Darius sat on the couch, his gaze resting on Thora's back as she stood facing the screen. She wore a white fitted blazer that lent her a different kind of cool compared to her usual uniform—lighter, sharper. Her hair had grown a bit longer, falling just past her shoulders, with a few loose strands clinging lazily to her cheeks. That boyish edge of hers was only getting more pronounced. "Word is his name's Badi. He's here to pitch a deal to the Ciphers." Darius offered with a smile. The words barely left his mouth before Luke's voice crackled through Thora's earpiece. "Boss, the guy's name is Badi Baker. He's a major pack Alpha from some small nation in southeastern Chaules. He doubles as a local tycoon. Nothing particularly impressive about him—doesn't even crack the top hundred on the Chaules wealth rankings. But his account activity over the past few months has been abnormal. No large wire transfers. Almost all manual deposits and withdrawals." Luke rattled off the intel at breakneck speed.Thora gave a flat acknowledgment, then turned back to Darius. "By all accounts, Dorian wouldn't bother meeting with someone like him." The way she saw it, Dorian's standards were sky-high. The gap in status between them was so vast there was no reason for him to lower himself to someone like Badi. "Sounds like someone knows him pretty well." Darius smiled, though it didn't quite reach his eyes—a trace of jealousy barely concealed beneath his tone. Thora shook her head. "Not really. Just the basics." Darius let it go, though a quiet bewilderment lingered at the back of his mind. Thora wasn't oblivious—far from it. Her observational skills were razor-sharp. She could read micro-expressions and emotional shifts with surgical precision, especially when profiling a target. But when it came to him, she was completely blind to every signal he put out. Unless he flat-out told her "I'm upset," she wouldn't catch on. "The amount of firearms Badi's trying to buy is way beyond what someone at his level could handle. On top of that, he specifically requested a sit-down with the head of the Ciphers," Darius said, his tone offhand. "If you ask me, the guy has no idea who he's dealing with. He thinks his money's enough to play in the same league as the Ciphers, and calling for Dorian by name is just his way of puffing up his chest, trying to prove he belongs. As for why Dorian agreed to the meeting ... probably just boredom." Thora furrowed her brow, her eyes fixed on the two men talking on the screen. It was obvious Dorian had Badi completely outclassed, his presence dominating the entire exchange. "He really does have a death wish," she said, then suddenly turned to face Darius. "What's your relationship with Dorian?" "We know each other—that's all," Darius answered casually. "I'm based back home most of the time, and the casino happens to be on Dorian's turf, so I asked him to keep an eye on it for me." Thora wasn't entirely satisfied with that answer, but she didn't press further.Just "knowing each other" didn't explain handing over an entire casino for someone else to use as their home base, or willingly fronting as the public owner of someone else's assets for that long. Unless someone deliberately went digging, no one would ever know the casino had a different name on the real deed. Was this just how things worked between Alpha businessmen? Maybe there was some kind of mutually beneficial arrangement buried underneath it all. Either way, Thora didn't bother pretending she understood. "So you're here this time for the counterfeiting investigation?" she asked. Darius looked at her, smiled, and gave a small nod. "Yeah ... more or less." He deliberately dragged out those last few words, lacing them with a teasing undertone that was easy to miss. "Has it hit your businesses hard?" Thora asked, her brow creased with concern. Darius didn't hesitate. "Hard? Devastating. If we hadn't caught it in time, our entire cash flow would've collapsed." There was a touch of exaggeration in his tone, but the core of what he said was true. With massive amounts of counterfeit cash flooding into the corporation, financial disruption was inevitable. The Skybound Group was already the largest corporation in the Astralis Empire and across all of eastern Chaules. Its subsidiaries had their fingers in virtually every industry on the continent. If its credibility collapsed, it wouldn't just mean the end of the corporation—it could destabilize the entire economy of eastern Chaules. For any business empire, that was both the cardinal sin and the killing blow rolled into one. "Luckily, we caught it early and partnered with the major banks to purge the counterfeits. We took a massive hit, but at least we stopped the bleeding." Darius delivered the second half with an easy lightness, as if writing off millions was just another Tuesday. "The people behind the counterfeiting ring—or at least their buyers—are targeting you specifically," Thora said, her voice low."The Skybound Group's never been short on enemies." Darius's smile carried a cold edge. "Especially those syndicates out in western Chaules—they've been gunning for the Blackwoods for a long time now." "But they should ask themselves if they've actually got what it takes." The first face that surfaced in Thora's mind was the man who had kidnapped Darius two years ago.