I didn't scream.
I didn't cry.
I planned.
For three days, Rina remained unaware that I knew. She still brought me reports. Scheduled meetings. Smiled like a sister. But behind my eyes, a chessboard moved.
On the fourth day, I sent her to host a C Group affiliate meet-up in Chiang Mai.
While she boarded her flight, I met with Legal.
"You want to terminate her?" they asked.
I shook my head. "I want her to choose her own destruction."
At my instruction, Ploy created a fake leak—documents outlining a "ghost division" Rina had supposedly embezzled funds from. They were uploaded anonymously to a secure boardroom channel with only one unauthorized access: Rina's.
She took the bait.
By that night, I had her login logs, IP pings, and a hidden mic recording of her panicked call to a rival PR firm, trying to "contain the backlash."
By morning?
Rina Hong was everywhere.
> "CEO's Right Hand Accused of Corporate Espionage"
"Moon Fowler's Team Fractures Under Pressure?"
I called her back to headquarters under the guise of a private crisis meeting.
She walked in, phone in hand, eyes darting.
"Something's happened," She said breathlessly. "I'm being framed—"
I cut her off with a file tossed onto the table.
She opened it.
Her face fell.
"You knew," She whispered.
"Since the press conference," I said flatly. "But I let you run free, Rina. So when the trap closed, it'd be loud enough to echo."
She looked desperate now. "Moon, I helped you—"
"You helped yourself to my trust. My files. My blood."
She reached out, and I stepped back.
"You don't belong here anymore," I said. "And if you try to come for what's mine again—I'll end more than your career."
Security entered. Silent. Unapologetic.
As they led her out, Rina glanced back.
I didn't.
---
In the private lounge of a luxury condo in Singapore, three figures sat around a table of untouched champagne.
Taeng stirred her glass with a steel nail. Kylan leaned back, looking bored. But across from them sat the real power.
A woman with a scar above her brow.
Short-cropped hair. Snake tattoo peeking beneath her collarbone.
She was called Ji-Ah.
Moon's ex-partner. A hacker. A fixer. A criminal. And a ghost from the time before Moon wore the name Chirapaisarnsakul.
"You said you want her ruined," Ji-Ah said in clipped Thai. "But I don't do cheap drama."
Taeng smiled sweetly. "We don't want drama. We want access. To the AI project. To Moon's encrypted plans. To everything she keeps in her silent files."
Ji-Ah looked amused. "You want me to break into the woman who taught me how to build firewalls?"
Kylan leaned in, his voice low. "Can you do it?"
She sipped her drink. "Oh, I can."
Pause.
"But you should know something before I agree."
They leaned closer.
"She's not the same Moon you remember. That girl used to run from her ghosts."
She stood slowly.
"Now she buries them."
—-
Three years ago.
Hong Kong's skyline flickered like broken promises.
We were ghosts in a world that didn't care if we burned.
I wasn't Moon Fowler then.
I was Chao-Fa—just a girl with a cracked laptop and the weight of her Father's legacy on her spine.
And she was Ji-Ah—the chaos I let crawl into my bed and whisper forever between stolen kisses and digital theft.
We were lovers— maybe not.
We were liars.
And I thought we were home.
The night it shattered, the air smelled like rust and rain. I stood on the rooftop we called ours, the city yawning beneath us. She was already there—hood down, moonlight catching on her cheekbones, calm like nothing was broken.
But I had the proof in my hands.
She sold our prototype code—the one my Father started before he died—to a biotech syndicate known for harvesting human subjects.
I stepped into the light. Her eyes widened, then settled.
"You found out," She said, not surprised. Not ashamed.
"Why?" My voice cracked. "Why that code?"
Ji-Ah's jaw tensed. "Because we were starving, Chao. Because I'm tired of hacking scraps while billionaires get fat. That code was worth something."
"It was sacred." I stepped closer, throat raw. "My Father died hiding it. You knew that. You knew that!"
"I did it for us," She whispered. "It was one line of defense code, I didn't think—"
"Don't lie," I cut her off. "You didn't do it for us. You did it for you. You've always been planning your escape. I was just a stop on the way."
Her lips trembled. "You don't mean that."
I reached behind her waistband—where she always kept her knife.
"You carry this like it's part of your soul," I murmured, fingers grazing steel. "Did you ever plan to use it on me too?"
"No," She breathed.
I pulled it free and stepped back.
And then—I threw it.
It sliced across her brow, not deep, but enough. Blood beaded instantly.
She didn't scream. She didn't cry. She just stood there… shocked.
Good.
I wanted her to feel it.
"That scar," I said, shaking, "is all you'll have left of me."
Her breath hitched. "You're not serious."
"I built a kingdom with you in the dark. And you sold the bricks for a paycheck."
The rain came hard then, like the sky was trying to wash the truth away.
But it was too late.
"I loved you," I said.
And then—
"I hate you."
I turned.
And walked away from the first woman I ever gave everything to.
The girl I once loved died that night.
And the woman I became?
She was born in a fire.
—
Ji-Ah's gloved hands danced across the keyboard inside C Group's data core. Cameras looped. Server access cloned.
Everything was going smoothly.
Too smoothly.
"Come on, Firefly," She whispered to herself. "Still hiding your treasures behind sentiment and strings?"
She cracked Layer 3.
Then Layer 4.
And then—Layer 5.
An interface appeared.
Not code.
Not a firewall.
But a video feed.
Of Moon.
Live.
Seated in her office. Looking directly at her through the lens.
Moon's voice came through the earpiece Ji-Ah never told anyone she wore.
> "Did you think I wouldn't recognize your signature encryption, Dagger?"
Ji-Ah froze.
> "I knew the moment you entered my network. I left that door open for you."
The office lights dimmed behind Moon.
> "I didn't forget what you took from me. But this time, I'm the one holding the knife."
The screen went black.
All access cut.
Sirens didn't blare.
But Ji-Ah knew—
She had already lost.