All Chapters of BEHIND THE MASK: Chapter 71 
				
					- Chapter 80
				
104 chapters
				The Ghost In The Smoke.
			
Hey, Loves. Me again. Remember the warning about random switches I'm going to be throwing in-between chapters? This is one of these. So bear with me, yeah? Thank you for reading this far!____The Terminator’s POVThe thing about hate is this. It isn't born overnight. It was cultivated. It grew like mold, feeding on damp silence and rotting memory. The Hales had taken everything from me, and when you strip a man down to nothing, you do not destroy him. You forge him. Into something sharper. Into something relentless.Into.......me.I had lived too long in their shadows, learning their steps, memorizing their weaknesses, turning their arrogance into weapons for my hands. They thought themselves untouchable. Ha! As if they were .There was Sinclair with his scar and silly rags to riches story, Ambrose, Sinclair's grandfather dearest, with his pride, the rest with their empire of glass. But glass shatters, no? Doesn't mean it'd happen immediately, but eventually it does. And me? I was al
				It’s Complicated.
			
Sinclair POVNow, let's agree on this. I had survived many things in life, no?Poverty. Betrayals. Near death situations, boardroom betrayals, billion-dollar takeovers, the occasional assassination attempt from men who couldn’t handle losing. But somehow, none of those compared to the particular hell that was pretending to have “fun” with Khalid Al-Fayeed.Because I couldn't understand what exactly the man loved about sports, laughter, sunshine, “unity”. And it was funny enough that those words had no business being in my vocabulary.And after an entire week of playing host, humoring him, and—worst of all—watching him get overly comfortable with April, I was more than ready to watch his private jet disappear into the clouds.So when Khalid gathered us all together in the villa’s courtyard that morning, his eyes shining like we’d just come back from some inspirational retreat, I braced myself. Whatever speech was about to leave his mouth, it would be nauseating.That was pretty much a 
				Electric Bolt.
			
Sinclair's POVIt was way past working hours, and the office had begun to take on that weird, eerie silence that only hits when everyone’s gone and the lights are half off. I rubbed at my eyes and leaned back in my chair, sighing as I glanced over the spreadsheet still open on my screen.Believe you me, I was the definition of the word tired.Apparently, our team had to pull extra hours thanks to some “urgent” client deliverable that came in at 4:55 PM like chaos itself had hit the send button or something.Most of them had gone home though. Literally almost everybody. The only person I could see in sight was April who was seated across the room, hunched over her desk with that stubborn furrow in her brow. I’d learned early on that it showed up when she was deep in thought, or about to lose it completely. Probably the second one, considering it was almost 11 PM.I grabbed two paper cups from the break room and poured us both some of that bitter, stale office coffee. At this hour, it w
				Miss Clown.
			
Sinclair's POVBy the time we finally wrapped up for the night, technically, the morning.....April stretched with the kind of dramatic flair you’d expect from someone winning an Olympic gold medal in “Suffering Through Corporate Life.”I could relate to that though. You probably could too.“We. Are. DONE,” she declared, half-singing it as she grabbed her tote bag and swung it over her shoulder like she was about to walk a fashion runway.She turned toward me, eyes alight with joy despite how drained she looked, and grabbed my hand. “Come on, let's get out of this death trap before someone invents another task.”I was about telling her it was midnight and we were the only ones left here, but on second thoughts.....no.I let her drag me toward the elevator, her fingers still laced with mine.Then she stopped dead in her tracks, in front of the metal doors.I knew that expression.“Oh hell no,” she said.I raised a brow. “What?”She looked at me with wide, are-you-fucking-kidding-me eyes
				Chicken And Chaos.
			
Sinclair’s POVApril stood in the middle of her living room like a war general surveying a battlefield. She had her hands planted on her hips, chin tilted at a stubborn angle, she let her gaze sweep across the disaster zone of unfolded laundry, stacked books, discarded sketches, and coffee mugs that had clearly been sitting there long enough to qualify for archaeological excavation.I, on the other hand, stood with folded arms, waiting for her to say something since she forbade me from sitting inside all this mess.If you asked me what I prepared for the night of project planning then I'd most likely say a laptop, a drink, and maybe a couple arguments here and there. But look what I got instead.“This...” she gestured dramatically at the chaos “...is uninhabitable. We cannot possibly work in here.”I looked around. Messy? Sure. But I’d grown up in worse. My grandma used to be a journalist before she started falling sick on a daily basis. Now, you can imagine the home of a journalist w
				Best 24 Hours.
			
April’s POVI woke up with the weight of the world pressing down on my eyelids. My lashes fluttered open, my brain sluggishly trying to reboot like an old laptop that hadn’t been updated since the early 2000s. For a full minute, I stared at the ceiling fan, wondering if I’d somehow woken up in someone else’s apartment.I finally made the decision. I was going to move. Even if I really didn't want to.Fabric rustled under me. My bed. My room.So why did I have the feeling that something was so wrong somewhere? I looked around trying to recall the events of last night.I froze.I had no memory of walking into this room, no memory of climbing into bed. The last thing I remembered was sitting in the living room with spreadsheets open, listening to Sinclair’s voice drone on about profit margins while I stared at him like an exhausted ghost. Then… blackness.“Wait.” My eyes widened. “Did Sinclair carry me here?”Had he gone home?I sat up so fast I nearly gave myself whiplash. My bed was tu
				The Grandfather Who Wouldn’t Die.
			
Sinclair’s POVIf you asked me how my morning started off, then I'd say it started off as a circus act.How? Let's see, how about the fact that I could still hear April's wide-eyed scream ringing in my ears from when she barged into the bathroom, frozen at the sight of me under the shower, her gaze darting places it shouldn’t have, before she fled like the hounds of hell were after her.Second, the car ride had been filled with her desperate attempts to avoid looking at me, as though pretending her boss’s body didn’t exist would erase her mortifying memory.I let her do what she wanted though. Watched her fumble with her tablet as her cheek turned scarlet pink. Hell, this was more entertaining than the paperwork I was going to meet when I got to the company.Eventually, we reached. But just as I parked my car and got out with her, we'd barely walked ten steps before my phone buzzed in my pocket.Caller ID: Hale HospitalThat wasn't a number that popped on my phone that easy.I answere
				His Text, My Trouble.
			
April’s POVGrandpa stayed silent for a minute, looking like he was this close to crying his eyes out or cursing his fate.“Get out, Sinclair. Go back to your company," he finally said with a dismissive wave. “You’ve always treasured it more than me, haven’t you?”His tone  dripped with the sort of accusation meant to guilt a child, but obviously it didn't reach Sinclair. He just stood there, with the faintest twitch in his jaw serving as the only sign of irritation.Beside him, I awkwardly shifted, unsure if I should defend him or stay quiet. After all, this was family business, and I was… well, not family.“Grandfather....” Sinclair began, but Chairman Hale cut him off with surprising energy for someone who had supposedly fainted minutes ago.“No. Don’t you dare argue with me.” His eyes, surprisingly lively, slid to me. Then, with a sudden burst of mischief that made me blink, he added, “April stays. I want to spend my last days with her.”I blinked. What?Sinclair’s head snapped to
				Possessive CEO Mode.
			
I hated boardrooms.Don't get me wrong, it wasn't because it got me stressed or intimidated.Please. If there was one place in the world where I thrived, then it was here.So yeah, it was far from that. I hated it here today because of one reason.She wasn’t here.April wasn't here with me.The chair at my left sat empty. That was her spot.She'd normally slide into her seat and stay quiet till the meeting finished. She never moved until I snapped my fingers and she'd appear with a pen in hand, ready to take over any duty I had for her.Now, it just felt empty, and every time my eyes flickered that way, I sighed like a sulking baby.I stared at my phone for the umpteenth time. She hasn't replied my last two messages. If I kept pestering her then she'd probably ignore me completely.I looked to to see Veronica already seated at the table, legs crossed, sunglasses still perched on her head as if she owned the sunlight. Her head was bent over her phone, nails clacking furiously against t
				How Much I Loved Him.
			
April's POVI stared at the clock again. It was about 12:07PM. He still wasn't here. He'd sent a text that he'd be here in about 10 to 20 minutes and it was almost an hour since I got the text.I sat perched on the edge of Grandpa Hale’s sofa, pouring his tea the way he liked it. Barely warm, a little more milk than the doctor recommended, two spoonfuls of sugar even though the nurses had been scolding him about it all week."You're a serious suspect," he spoke, looking at me suspiciously."Grandpa, I'm serious. The text wasn't meant for me. I think he sent it by accident," I defended myself."I'm old, not stupid," he huffed. "You two definitely have something going on. You obviously blushed. I saw it.""I...." I pressed my lips into a thin line.What was I going to say to bail myself out of this now?"Listen, Grandpa," I moved closer to hold his hands. "Sin's married. I wouldn't try to come in-between a married couple. Trust me."He nodded, and dropped his cup to pull me in for a hug