Chapter 20: Echoes in the Blood and the Unholy Alliance

The scent of old champagne and polished wood still clung to Yuhan's suit as he sat in the quiet cocoon of his armored car. The lively chatter and gleaming lights of the charity auction faded behind him, but the tension lingered, coiled tight in his chest. Every word exchanged with Shen Mochen and Chief Adekunle replayed like a haunting refrain.

"Strength runs in your family."

The phrase echoed in his mind like a warning shot cloaked in pleasantry. It wasn't just flattery. It was a signal. A threat. A knowing.

They knew something.

Or at least Adekunle did. Mochen, as always, had been observing. Testing. Weighing.

"They're playing me," Yuhan muttered, voice low and rough.

In the front seat, his head of security, Dapo, met his eyes in the rearview mirror. "Sir? Do we need to reroute?"

"No." Yuhan's eyes never left the city lights racing past his window. "But stay sharp. Assume we're being watched. And tell the team to activate Project Deep Scan. Immediately. I want a full audit of Chief Adekunle. Public, private—every account, every ally, every land deal. Start with anything tied to my father's businesses. Even from twenty years ago."

This wasn't just strategy anymore. It was survival.

And beneath that, a deeper, gnawing ache: Why was his father's name even part of this mess?

His father—the man who taught him about integrity over morning tea and sacrifice in the quiet way only real men did—wasn't supposed to be connected to the likes of Adekunle. It didn't fit. It hurt.

Was he being lied to his whole life?

Was his father a victim… or something worse?

In another corner of the city, Shen Mochen and Chief Adekunle stood shoulder to shoulder in the shadowed alcove of the grand auction hall, the glitter now reduced to glimmers and echoes as guests slowly drifted away. The air buzzed faintly with tension—refined, but unmistakable.

Mochen's smile didn't quite reach his eyes. "He's sharp. That much is clear. The way he looked at you… he's digging."

Adekunle's expression was disturbingly calm. "He's his father's son. Too much of him, maybe. Curious minds can be dangerous when they wander into rooms meant to stay locked."

Mochen gave a faint, humorless laugh and took a slow sip of cognac. "Still… you handled it well. Just enough pressure. Now we know what drives him."

"His family," Adekunle said simply. The words landed with quiet certainty. "He'll burn a city to keep them safe. That kind of love? It's a flaw—an opening."

Mochen hesitated, gaze darkening. "What about the message he received? The one with the photo… You're certain it wasn't one of yours?"

Adekunle chuckled. The sound was dry, unsettling. "I keep my affairs clean. Always. That wasn't me. There's someone else in play. Someone with eyes they shouldn't have. Perhaps someone with… foresight."

The jab was deliberate.

A flicker of tension danced across Mochen's features. "Then we have a common enemy, Chief. And that makes things… delicate."

"Indeed," Adekunle said, smiling now. "And shared enemies make for strange alliances. Yuhan may have just forged one between us—without even knowing it."

---

A Week Later

Yuhan barely slept. While the rest of the world spun on, his team worked around the clock—quiet, methodical, relentless.

And the deeper they looked, the uglier things became.

There was no obvious connection between Chief Adekunle and Yuhan's father on the surface. But just below it? Patterns. Financial breadcrumbs. Shell companies tied to offshore accounts. Old funds siphoned through corporations so complex, they practically screamed to be hidden.

One name surfaced more than once—a faceless conglomerate known for handling the kind of money that didn't like daylight. And disturbingly, some of its affiliates had popped up recently in Adekunle's orbit.

The more Yuhan dug, the more the ground beneath him crumbled.

Had his father known about this?

Was he complicit in something terrible?

Or worse—was he the architect?

One evening, Dapo stepped into the study, tablet in hand and face grim. "We found something," he said quietly.

Yuhan took the tablet. A scanned document loaded: an old land deed, buried under layers of shell company transfers. Nothing illegal—just... well hidden.

"It was sold a long time ago," Dapo explained, "but guess who bought it."

Yuhan's heart dropped as he read the name.

It was the land Shen Group built their first major development on.

The very foundation of Mochen's empire… had once belonged to his father.

It hit him like a blow to the chest.

This wasn't just a coincidence.

This was history rewritten. Legacy shattered.

Had his father helped build the monster that destroyed their family?

Or had he tried to stop something he'd once been a part of?

Yuhan's grip tightened on the tablet. "So this is the connection. This is what they didn't want me to find."

Everything was murkier now. There were no clean lines. No innocent victims. Just blood and betrayal buried in paperwork.

What did that make him?

His encrypted line buzzed.

The one only a handful of people had access to.

Unknown number.

He hesitated. Then answered.

A deep, unfamiliar voice spoke. Calm. Measured. Menacing.

> "We know what you're looking for, Yuhan. And you're not the only one who lost something that day."

The line went dead.

Yuhan sat frozen, the weight of generations pressing down on him. The game wasn't over. It was just beginning .