Chapter 195
No.1
The next morning, the air inside the exclusive Upper East Side beauty salon smelled of crushed lavender and expensive entitlement.
Allena lay on a plush velvet massage table,wrapped in a heated silkrobe. A technician was carefully applying a gold-leaf mask to her face,avoiding the bandages near her hairline.
Sitting in the plush chairs around her were three wives of prominent Wall Street hedge fund managers.
"It was honestly terrifying," Allena sighed, her voice dripping with fabricated trauma. "August was just trying to give me a quiet, romantic dinner. And then she showed up."
The wives leaned in, their eyes wide with gossip-hungry anticipation.
"Elisa actually rented a child," Allena whispered,shaking her head in mock disbelief."She borrowed a little girl from her friend, dragged the CEO of Aethel out into the freezing cold, and paraded in front of the restaurant window just to make August jealous. She is completely unhinged."
No.2
"Oh my god," one of the wives gasped, covering her mouth. "That is positively feral. But what do you expect from a hospital nurse? No class."
"Exactly," Allena agreed sadly. "She is having a total psychotic break because August finally threw her out. I just feel so sorry for the little girl she used as a prop."
Within two hours, the rumor had spread like a virus through the encrypted group chats of Manhattan's elite. Elisa Wilder was officially branded a desperate, mentally unstable woman clinging to her billionaire ex-husband.
Meanwhile, on the top floor of the Chambers Group headquarters, the atmosphere was suffocatingly tense.
August sat behind his massive mahogany desk.He stared at the Bloomberg terminal monitor. Aethel Intelligence's stock was holding strong, completely unaffected by the broader market panic.
Simon stood nervously in front of the desk, holding a thin blue folder.
No.3
"Sir, the deep-dive background check on the Gilmore child," Simon said, sliding the folder across the polished wood.
August opened it. Inside were pediatric dental records, vaccination charts from a Long Island clinic, and a heavily redacted birth certificate. The mother's name was listed as a distant,deceased cousin of Jewel Gilmore.
It was a flawless, impenetrable firewall Elisa had paid a fortune to build on the dark webo five years ago.
August flipped through the pages. The last lingering shadow of doubt in his mind evaporated.He closed the folder and tossed it directly into the heavy-duty paper shredder next to his desk. As the machine roared to life, he felt a strange, hollow sense of relief, the kind a man feels when he successfully convinces himself a monster under the bed was just a shadow.
The machine ground the fake documents into confetti.
"Call PR," August ordered, his eyes glued to the Aethel stock ticker. "If any tabloid tries to link my name to Elisa's stunt last night, hit them with a cease and desist immediately."
No.4
"Yes, sir," Simon nodded. "Also, Devon Browning is waiting for you in the VIP conference room at Mather Medical Center. The venture capital assessment for Aethel's new Al project is starting in twenty minutes."
August stood up and buttoned his suit jacket. A cold, predatory light flashed in his eyes.He was going to crush Alastair Cromwell's new project, and he was going to make sure Elisa watched her new protector fail.
Thirty minutes later, inside the sterile, glass-walled VIP conference room at Mather Medical Center.
Devon sat at the long table, his feet propped up on the edge, arrogantly flipping through Aethel's clinical trial proposal. Allena sat next to him,wearing a white blazer to look professional,acting
as his "medical consultant."
"This algorithm is garbage," Allena scoffed,pointing a manicured finger at a complex data chart she couldn't even begin to comprehend."The predictive models for the cardiac response are completely unstable. It's a massive liability."
No.5
Devon nodded vigorously. "I knew it. This 'Faye'character is just a Silicon Valley myth. It's a scam to pump their valuation. I'm going to tear this rep apart."
The frosted glass door swung open. August walked in, radiating absolute authority. He took the seat at the head of the table.
"Is the Aethel representative here?" August checked his platinum watch, his voice sharp with impatience. "I have a board meeting at two. l am not waiting for a scam artist."
"They probably realized we figured out their fake data and ran," Devon laughed loudly.
The sound of his laughter was cut short by the sharp, rhythmic clack-clack-clack of high heels echoing down the hallway. The footsteps were precise, unhurried, and carried a heavy,authoritative weight.
The glass door was pushed open.
No.6
Two senior Vice Presidents from Aethel Intelligence walked in first. They immediately stepped to the side, standing at attention like soldiers clearing a path for a general.
Elisa walked into the room.
She wore a razor-sharp, tailored black Tom Ford suit that fit her like armor. Her hair was pulled back into a sleek, severe knot. She held a sleek silver tablet in her right hand. The exhausted, broken nurse from the ER was completely gone.
She walked straight to the head of the table, her eyes locked onto August.
August's breath caught in his throat. His hands gripped the armrests of his chair. Devon's jaw dropped. Allena's face turned the color of chalk.
Elisa plugged her tablet into the central console.A massive, complex holographic projection of a human heart, overlaid with billions of data points,flared to life in the center of the table.
No.7
Elisa placed her hands flat on the glass surface.She leaned forward,looking down at the three of them with a smile that could freeze boiling water.
"Good morning," Elisa said, her voice echoing with absolute, terrifying authority. "The Aethel clinical data assessment will now begin."