The Grand commander's Return; Ex-wife's fatal Mistake

Chapter 12: The $25 Million Cover-Up

Back at the boardroom, champagne glinted in thin crystal flutes across the executive conference table as the central bankers prepared the final signature pages for the $500 million credit facility.

Brody sat beside Nala, leaning back in his leather executive chair with a smooth, effortless smile plastered across his face. Old Chairman Cromwell nodded approvingly from the head of the table, while Senior Vice-Chairman Matthew Langston reviewed the legal terms with a greedy smirk.

Ping!  A text notification chimes in Brody's phone.

He reached down, slipping his phone out under the edge of the mahogany table. It was from  Luke, Dr. Elena Radford assistant.

The message flashed across the dark screen.

LUKE: EMERGENCY. Dr. Radford found the military kernel and traced the original architect to Declan Wilde. She is coming back up to expose you to the board.

The smile froze on Brody’s lips. The blood drained from his face.

Declan, you lucky bastard! What with you and these women! 

Brody's jaw tightened.

"Brody?" Nala whispered softly, leaning over with concern as she noticed his rigid posture. "Are you alright?"

"Excuse me," Brody choked out, his voice thin and dry. He stood up so fast his chair screeched against the carpet, drawing sharp looks from the central bankers. "Restroom. Too much champagne. I will be right back."

Brody practically sprinted down the private executive hallway, ducking into the marble restroom and throwing the deadbolt shut.

He whipped out his diagnostic slate and jammed in his master override credentials, desperately trying to lock down the kernel before Elena could present her audit report.

ERROR: OVERRIDE REJECTED REASON: ACCESS DENIED

"That bastard!" Brody hissed under his breath, slamming his palm against the marble counter. The core system has completely locked him out.

With sweat dripping into his eyes, Brody opened his encrypted messaging app, frantically contacting Viper-Tech on the dark web once again.

​BRODY: Emergency! State auditors found the military kernel. Wipe the logs and overwrite the root access now!

​VIPER: Stand by. Initiating brute-force payload into the kernel root.

​On the other side of the encrypted channel, Viper-Tech launched a massive, multi-threaded penetration attack aimed at breaching Subnet Sector 4. But the moment his malicious code hit the outer firewall, a dark, sovereign defense protocol flared to life.

​Inside Griffin Tower, Declan’s console chimed softly.

​Declan didn't just block the attack, he traced the intruder's signal back through six proxy servers in three seconds, completely hijacking Viper-Tech’s terminal screen and establishing a silent, double-sided audio tap into their channel.

VIPER: Impossible! My exploit vector was erased in a microsecond.  Aegis-Core is an unhackable monster. Whoever built that architecture is an absolute genius, and his security walls are unbreakable from the outside.

​Brody’s heart slammed against his ribs like a sledgehammer as he stared at the screen.

BRODY: I am about to lose a five-hundred-million-dollar deal! Fix this!

​VIPER: I can't break his wall, man!  But I can build you a visual clone shell. It will project a fake, operational dashboard on your main console for your presentation. It won't hold up under a deep code inspection tomorrow, but it will fool a room full of suits tonight. Cost is $10M wire right now.

BRODY: I don't care! I will pay anything! Just do it!

Brody didn't hesitate for a single second. Stock prices were soaring at an all-time high, and once the $500 million contract was inked, he could easily slide the funds back into the treasury before anyone noticed.

He authorized the $10,000,000 offshore wire transfer straight out of the restricted corporate vault.

Ten million dollars. That was twenty-five million dollars stolen from Cromwell Capital's emergency reserves in less than two hours.

Declan  sat back in his chair smiling as he listened to Brody’s panicked voice streaming through his terminal speakers. He deliberately allowed Viper-Tech to deploy the clone shell, secretly weaving a hidden diagnostic tracer directly into the fake interface so he could monitor every tap, command, and keystroke Brody would make from that moment forward.

Two minutes later, the dark web hacker sent back a green confirmation icon. The fake clone shell was deployed over the primary console, masking all system errors behind a glowing green status indicator.

Brody sighed, washed his face, smoothed his hair, and walked back into the boardroom like a victorious king. He picked up the fountain pen, signed his name beside Old Chairman Cromwell’s bold signature, and shook hands with the lead banker as press cameras flashed from the doorway.

"Congratulations, Brody," Matthew Langston beamed, clapping him hard on the shoulder. "Cromwell Capital is officially unstoppable!"

"To Sawyer-Cromwell!" Nala toasted proudly, her eyes shining with triumphant ambition as she raised her glass. "The most secure, unhackable system in the state!"

BANG!

The heavy mahogany boardroom doors swung open with a violent thud.

Dr. Elena Radford marched straight into the room, her face cold, hard, and rigid with professional fury.

The laughter instantly died down. Old Chairman Cromwell’s brow furrowed, while Matthew Langston set his champagne glass down with an irritated clack.

"Dr. Radford," Matthew snapped, stepping forward. "What is the meaning of this dramatic intrusion? The contract is signed."

"This contract is built on a massive corporate fraud!" Elena declared loudly, her sharp voice echoing off the high ceilings. She pointed a tight finger directly at Brody's chest. "Brody Cromwell is a thief and a fraud! The software Sawyer-Cromwell just licensed to the state grid is not proprietary, and it is certainly not built by Brody!"

The boardroom erupted into stunned gasps. Nala instantly stood up, her face flushing with indignant rage.

"How dare you!" Nala shouted, her diamond bracelet flashing as she slammed her hand on the table. "Brody sacrificed his health for three years to build this platform! How dare a state bureaucrat step in here and throw baseless accusations on our greatest night!"

Brody didn't panic. With the fake clone shell running live downstairs, a slow, smug smirk spread across his face.

"Careful, Dr. Radford," Brody said smoothly, crossing his arms with utter arrogance. "Defamation against a public firm carrying an active stock valuation can land you in federal court. If you're going to accuse me of theft, you had better bring proof."

"The proof is in your root directory," Elena countered sharply, turning to the central bankers. "He does not hold the master admin keys. The foundational code belongs to an elite military architecture, and Brody has been locked out of his own kernel by the true creator!"

"Is that so?" Brody chuckled, taking a step toward the central diagnostic terminal integrated into the boardroom wall. "Let's check, shall we?"

Brody casually walked over to the glass wall terminal, brought up the main security interface, and placed his right thumb flat against the scanner.

Thanks to Viper-Tech's $10 million clone shell, the screen instantly flashed a brilliant green.

BIOMETRIC USER VERIFIED: BRODY CROMWELL ACCESS GRANTED: MASTER SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR SYSTEM HEALTH: 100% PERFECT INTEGRATION

Elena’s eyes widened in absolute horror. Her breath caught in her throat as she stared at the screen.

Impossible... Elena thought, her mind spinning into complete chaos. Luke showed me the locked military seal just ten minutes ago in the car! How is he logging in seamlessly now?!

Brody turned back to the room, spreading his arms wide with a triumphant laugh. "Is this the locked system you were talking about, Dr. Radford? Because it looks to me like I have full administrative control."

Old Chairman Cromwell stood up, his heavy walking cane striking the hardwood floor with a terrifying thud. His eyes burned with icy rage as he glared at Elena.

"You have humiliated this board, maligned my son, and disrupted a historical state transaction based on complete fantasy," Old Chairman Cromwell boomed, his voice dark and absolute. "I will be placing a personal call to your superiors at the State Reserve Grid before midnight, Dr. Radford. Your career as a public auditor is officially over."

"Chairman, listen to me…." Elena tried to speak, but Matthew Langston cut her off with a cold wave of his hand.

"Security, escort this woman out of the building," Matthew commanded coldly.

Elena stood frozen for a second, her blood running cold as she looked at Brody’s smug, arrogant grin. Her sharp mind raced, putting the pieces together with terrifying speed. Brody couldn't have wiped military-grade code in ten minutes. Someone inside her team must have alerted him the second she ordered the deep trace in the SUV.

Her eyes darted briefly toward Luke, who was standing quietly near the back door with his head lowered, avoiding all eye contact.

Luke sold me out, Elena realized with sickening clarity.

Without saying another word, Elena turned on her heel and walked out of the boardroom, keeping her head held high despite the humiliating whispers of the executives behind her.

She marched down the private service hallway, pulling her personal phone from her coat pocket with a shaking hand. She dialed a private, encrypted line, placing the phone firmly against her ear.

"It's Elena," she spoke into the receiver, her voice hard as steel, burning with a new, dangerous resolve. "I need you to pull up the real-time satellite location logs for Fiona Griffin's private convoy right now."

The voice on the other end answered softly. "What are you looking for, ma'am?"

Elena looked back one last time at the boardroom doors, her dark eyes flashing with absolute determination.

"I need to find Declan Wilde!"