The damp chill of the wharf had seeped into Elara's bones, but it was
Julian's final, whispered words that festered like frostbite. October 1992. The
year her mother's light had been extinguished. She returned to Aeterna Tower
with Silas in a silence thicker than the night fog, the torch inside her now a
conflicted thing—a beacon of purpose shadowed by dread.
While Elara pored over her mother's old diaries, searching for any trace
of that fatal October, Silas threw himself into a different maze: Kore Tech.
Bianca's evidence had been a master key to Robert's empire, but Kore
Tech remained a stubborn, locked room. The shell companies bled into one
another, a Russian doll of obfuscation. Silas sat before a bank of monitors,
the blue glow etching tired lines into his face. For every firewall he
bypassed, two more seemed to materialise. The money trails were being scrubbed
in real-time, a digital tide erasing footprints as fast as he could find them.
"It's like chasing a ghost," he muttered, more to himself than to Ethan
on the secure video feed.
"A ghost with a very sophisticated vacuum cleaner," Ethan replied, his
usual levity absent. He was running parallel searches from a nondescript safe
house. "The cleanup is automated, triggered by specific inquiry parameters.
It's not just defence; it's active sanitisation."
Silas leaned forward, his fingers flying over the keyboard. "Then we
need to be faster than the algorithm. Follow the legacy code. Find the first
architect."
For hours, it was a digital siege. Then, finally, a crack. A server log,
buried under decades of data from Kore Tech's earliest incarnation. The primary
administrative contact was listed not by title, but by a chilling, simple
designation: Liaison: Mr. S. Cohen.
"S. Cohen," Silas breathed, the pieces snapping together with ugly
clarity. Not Julian. The initial pointed to a deeper, older shadow. Steven.
Julian's uncle.
Steven Cohen. The phantom. The man who had worked directly with Robert
Hayes in the dirtiest trenches. The one Elara had shot, who had vanished into
the winter sea.
"Ethan, pull everything. Every transaction, every contract, every
communication log that references that designation."
But the trail didn't lead to a boardroom or a mansion. It led to a cold
case. Silas cross-referenced the data with his own encrypted files—the ones
detailing the night at Oakhaven Harbour, the night Elara had been taken. The
night Steven Cohen plunged into the black water.
"He vanished," Silas said, his voice flat. "Presumed dead. The Coast
Guard search was called off after seventy-two hours. No body. No demands.
Nothing."
Ethan's face on the screen grew solemn. "You asked me to keep a passive
ear to the ground. I reached out to every source in maritime recovery, private
investigation… even the alternative extraction circles. Zero. If he washed up,
someone made him disappear all over again. If he survived…" Ethan's shrug
conveyed profound professional frustration. "He's a ghost. A rich, powerful,
vengeful ghost."
Silas pushed back from the desk, the chair groaning in protest. He
walked to the window, staring out at the city whose lights now seemed to hide
as much as they revealed. Steven Cohen's shadow loomed over everything. He
wasn't just a missing person; he was a missing variable, a dormant pathogen in
the system Julian was so desperate to keep stable.
The Kore Tech wall wasn't a wall. It was a monument. A company built not
just by Robert, but for the Cohen family's most clandestine needs, spearheaded
by the ruthless uncle. And its guardian, its original "Mr. S. Cohen," had
seemingly returned to the abyss.
But Silas didn't believe in ghosts. He believed in survivors. And a
survivor with those resources didn't vanish; he went to ground. He retreated to
a place of absolute safety to heal. Or to plot.
A new, disturbing theory began to form. What if Steven's disappearance
wasn't a tragedy, but a strategic retreat? What if the real, unbreakable
alliance was between Robert and Steven alone? If Robert was Steven's toxic
puppet, then Steven was the true keeper of the shadows—the direct line to the
original poison. His disappearance made him a free radical of malice,
impossible to contain. His goal wouldn't be mere revenge on Elara. It would be
the total sabotage of Aeternum and the Thorne legacy itself.
Julian's warning on the wharf took on a new, more sinister tone. He
wasn't just trying to prevent chaos; he was trying to contain his uncle's
secret kingdom—a kingdom Robert could now unwittingly lead them to.
The office door opened. Elara entered, her mother's diary in hand. She
looked pale, haunted. "October 1992," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "My
mother's last journal entry is from September. The rest of the month… it's
blank. It's like she stopped living before she died."
Silas turned from the window, his digital hunt instantly overshadowed by
the pain on her face. He wanted to tell her about Steven, about the ghost in
the machine. But the connection to her mother, to that specific date, was still
a gaping void. Throwing another Cohen-shaped mystery at her now felt cruel.
"We'll find the ledger," he said instead, crossing the room to her.
"We'll get the truth."
"What if the truth is worse than the lie?" The question hung in the air
between them.
Before he could answer, his computer chimed—a priority alert from
Bianca. The message was terse: Security perimeter at Hayes estate has shifted.
Robert is digging in. He's called for a private delivery from Kore Tech's
archival division. Tonight.
The ledger. It was moving.
Silas and Elara locked eyes, the moment of dread shattered by sudden,
urgent purpose. The past would have to wait. The present was in motion.
"We need to intercept that delivery," Silas said, his operative's mind
already calculating routes and risks.
"And if it's a trap?" Elara asked, the memory of the wharf fresh.
"Then we spring it on our terms." He pulled up city maps and traffic
feeds. "But we're not just looking for a courier. We're looking for a thread
that might lead back to a ghost. If Steven Cohen is still out there, still
connected, this is the moment he might surface. He's not a relative to be
protected; he's a rogue with a score to settle. That makes him even more
dangerous."
As they prepared to leave, Silas cast one last look at the monitor, at
the faded server log entry for Mr. S. Cohen. The keeper of shadows wasn't just
in a ledger; he was in the code, in the blood, and possibly, still in the
world. Not as a patriarch, but as a spectre lying in wait. And they were about
to walk right into his oldest, most carefully laid trap.