Chapter 30: The Blood Ledger---

They gathered in the war room again.

Same table.

Same chairs.

But something had changed in all of them.

The air felt heavier. The stakes—no longer just survival, but something more terrifying:

Confronting the blood-soaked foundation of Lexington itself.

---

Faith placed the decrypted files from Zaria's flash drive on the projector.

Names. Dates. Transactions.

Hundreds of entries.

Silent donations. Bribes. Coded instructions passed through "development funds" and "security grants."

Leo scanned the first page. "Every one of these people took Syndicate money?"

Faith nodded. "And nearly all of them had ties to Richard Lexington. Your father… he wasn't just investing in silence. He was distributing it."

Jayden clenched his jaw.

"I need to know who he answered to."

---

That's when Nia chimed in.

"There's one more file," she said quietly. "It was locked behind a secondary encryption. Took me all night."

She pulled it up.

Not a name.

A voice recording.

Jayden's hands froze as the sound began to play:

> "Richard, we warned you. You can't buy peace. You have to rent it—monthly. The moment your son starts poking around, we come for you first."

Another voice. Richard's. Tired. Defeated.

> "Leave him out of it. He's nothing like me."

Silence.

Then the first voice again:

> "That's what we're afraid of."

---

Jayden turned away from the screen.

His hands gripped the edge of the table.

So that was it.

His father hadn't been murdered by mistake.

He'd been silenced.

Executed.

Because Jayden wasn't like him.

---

Sasha crossed her arms. "Who's the voice?"

Nia shook her head. "Still analyzing. We'll trace the accent, run pitch modulation, narrow it down."

Jayden looked up. "Don't just trace it. Leak it."

Leo flinched. "You sure?"

Jayden nodded. "Let them know we're not afraid of ghosts."

---

Across the city, journalists began picking up whispers of a leak tied to Richard Lexington's death.

Anonymous forums exploded with speculation.

One thread gained over a million views in a night.

> "Did a global syndicate kill Kenya's richest man?"

Jayden didn't comment.

He didn't deny it.

But the message was clear.

Silence had expired.

---

Three days later, the first retaliation came.

The Lexington Medical Fund—a charity that provided surgeries for vulnerable kids—was frozen.

By "banking errors."

Nia checked the system. "It's them. They're punishing us through the children."

Jayden's voice was tight. Controlled.

"Unfreeze the funds. Reroute them. Use my personal offshore account if you have to."

Faith blinked. "That'll flag you for laundering."

"I don't care."

---

Meanwhile, in a luxury lodge on the outskirts of Kigali, Cormac Veldt sat in silence.

One of his advisors entered. "The boy leaked the tape. People are talking."

Cormac sipped his tea.

"Good. It means he's still emotional."

"And the girl?"

"We let her run. Let her think she's winning. People always reveal more when they believe they're free."

---

Back in Nairobi, Jayden sat alone in his father's old study.

He hadn't touched this room since his inheritance.

It still smelled of cedar and cigar smoke.

He walked to the old bookshelf and pulled a weathered ledger.

Not digital.

Handwritten.

His father's personal journal.

The cover read:

"For the son I didn't raise—but hoped would find this."

---

He opened it.

Inside: page after page of regrets, strategies, lists of debts owed, people betrayed, names he could no longer trust.

And one final page that hit harder than any threat.

> "If you're reading this… I didn't die peacefully.

But I died knowing you would live differently.

Be better.

Even if they come for you—

Never become me."

Jayden closed the book with trembling hands.

And he cried.

For the man his father could've been.

And the man he now had to become.

---

Later that night, Jayden released another statement—short, unfiltered.

> "To those watching from behind curtains,

To those bribing officials and breaking systems:

I'm not fighting to preserve Lexington.

I'm fighting to restore truth.

If that threatens you…

Then you're exactly the problem."

The internet lit up.

#TheSonWhoSpoke began trending across Africa and into Europe.

People who had never heard of Jayden Lexington now knew one thing:

> He wasn't scared.

---

And far away, Zaria sat in a rented apartment, watching the feed.

She didn't smile.

But her eyes softened.

"He's going to burn the world down," she whispered. "And maybe it needs it."

---

End of Chapter Thirty