Chapter 164 Chapter 164
Liana’s POV
The evidence glows on the screen between us, Elia’s voice, trembling and raw, echoing from the tiny laptop speaker.
“Stanley, please. I want out. Let me go. I’ll disappear forever.”
The sound cuts through the glass walls of Stanley’s office like a blade. Outside, the city bleeds gold and shadow, the skyline reflected in the windows of Z-Core Tower. Inside, it’s too quiet. The kind of silence that comes before something shatters.
Stanley leans back in his chair, eyes closed, fingers steepled. For the first time since I’ve known him, he looks old. Not tired, haunted.
When the audio ends, I don’t speak right away. I let the silence do the work.
“I found that in the drives Dominic recovered from Elia’s grave,” I finally say. My voice is steady, but my pulse hammers against my ribs. “You want to tell me what the hell I just heard?”
He exhales through his nose, slow and deliberate. The performance of calm. “I suppose Dominic didn’t mention he was trespassing on corporate property?”
“This isn’t about Dominic.” I lean forward, meeting his gaze head-on. “It’s about Elia.”
Something flickers in his eyes, He reaches for the tumbler on his desk, the amber liquid trembling slightly as he lifts it.
“Elia,” he says softly, as if tasting the name. “She never could let go of anything.”
“Neither can you,” I snap. “Except, apparently, her life.”
That gets him. His eyes sharpen, his shoulders straighten. The mask slides back into place.
“Be careful, Liana,” he says, his tone controlled, but the edge beneath it unmistakable. “You’re talking about things far above your clearance.”
“Clearance?” I scoff. “You think this is about hierarchy? You think you can hide behind protocol while an entire family’s reputation is rotting in the ground with a woman who might not even be dead?”
He doesn’t answer. Just stares at the skyline like he’s counting the windows.
“Dominic thinks you killed her,” I say quietly. “That you buried data and cash in her grave to cover Project Eden. But this…” I tap the laptop “ this sounds different. She wasn’t just a victim. She wanted out.”
He finally turns back to me. His expression shifts.
“You want the truth?” he says, voice low. “Fine. You deserve that much.” He sets the glass down and folds his hands on the desk.
“Elia came to me six months before she ‘died.’ She was drowning, Liana. You’ve seen what it’s like in that family, the pressure, the expectations, the empire balanced on one name. Smith. She wanted out before it crushed her.”
I stare at him, searching his face for a lie. “You’re saying she chose this?”
“She begged me,” he says. “Said she’d give up everything including her inheritance, her position, even Dominic if I helped her vanish”
The room tilts slightly, as if the floor’s been pulled out from under me.
“And you helped her?”
“Yes,” he says simply. “I arranged it. A car accident in the mountains, a sealed casket, a DNA match fabricated from tissue samples. She was supposed to disappear overseas with a new identity.”
He pauses, then looks up, meeting my eyes.
“But then I realized what an opportunity it was.”
The words drop like stones. My heart stutters. “Opportunity?”
He doesn’t flinch. “Dominic was becoming a liability”
“So you framed him.”
“I redirected suspicion,” he corrects. “Let the world believe the grief-stricken husband went rogue. That he was unstable. It was easy, he was unstable. Always has been.”
The casual cruelty in his tone makes my skin crawl. “You used her death to destroy him.”
He doesn’t deny it. Just looks out at the city again. “And it worked. The Smith assets came under Z-Core’s management. The board called it ‘stabilization.’ We survived. We grew. And no one questioned it.”
My voice comes out as a whisper. “Except Dominic.”
He smirks faintly. “Dominic never learned when to stop digging. And now he’s in over his head again, dragging you down with him.”
I stand up so fast the chair scrapes against the floor. “You don’t get to threaten me.”
He raises a brow. “I don’t need to. You’re smart enough to know the cost of crossing me.”
The air between us feels electric, toxic. My chest tightens — fury fighting against disbelief.
“You said Elia wanted freedom,” I say. “But you turned her escape into a power play. You took her choice and weaponized it.”
“She made the first move,” he replies coldly. “I just played the board better.”
I stare at him, this man who’s been my mentor, my ally, the face of composure in every crisis. Now all I see is rot in a tailored suit.
“Where is she, Stanley?” I ask. “If she’s alive… if she really escaped, where did you send her?”
He hesitates, the first crack in his calm. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I lost contact after the transition. She was supposed to send confirmation, but she never did. For all I know, she’s gone for good.”
A chill runs through me. “You mean dead.”
“I mean,” he says slowly, “that sometimes people get what they wish for.”
I can barely breathe.
He rises from his chair, walks around the desk until he’s standing close enough for me to smell the faint trace of cologne and whiskey. “You’re not the first to chase ghosts, Liana. But if you keep following this one, it’ll cost you everything you’ve built here.”
He gestures to the office, to the empire of glass and chrome that now feels like a cage.
“I built this,” I say quietly. “Not you. Not Elia. Me.”
He smiles faintly. “Then be smart enough to keep it.”
I close the laptop, the soft click echoing like a gunshot. “You’re right,” I tell him. “I am smart enough. Which is why I recorded this conversation.”
His eyes snap to mine. The smile disappears. I let the words hang there just long enough before turning toward the door.
“You taught me to think like a strategist, Stanley,” I say without looking back. “You just forgot that even pawns can become queens.”
As I step into the corridor, the glass doors slide shut behind me, sealing him inside his pristine empire. My hands are shaking not from fear, but from clarity.
Dominic was right. Elia’s disappearance wasn’t just tragedy. I press my palm to my chest, grounding myself as I walk toward the elevator. Elia wanted to disappear. But I won’t let her become a ghost.