Linn was already dressed for the auction.
The deep crimson evening gown hugged her figure perfectly—elegant without being excessive.
The platinum-blonde wig cascaded over one shoulder in soft waves, transforming her almost beyond recognition.
Blue contact lenses had turned the warmth of her usual gaze into something colder, almost aristocratic, while the final touches of makeup sharpened every feature just enough to become someone else.
An heiress.
A woman born into old money.
A woman who belonged in a room where fortunes changed hands over a single raised paddle.
She turned slightly from one side to the other before giving her reflection a firm, satisfied nod.
A knock sounded at the door.
Grabbing her evening clutch from the vanity, she gave herself one final glance before crossing the room.
She already knew who it would be.
The moment she opened the door, Helix stood waiting exactly as expected.
Designer tuxedo.
Polished leather dress shoes.
An expensive watch resting neatly beneath his cuff.
Everything he wore probably cost more than most people’s annual salary.
Crossline was obscenely rich.
Linn stared at him.
Then, very, very slowly, she looked him up from head to toe.
Her expression became increasingly pained.
“…Seriously?”
Helix met her gaze with his usual unreadable expression.
“Let’s go.”
“No.”
For perhaps the first time that day, the slightest hint of confusion crossed his face—a faint crease between his brows.
Linn pointed directly at him.
“What is that?”
Helix lowered his eyes, briefly examining himself.
“…A tuxedo.”
“I know it’s a tuxedo!” she shot back, throwing both hands into the air.
“We are supposed to pretend we are billionaires! What the hell is wrong with you?”
Helix looked down at himself again, as though genuinely trying to locate the problem she had identified.
“…It is custom-made.”
“The tuxedo is not the problem!” She pointed at him again as though presenting evidence before a jury.
“You are!”
Linn let out a dramatic sigh, and grabbed him firmly by the sleeve.
He offered no resistance as she dragged him through the doorway and into her room, the door clicking shut behind them.
She marched him straight toward the vanity before planting both hands against his shoulders and pushing him gently into the chair.
“Sit.”
Helix sat without resistance.
Linn opened her makeup case with remarkable seriousness, every brush and palette laid out before her with the precision of someone preparing for delicate work.
“You need makeup.”
“I do not.”
“You absolutely do!”
“It serves no tactical purpose.”
“It serves billionaire purposes!”
“…”
She picked up a makeup brush and pointed it directly at him like a commander issuing battlefield instructions.
“And your hair!”
“My hair is acceptable.”
“It looks like you lost an argument with gravity!”
Helix lifted one hand and briefly touched his hair, as though checking whether gravity had, in fact, won.
“…It is within regulations.”
“We are going to an auction, not a military base!”
Another sigh escaped her.
“Someone spent a fortune designing this masterpiece, and you made it look like you are about to attend a funeral! At least learn to put on some makeup and style your hair when necessary!”
“Do gunfights and assassinations involve face painting?”
“…”
Linn closed her eyes.
She inhaled.
Counted silently to three.
Then opened them again.
“Makeup is different! It is for confidence!” Her patience had become alarmingly thin.
“Face painting is for clowns!”
Helix regarded her quietly.
“…Then you are a clown.”
He tilted his head ever so slightly, folding his arms across his chest.
“You look ridiculous.”
Linn looked very offended.
“Excuse me?!”
She considered murder for a second.
“Fine! If I really look that ridiculous to you, prove it!” She folded her arms tightly across her chest.
“Laugh!”
“…”
“…”
“…I do not laugh on command.”
She dipped the foundation brush into the compact.
“Now shut up!”
“I was not talking.”
She began dabbing the foundation lightly across his face.
To her surprise, his skin needed far less work than she had expected.
It was neither flawless nor polished like someone who invested in expensive skincare, but it was remarkably clear.
Years spent outdoors had left the faintest roughness along his jaw and cheekbones, softened only by a handful of barely visible scars that disappeared unless the light caught them just right—hardly the complexion one would expect from someone who had spent most of his life in combat.
Considering how little attention he seemed to pay to his appearance, it felt profoundly unfair.
Silence gradually settled over the room.
For several minutes, the only sounds came from the soft tapping of brushes against skin and the occasional click of cosmetic containers opening and closing.
Helix remained perfectly still throughout the entire process.
He neither flinched nor shifted in his seat.
Even when Linn brushed lightly across his cheekbone.
Even when she adjusted his jaw with two fingers to better reach the opposite side.
Nothing.
Halfway through applying concealer, she paused.
“Do you always sit this still?”
“Yes.”
She looked at him suspiciously.
“You are creepy.”
“Thanks.”
She dusted away the last traces of powder before stepping behind his chair and slipping her fingers into his neatly combed hair.
One adjustment.
She stepped back.
“…No.”
She leaned forward again, adjusting another section.
Still no.
She frowned thoughtfully.
A third attempt.
“…Still no.”
Another dramatic sigh escaped her.
“This is harder than I thought.”
Helix watched her reflection in the mirror as she continued rearranging strands that looked identical to him.
“Are we leaving today?”
“We will.”
She flattened another stubborn lock of hair before undoing it almost immediately.
“…Eventually.”
Another minute passed.
Another adjustment.
She tilted her head, adjusting the front once more.
“…There.”
A satisfied smile spread across her face.
“Now that…” She folded her arms with obvious approval.
“…looks like someone who casually buys islands.”
Helix turned his eyes toward the mirror and studied his own reflection for several quiet seconds.
“…I do not see the difference.”
“…Because you have no sense of fashion,” Linn replied immediately, staring at him as though he had personally insulted the entire fashion industry.
She opened a drawer beneath the vanity and retrieved a pair of silver-framed glasses.
Without explanation, she slid them onto his face.
“Perfect.”
Helix blinked once.
“They are not prescription.”
“They do not have to be.”
“They reduce visual accuracy.”
“They increase billionaire accuracy.”
She stared at him as though daring him to argue further.
Helix held her gaze for a moment before quietly rising from the chair.
Together, they stepped out into the hallway and headed for the private elevator reserved exclusively for Crossline operatives.
Rather than descending to the public lobby, the elevator carried them to one of Velaris’s restricted lower levels, accessible only through biometric authorization.
Beyond its doors stretched an unmarked corridor concealed behind what appeared to be an ordinary maintenance passage, leading directly to the underground parking facility—a secure exit designed to ensure operatives could enter and leave the headquarters without ever passing through the building’s public surveillance systems.
Waiting inside the underground garage was a sleek black luxury coupe, its sculpted bodywork reflecting the overhead lights with understated elegance.
One glance was enough to tell it belonged in the same world as private jets and waterfront estates rather than ordinary city traffic.
The discreet Crossline modifications hidden beneath its handcrafted exterior remained invisible to anyone who admired it from the outside.
Tonight, they were not leaving as operatives.
They were leaving as money.
Helix unlocked the vehicle with a press of the key fob before walking around to the driver’s side.
Linn slipped into the passenger seat, smoothing the folds of her evening gown as the door closed behind her.
Moments later, the engine came to life with little more than a refined purr, and the coupe rolled silently out of the underground garage, disappearing into the city’s traffic on its way to the auction.
Linn opened the designer clutch she had insisted on buying with Jion’s black card and carefully withdrew two matte-black invitation cards.
They appeared deceptively simple—no logo, no event name, no address.
Only a unique serial number engraved across the surface and a microscopic authentication seal embedded beneath the finish.
Two days earlier, Jace had traced the invitations’ delivery route while Sean quietly intercepted them under yet another borrowed identity.
Once the original recipients had been discreetly prevented from attending, Niel took over, transferring the invitations’ registrations to Crossline’s fabricated identities and preparing every supporting credential the auction’s verification process might require.
Linn turned one of the matte-black invitation cards between her fingers.
The sight of them reminded her of a conversation from the previous day.
Jion had placed two identity folders onto the conference table.
Linn opened hers.
Helena Ashford.
Then she reached for Helix’s folder.
Caleb Ashford.
Her eyes moved between the two names before slowly lifting toward Jion.
“…Why are we married?”
She looked offended.
“It would attract less attention,” Jion answered simply.
“No.”
Jion raised an eyebrow.
“No?”
Linn closed both folders and slid them back across the table.
“Make us siblings.”
“Most high-net-worth attendees arrive with their spouses.”
“I don’t care.” She folded her arms.
“I demand us as siblings.”
Jion studied her for a moment before shifting his gaze toward Helix.
“Any objections?”
Helix remained completely indifferent.
“None.”
Jion let out the faintest sigh.
“Very well. I’ll have the identities revised.”
Linn slipped both invitations back into her clutch before glancing out the window.
The city lights had long since faded behind them.
In their place stretched deserted roads, aging warehouses, and industrial blocks that grew quieter with every passing mile.
The farther they drove, the stranger the route became.
Streetlights grew farther apart with every intersection until even the city’s distant glow had vanished behind them.
There were no luxury hotels.
No grand convention centers.
Nothing that remotely resembled a place where billionaires would gather to spend fortunes in a single evening.
Eventually, the coupe turned into what appeared to be an abandoned freight warehouse.
Rust stained the corrugated walls, several windows had long since been boarded shut, and the faded company logo above the loading bay had almost completely peeled away with age.
Linn’s eyes narrowed.
“You’re telling me billionaires come here?”
Helix slowed the vehicle before an unmarked steel gate.
“They come underneath it,” he responded evenly.
From the outside, the property looked like nothing more than another forgotten industrial relic waiting for demolition.
Years ago, it had operated as a large freight distribution warehouse, one of the city’s busiest logistics facilities, its underground loading levels designed to move cargo directly beneath the complex without disrupting traffic above.
When the company eventually collapsed, the warehouse had been abandoned almost overnight, leaving behind little more than rusting steel, cracked concrete, and a reputation no developer had bothered to reclaim.
According to the intelligence Jace had gathered, however, the abandonment had only been an illusion.
Sometime after the property changed hands through a series of shell companies, the underground levels had been quietly renovated beyond recognition.
The original freight tunnels and loading bays remained, but everything beneath the surface had been transformed into one of the black market’s preferred venues—isolated, defensible, and large enough to accommodate gatherings that officially did not exist.
Rather than emerging into a neglected basement, the descending ramp led toward a sprawling underground parking facility illuminated by warm white lighting.
Luxury vehicles lined the polished concrete floor in orderly rows—handcrafted grand tourers, limited-production hypercars, chauffeur-driven executive sedans, even armored limousines whose combined value easily exceeded the warehouse above many times over.
Above ground, the building looked abandoned.
Below it, wealth had buried itself where no one would think to look.
The engine fell silent.
Linn remained seated for only a moment, her fingers resting lightly against the designer clutch on her lap.
The familiar unease settled quietly beneath her ribs—the same feeling that always accompanied the start of a mission.
She drew a slow breath.
Exhaled.
Almost instinctively, she adjusted a loose strand of her platinum-blonde wig before stepping out of the car.
Helix was already waiting beside the vehicle.
The underground parking facility was quieter than she had expected.
Elegantly dressed men and women stepped from luxury vehicles one after another, their conversations kept low as they made their way deeper into the complex.
Chauffeurs remained beside their cars while discreet security personnel watched from a distance without drawing attention to themselves.
Without exchanging a word, Linn and Helix joined the steady stream of attendees.
The farther they walked, the more the abandoned warehouse above seemed to disappear.
Polished marble replaced concrete, warm lighting softened the corridors, and the number of well-dressed attendees gradually increased until they reached an expansive reception area where the crowd slowed before a series of verification counters.
One by one, attendees presented identical matte-black invitation cards to the staff stationed behind sleek black desks.
Linn and Helix stepped forward, presenting theirs.
The attendant accepted the cards with practiced courtesy, placing each beneath a compact scanner built seamlessly into the countertop.
A soft green light flickered across its surface before disappearing almost immediately.
The staff member offered a polite nod.
“Welcome, Mr. Ashford. Ms. Ashford.”
The cards were returned immediately.
Linn accepted hers with a composed smile befitting the identity she now wore, offering nothing more than a courteous nod before continuing onward with Helix.
Crystal chandeliers bathed the underground venue in warm light as elegantly dressed guests settled into their seats.
Quiet conversations drifted through the room while attendants moved silently between them with trays of champagne.
Linn and Helix neither lingered nor hurried as they made their way through the rows in search of their seats.
Her attention drifted briefly around the hall, quietly taking in the sea of crystal chandeliers, tailored suits, evening gowns, and conversations where fortunes seemed to change hands as casually as the weather.
Everything about the place radiated quiet extravagance—so unlike anything she had ever known.
Barely a few seconds passed before she turned back…
…Helix had somehow acquired three women.
They stood around him with effortless smiles, their conversation already underway as though they had known him for years.
Linn blinked once.
Then a slow grin spread across her face.