Chapter 531: A Disturbing Point

The last time they entered Ashley’s secret floor, they had been hunting Marshal Di Carpio.

Now, Marshal was dead.

Yet as Red and Khan’s crew followed Ashley into the darkness, none of them felt as though the danger had truly passed.

The lights switched on one after another, illuminating the vast room. Everything they had left behind remained untouched, including the evidence board covered with Marshal’s photographs, connections, and known locations.

Rum glanced around before scratching the back of his head.

"Boss," he began, "why exactly are we back here?"

Ashley stopped in the middle of the room and turned to face them.

"Because Memphis is still alive."

The group fell silent.

Rum blinked. "Is he?"

"I thought Black Dragon’s faction caught him," Rus remarked.

"They caught someone who looked like him," Ashley corrected. "Not Memphis himself."

That was the problem.

The information circulating in the underground had been confusing. Some reports claimed Memphis had been captured. Others insisted that the man Black Dragon had taken wasn’t Memphis at all.

No one knew which version to believe.

Ashley hadn’t spoken to her men about anything serious in the past few weeks. She had been occupied with the company, her parents, her marriage, and raising Primo. But after her conversation with Lucian—and with Liza and Tommy away—it was time to turn her attention to the threat they had left unresolved.

"Tank, clear the board," she ordered.

As always, Tank didn’t ask any questions. He approached the evidence board and began removing everything connected to Marshal.

Photographs, locations, names, and connections came down one after another.

Everything they had gathered while hunting Marshal disappeared until only a blank board remained.

Ashley watched in silence.

Marshal’s Chapter was over.

Memphis’s had only begun.

"As all of you know, what happened was orchestrated by two people," she began, raising two fingers. "Marshal proposed the plan, but he wasn’t the one who carried it out."

Red’s expression darkened. "Tinie," he said.

Ashley nodded.

The mere mention of the name was enough to change the atmosphere in the room.

Tinie had joined Dominion in the same batch as Red. He had excelled at practically everything, and only Red had ever been able to challenge him for the top spot in terms of strength.

More importantly, Tinie had been loyal.

Perhaps even the most loyal among them.

That was why his betrayal had shaken Dominion deeply. No one could understand how a man like him had turned his back on the organization and chosen to work for Memphis.

Unfortunately, Tinie had died before Lucian could interrogate him.

Whatever answers he carried had died with him.

"Tinie’s involvement tells us one thing," Ashley continued. "Memphis didn’t simply recruit people from the outside. He managed to turn someone from within Dominion—someone no one would have suspected."

Her gaze swept across the group. "If he did it once, he could have done it again."

No one spoke.

They didn’t need to.

The possibility alone was enough to place everyone on edge.

Ashley walked toward the cleared board and picked up a marker.

"As for the man Black Dragon captured, Lucian realized he wasn’t Memphis," she explained. "He was a proxy—someone prepared to take Memphis’s place if things ever went wrong."

She wrote one word in the center of the board.

MEMPHIS.

"He didn’t just find someone who resembled him. The proxy might have undergone surgery to make the deception more convincing."

Vodka crossed his arms. "That means he had been preparing his escape for a long time."

"Exactly." Ashley capped the marker. "People don’t create doubles unless they’re protecting something much bigger than themselves."

Or unless they knew powerful people would eventually come hunting for them.

Memphis had prepared for that possibility long before Marshal’s downfall.

That was what concerned her most.

He hadn’t merely escaped. He had expected them to come.

"If Lucian hadn’t noticed the deception, we would’ve believed Memphis was already in Black Dragon’s hands," Ashley continued. "We would’ve stopped looking for him and lowered our guard."

"And he could’ve come after us whenever he wanted," Red finished.

Ashley met his gaze. "He still can."

Silence settled over the room. They didn’t know where Memphis was, but Memphis knew where to find Dominion.

Ashley drew a slow breath, her eyes sharpening.

"I want us to find Memphis before he decides to come for us."

Khan narrowed his eyes at the board. "What does Black Dragon say?"

"He called for a board meeting," Ashley replied. "He plans to reveal what they know and observe everyone’s reaction. If Memphis has another person inside Dominion, that meeting might force them to make a move."

"Might," Nelek repeated.

"Might," Ashley confirmed. "We could get a lead, or we could walk away with nothing. I don’t want us sitting around and waiting to find out."

She turned back toward them.

"Lucian will handle the threat inside Dominion. We’ll start searching outside it."

The men exchanged glances.

For weeks, Memphis had remained at the back of their minds, overshadowed by Marshal’s downfall and everything that came afterward.

Now that Ashley had dragged his name back into the light, the danger suddenly felt much closer.

Khan exhaled sharply.

"So, what’s the plan?" he asked. "Where do we start?"

"That’s the problem," Red said. "We don’t have a lead. How are we supposed to find a man everyone believes is dead?"

Rum shrugged. "We could dig up his grave."

Everyone slowly turned toward him.

"What?" Rum spread his hands. "He supposedly died, didn’t he?"

"We already know the body wasn’t his," Red replied flatly.

"Then we dig it up and find out whose body it was."

A brief silence followed.

Vodka glanced at Red. "He has a point."

Rum’s face brightened, only for Red to comment,

"A disturbing point."

Rum’s smile disappeared. "Fuck you."

"War and I can look into it," Gin volunteered.

He pointed at himself, but his attention had already shifted elsewhere.

Several steps behind Ashley stood the secret floor’s computer system.

Gin’s eyes lit up, and he spoke excitedly, "We can use that."