The Hacker's Strike

Clara’s terrifying, unexpected return sent Sloane fleeing from the grand lobby of Callahan Corporation in a cold-sweat panic. The frantic clicking of her expensive heels echoed across the marble floor as she rushed toward the exit. From the safety of the first-floor waiting room, young Declan quietly watched through the glass doors. He tracked the woman’s retreating figure as she scrambled away like a frightened rat. He knew exactly who she was. Sloane Ashford. His mother’s vicious half-sister. The very same woman who had ruthlessly forced his mother out of the country four years ago.

Declan let out a cold, deeply mature scoff. He turned his attention away from the glass. A few feet away, his little sister, Hazel, sat on the plush carpet. She kept her head down, quietly immersed in a colorful picture book, ignoring the world around her. Declan left her to her reading and stealthily moved toward the room's high-end computer.

The machine booted up with a soft hum. Declan’s fingers hovered over the keyboard for a split second before flying across the keys. A literal prodigy at deciphering complex code, he bypassed the basic security firewalls in seconds. The screen turned a vibrant blue, reflecting against his dark eyes as lines of code cascaded downward.

He systematically hacked directly into Ashford Corporation’s secured internal network. They possessed decent security, but nothing that could stop him. With lightning-fast keystrokes, he extracted all of their top-tier client information, bundling the sensitive data into encrypted files. He routed the data through an untraceable foreign IP address and leaked the files online. But that was not enough. He dug deeper into their official website's source code, altering key symbols, scrambling the infrastructure until the domain crashed.

Within a mere half an hour, the consequences exploded across the internet. Ashford Corporation’s heavily inflated stocks plummeted disastrously on the live market trackers. Watching the chaotic, disastrous financial news unfold on his monitor, Declan merely sneered. It was just a small, initial lesson. He firmly promised himself that if the corrupt Ashford family ever dared to offend his mother again, they would pay an even greater, bloodier price.

A sudden shift in movement caught his attention. Hazel drew close, standing right beside his chair. Her large, watery eyes fixed intensely on the bright monitor. An auto-play feature had unexpectedly shifted the financial news video to a different segment, displaying an aloof, incredibly handsome man on the screen. It was the exact same person they had dramatically run into on the busy road earlier that morning.

Assuming she simply found the news broadcast boring, Declan reached out to close the window.

Hazel grabbed his hand with surprising force.

Declan paused, staring at his sister. She shoved his hand away and pawed desperately at the display, her small fingers scratching the glass as if physically trying to pull the man out of the digital screen.

“Haze, do you know him?” Declan asked slowly, surprised by her unusual reaction.

He received no reply. Hazel just kept up her intense staring, her breathing slightly ragged as she touched the man’s face on the screen.

Declan narrowed his sharp eyes at her frantic behavior. He expertly took a quick screenshot of the man's face, opened a new tab, and ran an extensive reverse image search. The immediate results loaded in the blink of an eye.

Kaelen Vance. Twenty-eight years old. CEO of Vance Corporation.

Declan stared at the name. He remembered a foreign specialist doctor once mentioning something crucial. Severely autistic children often fiercely rejected all strangers, making exceptions only for their own direct blood relatives.

Intently scrutinizing the man’s sharp features on the screen, Declan felt a jolt of shock. He dragged a picture of Kaelen next to a candid photo of Hazel. Kaelen shared the exact same eyes. The exact same mouth. It was like looking at an older, masculine mirror image of his sister.

His mother always skillfully evaded his questions about his biological father. Her constant deflections led him to believe the man was dead. But this stunning physical resemblance was undeniable.

Declan narrowed his eyes, his mind working in overdrive. He needed to find a covert way to conduct a DNA paternity test.

Meanwhile, back at the headquarters of Ashford Corporation, the building descended into sheer, unadulterated chaos.

“You are trash!” Victor Ashford furiously berated his terrified tech specialists, his face flushed red with rage. He slammed his fist onto the conference table. “It is clear someone is attacking us from the shadows! How have you not found them yet?! Did we hire you to sit here for fun?!”

The executives in the war room shivered, not daring to breathe loudly as they faced their screaming boss. They failed miserably to stop the devastating cyber attack.

The heavy oak doors swung open. Sloane calmly stepped into the room.

“Don’t be angry, Dad,” Sloane said, taking charge. She issued swift, cold orders to the various departments for immediate damage control. “Tech department, repair the website immediately. Customer service, contact our major clients to appease them. Public relations, start drafting a statement to fix this mess.”

The staff scrambled to obey, grateful for the distraction. Sloane waited until the room cleared out a bit before slowly turning to her enraged father. She bit her lip, her composed facade cracking just a fraction as she revealed the horrifying truth.

“Dad, do you know why Ashford Corporation is suddenly facing this apocalyptic crisis?” she asked.

Victor glared at her, chest heaving. “Why?”

“Because Clara is back.”

“What?!” Victor practically jumped out of his leather chair in shock. His eyes widened in disbelief. “I thought that jinx died a long time ago!”

“I went to Callahan Corporation today and saw Clara. She is alive and kicking,” Sloane explained, her voice dropping to a harsh whisper. “She swore to take back everything that belongs to her. She is likely the one who just leaked our client information today.”

Victor paced the floor, running a hand through his thinning hair.

Sloane stepped closer, her voice trembling slightly as she confessed her deepest fear. “Dad, I am terrified of her discovering that the twins are still alive. She is their mother. If she finds out, she will want them back.”

Victor stopped pacing, his face turning pale.

“They also have Kaelen Vance’s blood flowing in their veins,” Sloane continued, her tone laced with dread. “If Kaelen learns that we blatantly lied to his terrifying family for four whole years, both of us will be ruined.”

Victor sucked in a sharp, horrified breath. He realized the deadly magnitude of the threat. He had gone to Vance Corporation multiple times to make himself known as the grandfather of the twins, yet Kaelen Vance never showed him a shred of respect. If Kaelen found out about this deception, the Ashford family would be wiped off the map.

Sloane leaned in close, her eyes darkening with a sinister resolve as she looked at her father. “I thought of a way to solve this problem once and for all, but I need your help…”