?Chapter 1425:


    That told her enough. The intruder had to be one of Kolton’s covert operatives assigned to watch her. Her father trusted no one — not even his own blood.


    On certain days, Kiley thought it a sorrowful thing to grow up in such a family. Every child longed for a parent’s trust, yet she had never once felt her father’s faith in her. Over the years, she had convinced herself that her only purpose was to clear a path for her younger brother, udius. In the end, even that belief had shattered into something close to a dream that never touched the ground.


    What she had glimpsed on the screen before closing it — those stark words that had shed before her eyes — felt like cold needles breaking through her thoughts.


    Bacterial experiments. Human trials. Viral vectors. Illegal organ transnts. Human trafficking.


    The terms carried the stench of cruelty, like foul bubbles rising from a swamp long left to rot. The Cooper Group — apany polished by a hundred years of glory, a name praised in every hall of business — concealed beneath its surface a darkness so foul it seemed to sneer at its own bright reputation.


    This darkness reached far beyond her father’s so-called wisdom of aplishing one’s ambitions with other people’s resources. Kiley felt her long-held beliefs tremble like a house struggling to stay upright in an earthquake. She could make peace with the coldness of turning charity into personal gain — such things were part of the world she had grown up in, shaped by profit and power. There were times she had even enjoyed the quiet rush of clever schemes and careful nning.


    But what the USB contained went far beyond ambition. It was a record of cruelty so deep it felt like a bottomless pit. Kiley almost sensed the smell of blood rising from those stained reports, almost saw the hopeless faces hiding behind the cold rows of numbers. Her younger brother udius — the once-promising heir of Cooper Group — had been pulled into it and forced to take something called X-079. What was that substance? A newpound designed to kill more efficiently? Or something far worse — something meant to bind a person’s mind entirely?


    The Cooper Group, the institution she had given her loyalty to, the one she had been willing to sacrifice her own safety for, had been secretly feeding a dark force, helping it spread ruin and craft poisons strong enough to threaten the entire world.


    A rush of dread swept through her and tightened her breath. Her grip closed around the USB drive without thinking. Its sharp corners pressed into her palm and sent a jolt of pain through her skin, yet it did nothing to settle the nausea rising inside her.


    Then, amid the spiral of her thoughts, she caught a faint click from the other side of the door — so quiet she almost doubted it.


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    Someone was trying to get in.


    The sound shook her. She had believed her performance convincing enough. Clearly, things were not moving the way she had expected.


    With careful movement, Kiley pulled open the desk drawer and lifted out a handgun. If the operative was already making his way inside, there was a real possibility that Kolton had sent him to silence her. Such a thought would once have seemed impossible — Kolton was her father. But after everything that had happened, especially what had been done to udius, Kiley could no longer ce her faith in anyone.


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