The study was cloaked in shadows, lit only by the warm amber of a single desk lamp. It had once belonged to Dominic Roth a room Elena had avoided since the funeral. Too many memories were buried beneath its rich mahogany shelves and the scent of old leather.
But tonight, something pulled her back in.
She closed the door behind her, shutting out the world. The board meetings, Victor's political maneuvering, Liam's eyes in the server room, all of it could wait. She needed clarity. Answers. Anything.
She moved to her father's massive desk and opened the drawer that had stuck last time. Her fingers brushed past expensive pens and outdated tablets before settling on something weightier, wrapped in dark blue velvet.
She froze.
Carefully, she lifted the cloth. Inside was a small, worn leather-bound book with a brass latch. No title. No markings. Just weight and secrecy.
Her breath caught. It wasn't labeled, but she knew what it was.
Dominic's private journal.
She'd overheard him mention it once to Clara, her stepmother about how every CEO should keep a coded record of thoughts that couldn't go into official files. His way of staying one step ahead of allies and enemies alike.
The latch clicked as she opened it, but what lay inside wasn't what she expected.
Not words.
Not handwriting.
But printed lines of alphanumeric code.
Encrypted entries. Pages and pages of them. Random to the untrained eye but not to Elena.
Her stomach twisted.
She turned to the back cover and found a small USB chip embedded in the spine, almost invisible. She pried it loose and pocketed it. The man had hidden secrets within secrets.
She flipped through more pages. One heading jumped out among the strings of gibberish: WEXFORD. Her eyes narrowed. She remembered the name from one of Roth Industries' abandoned patent folders, and it was now appearing in a private journal?
What had her father been hiding?
Suddenly, the desk light flickered then steadied.
A cold ripple ran down her spine.
She turned slowly.
No one was there.
But someone had been here. She was sure of it.
She checked the doorknob. Still locked.
Still... that strange feeling lingered. As if something or someone was watching.
She closed the journal and placed it back in the drawer for now. She needed Liam's help. Not just because he was the only one smart enough to crack the encryption, but because she trusted him more than she wanted to admit.
As she left the study, clutching the USB in her coat pocket, her mind raced not with fear, but with purpose.
Dominic's secrets were buried deep. And Elena Roth was done waiting in the dark.