atelier.

"Marcus," Elijah called, his low, deep baritone voice breaking the cabin's silence.

"The Vance Family won't move alone. Mrs. Vance is too cowardly to conduct a physical infiltration into the SoHo district without security guarantees from Uncle Silas. Who is the field rat they hired for tonight?"

Marcus pressed several buttons on the front dashboard control console. Within seconds, an intelligence data file complete with a digital profile photo appeared on Elijah's tablet screen.

"They have contacted Julian Cross, Young Master," Marcus answered calmly. "He is a former industrial espionage specialist who once worked for a Mayfair corporation in London before becoming a mercenary in the lower Manhattan black market. He has a special skill in disabling conventional biometric alarm systems."

A very cruel and deadly predator's grin instantly etched itself onto Elijah's handsome face.

"A specialist from Mayfair? What a poetic coincidence. Morgan Valdez rots in London, yet the shadows of his parasites still try to crawl through the remnants of his old pawns in New York."

Elijah turned off his digital device, then adjusted the collar of his moss-green plaid flannel shirt.

"Let Julian Cross pass through the outer perimeter of SoHo's main road. Turn off the outdoor laser detection system so he feels confident. However, the moment he sets foot on the studio terrace steps, activate the vacuum isolation protocol on the first floor."

"Understood, Young Master. Do you want the Apex Sovereign cleanup team to eliminate him immediately?"

"No," Elijah hissed, his eyes narrowing sharply, radiating the intimidating aura of an absolute, untouchable ruler.

"I myself will welcome the Vance family's guest. I want him to send a very beautiful final audio message to Uncle Silas before his tongue can no longer produce sound."

Meanwhile, precisely at two in the morning, a black shadow moved very nimbly through the snow piles in the alley beside Elena Vance Atelier.

Julian Cross, wearing soundproof black tactical gear and a thermal mask, crouched behind the marble pillar of the studio's back door.

In his hand, a microwave frequency hacking device blinked green, indicating that the building's outdoor alarm system had been successfully disabled—or at least, that was what he believed.

"This SoHo security system is too overhyped," Julian muttered cynically through his wireless microphone, connected directly to Mrs. Vance's device on the Upper East Side.

"I'm already at the secondary entrance. In three minutes, the Blackwood clan's tiara design draft will be in our hands."

On the other end of the connection, Elena's mother's voice trembled with greedy ambition.

"Good! Make sure you destroy all the digital copies on the main computer after you take the physical draft! I want that cursed child to crawl back to the Vance clan broken and without protection!"

Julian did not reply. With trained expertise, he inserted a titanium wire coated with cyber sensors into the gap of the back teak door lock. Click. The door opened without making a sound.

Julian stepped into the darkness of the studio's first floor, feeling the warmth of the air conditioning mixed with the faint scent of sandalwood. However, as soon as both his feet fully touched the white Italian marble surface, a strange, cold sensation suddenly crept up the back of his neck.

The teak door behind him immediately slammed shut automatically, followed by the hissing sound of a ten-ton magnetic locking system sealing all exits completely.

At that same moment, all the LED spotlights on the studio lobby ceiling blazed to life with blinding intensity, turning the night's darkness into bright daylight.

Julian recoiled, his hand instantly moving toward the silenced firearm at his waist.

However, before his fingers could touch the gun grip, a very low, cold baritone voice filled with deathly authority flowed from the direction of the charcoal-gray sofa in the corner of the room.

"You're twenty minutes late from your cyber calculation, Mr. Cross," Elijah said.