All Chapters of SECRETLY The Billionaire Tycoon: Chapter 31
- Chapter 40
55 chapters
WE'RE FLYING INTO A TRAP
The kidnapping hit international news within four hours of Isabella's disappearance.CNN ran it as breaking news with the headline: "Billionaire's Ex-Wife Taken by Unknown Assailant." The BBC followed with: "American Socialite Kidnapped from New York Hospital." Every major outlet picked it up, recycling the same security footage—the woman in scrubs, the wheelchair, Isabella's unconscious form being loaded into a van.By morning, the story had evolved into breathless speculation about motive, ransom demands, international conspiracy theories. Talking heads filled twenty-four-hour news cycles with analysis that revealed nothing while saying everything.But no ransom demand came.No calls. No messages. No communication of any kind.Just silence.Which was, somehow, more terrifying than any threat could have been.Adrian watched the coverage from Sophia's Paris apartment, his mind calculating possibilities and probabilities. Kidnappers who wanted money made contact quickly—time was their
SORRY KID, NOTHING PERSONAL
Adrian was on the phone with the pilot before Sophia finished her sentence."Change course. Destination Prague, Czech Republic. File whatever flight plan is necessary but get us there now."The pilot's voice came through with professional calm despite the unusual request. "Sir, we're currently over Austria. Prague is approximately forty minutes northeast. I'll need to coordinate with air traffic control—""Do it. Whatever it takes."Adrian ended the call and turned back to Sophia, who was still analyzing the video frame by frame on her tablet."Show me what you found."Sophia zoomed in on the background details. "That sign says 'Česká Republika'—Czech Republic. The architectural elements match Soviet-era industrial construction common in Prague. And here—" she highlighted another section "—that's a logo for Škoda manufacturing. Czech automotive company. This footage wasn't taken in Romania. It was taken in Prague."Adrian felt the pieces clicking into place with cold clarity. "Natasha
NO WAY TO KNOW
Theodore Marks kept his weapon trained on Adrian's team with the steady hand of someone who'd pointed guns at people for four decades without hesitation."Drop your weapons," Theodore said calmly. "All of you. Slowly. Or I start shooting, and we see how many of you I can take down before you take me."Adrian's extraction team didn't move. Erik, the Norwegian team leader, maintained his weapon position, calculating angles and probabilities. The other operators held their ground, trained professionals recognizing that Theodore wasn't bluffing.Natasha smiled from her position beside Isabella's chair. "You trusted too easily, Adrian. Your father warned you about that weakness. He said you'd believe Theodore was your ally because you wanted allies so desperately. Turns out he was right.""We're not dropping weapons," Erik said quietly. "Standard hostage protocol. We maintain defensive positions.""Then let me show you why that's a mistake." Theodore raised his voice slightly. "Positions r
IS MY BABY ALIVE?!
Adrian stared at the shattered tablet on the warehouse floor, his mind screaming questions that had no immediate answers.Had the message sent before the device broke? Or had the destruction stopped the transmission in time?The screen was black. Fragments of glass and plastic scattered across concrete. No way to recover data from the destroyed hardware. No way to know if, in those final three seconds, an encrypted command had reached its destination six thousand miles away.Three seconds.The difference between life and death for an infant who'd already survived impossible odds.Adrian's phone was in his hand before conscious thought completed. Speed dial. Ryker's number.It rang once. Twice. Three times—an eternity compressed into seconds."Sir?" Ryker's voice, alert despite the 3 AM New York time."Get to the NICU. Now. The doctor may be compromised. Natasha planted someone inside. They're supposed to disconnect life support on my signal.""I'm twenty blocks away—""I don't care if
YOU'RE FREE
The revelation that someone had switched Dr. Morgan's saline for potassium chloride changed everything.Adrian was still on the warehouse floor in Prague, phone pressed to his ear, when Ryker delivered the details that transformed attempted intimidation into actual attempted murder."Hospital security is reviewing footage now," Ryker said, his voice tight with controlled urgency. "Dr. Morgan accessed the medication room at 2:47 AM. She prepared what she believed was a saline syringe. But someone else was in that room earlier.""Who?""Footage shows another doctor entering the medication room at 2:34 AM. Thirteen minutes before Dr. Morgan. He spent four minutes inside, then left carrying nothing visible. But the medication storage logs show someone accessed the controlled substances cabinet during that window.""Name," Adrian demanded."Dr. James Hartwell. Senior neonatologist. He's been with St. Mary's for twenty years before transferring to your Apex Tower facility three weeks ago. I
FORGIVE ME, ADRIAN
Vincent Kane stood on the tarmac at Teterboro Airport, leaning heavily on a cane that looked more medical than decorative.This was the first time Adrian had seen his father in person in five years. The first time since that morning in the Kane estate when Vincent had delivered his ultimatum: Leave with nothing or stay and be destroyed. Five years of exile, humiliation, rebuilding, and war.And now they stood face to face again.The cancer had ravaged Vincent in ways the video calls hadn't fully conveyed. His suit—still impeccably tailored, still worth more than most people's cars—hung loose on a frame that had lost significant weight. His skin had the gray-pallor of someone whose body was losing the war against cellular mutation. His hands, which had once commanded boardrooms and crushed competitors, trembled slightly against the cane's handle.But his eyes. His eyes were still sharp, still calculating, still seeing three moves ahead of everyone else."You passed the test," Vincent s
LEAVING MY SON BEHIND
Adrian stared at Dr. Hartwell's suicide note until the words stopped making sense as language and became just symbols on a screen.Your mother sends her regards.His mother had died twenty years ago. He'd been three years old. Too young to remember her face, too young to understand what death meant, old enough to feel the absence forever after.Or so he'd been told."Ryker," Adrian said into the phone, his voice frighteningly calm. "Tell me about my mother's death. Everything Vincent told you when you started working for the family.""Sir, she died in a car accident in France when you were three. September 14th, 1991. Single-vehicle collision on a mountain road. Vincent had her buried in the family plot in Switzerland. I've seen the death certificate myself.""Show me that death certificate now. Photograph it and send it to me."Three minutes later, the image appeared on Adrian's phone. Official French government seal. Cause of death: traumatic injuries sustained in vehicular accident
YOU HAVE 24 HOURS
Sister Mary Catherine led them deeper into the convent's gardens, away from the other sisters who were beginning to notice the visitors. They walked through rows of herbs and vegetables until they reached a small stone chapel at the garden's edge—centuries old, moss-covered, beautiful in its decay.Inside, the chapel was cool and quiet. Afternoon light filtered through stained glass windows, painting the stone floor in colors."Sit," Sister Mary said, gesturing to the wooden pews. "What I need to tell you requires privacy and time."Adrian sat, Sophia beside him, both waiting for his mother to explain the warning she'd delivered with such certainty.Sister Mary remained standing, her hands clasped in front of her habit, looking every bit the nun she'd become rather than the doctor she'd once been."Your father is dying, yes," she began. "But Vincent Kane doesn't do anything without purpose. Including dying. He's set up a situation where you'll have to prove you're him. Not just simila
SUCH A SHAME
The private jet's engines roared to life on the Shannon Airport tarmac at 8:47 PM.Adrian sat in the cabin, watching the clock on his phone with the kind of focus usually reserved for watching bombs count down. Twenty-three hours and thirteen minutes. That's how long he had to reach Switzerland, reach his father's villa, and sign the inheritance documents before Vincent Kane's life support was scheduled to end.Twenty-three hours to cross nearly fifteen hundred miles.Under normal circumstances, easily achievable. The flight from Ireland to Switzerland was six hours maximum. Add ground transportation and various delays, still plenty of time.But circumstances were never normal when Vincent Kane was involved.Sophia sat across from him, her laptop open, coordinating logistics with Ryker in New York. Flight plans. Weather forecasts. Ground transportation in Switzerland. Backup plans and contingencies for the backup plans."The will's terms are explicitly clear," she said, reading from t
I WON'T SIGN THIS!
Ten minutes.Adrian stared at the locked gates, his mind racing through impossible mathematics. The gates wouldn't unlock for eleven minutes. Life support would be terminated in ten. Even if he could somehow override the timer—which seemed unlikely given Vincent's paranoid security protocols—he'd still be cutting it to the absolute wire.Mathematically impossible.Sophia was already assessing the perimeter, her eyes tracking the villa's walls. "We go over. The walls are fifteen feet. Stone construction with enough hand and footholds. We can climb."Adrian looked at her—elegant in her traveling clothes, not dressed for scaling walls in the Swiss pre-dawn cold. Then he looked at himself—dress shirt, slacks, leather shoes completely wrong for climbing."We're not equipped for this," Adrian said."We're equipped with desperation. That'll have to be enough." Sophia was already moving along the wall, finding the section with the most obvious climbing points. "Come on. We have ten minutes. W