The Unwanted Ex-Wife Is A Genius Hacker

Alyse pushed open the heavy glass doors of Le Bernardin.

The biting cold wind of the Manhattan winter was instantly shut out, replaced by the warm, expensive scent of truffles and aged wine.

Four-year-old Nora tugged at the hem of Alyse's trench coat. The little girl looked around with wide eyes, her golden curls catching the light from the massive crystal chandeliers above.

"Shh," Alyse whispered, her tone gentle but firm.

Nora nodded obediently, her small hand gripping the fabric tighter.

The maitre d' stepped forward, his eyes scanning Alyse's simple coat. He opened his mouth, clearly preparing a polite refusal for walking in without a reservation.

Alyse didn't wait for him to speak. She reached into her pocket and slid a solid black private card across the polished reception desk.

The maitre d's expression shifted instantly. The polite dismissal vanished, replaced by a deep, practiced bow. He gestured toward the dining room with absolute reverence.

They were led to a secluded semi-private booth, shielded from the main dining area by frosted glass partitions.

Across the room, sitting in a plush leather booth, Zane Coulter aimlessly stirred his martini. His eyes drifted over the crowded room, bored by the usual Wall Street crowd.

Then, a familiar profile caught his attention.

Zane's hand jerked. The martini sloshed over the rim, the cold liquid spilling onto his custom-tailored suit.

He narrowed his eyes, leaning forward. The woman walking toward the back booth was wearing a simple coat, her aura freezing cold. It was Alyse Ellis. The same Alyse who had vanished five years ago.

His heart slammed against his ribs. Zane pulled his phone from his pocket, his hands shaking. He aimed the camera toward the semi-private booth and rapidly tapped the shutter button.

He forgot to turn off the flash.

A faint white light pulsed through the room.

Alyse stopped walking. Her head snapped toward the source of the light, her eyes narrowing into sharp slits.

Zane threw himself backward, pressing his spine hard against the leather sofa. His breath hitched in his throat. He waited a full ten seconds before exhaling, realizing she hadn't spotted him.

Alyse frowned. She scanned the dining room, finding nothing but wealthy patrons eating their seafood. Her face remained expressionless as she stepped into the blind spot of the booth, pulling Nora out of sight.

Zane opened the photo gallery on his phone and zoomed in.

His stomach dropped.

It wasn't just Alyse. Standing right beside her, holding her coat, was a little girl. She looked about four or five years old.

His fingers trembled as he selected Godfrey's contact. He attached the photo and typed out a message.

You are never going to believe who I just saw in New York.

He hit send.

High above Wall Street, inside the penthouse office of the Hammond Building, Godfrey stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows. The city lights reflected in his cold, empty eyes.

His phone buzzed against the mahogany desk, shattering the dead silence of the room.

His assistant, Alex, stood near the door, carefully watching his boss.

Godfrey turned away from the window. He walked to the desk, picked up the phone, and unlocked the screen.

His pupils contracted violently.

The woman in the photo was the woman he had hated for five years. The woman he had searched for until his sanity frayed. And she was sitting in a restaurant less than three miles away.

Godfrey's breathing turned ragged. His fingers gripped the edges of the phone so hard his knuckles turned completely white.

Then, his eyes dragged downward.

He saw the little blonde girl standing next to her.

A deafening roar exploded in his brain. It felt as if a sledgehammer had just smashed directly into his chest. His lungs stopped working.

The memory of that humiliating divorce agreement flashed behind his eyes. He saw Alyse standing in the courtroom, her face completely blank, admitting to her betrayal. The memory sliced through his nerves like a serrated blade.

Godfrey's arm shot out. He swept the heavy crystal paperweight off the desk.

It hit the floor with a violent crash, glass shattering across the expensive rug. Alex jumped backward, his face draining of color.

Godfrey dialed Zane's number. He ground his teeth together, his voice coming out as a terrifying, gravelly rasp.

"Where."

Zane swallowed hard on the other end of the line. He gave the name of the restaurant, his voice shaking as he mentioned the little girl.

Godfrey ended the call. He didn't say another word. He grabbed his dark wool coat from the sofa and marched toward his private elevator.

"Sir, the international board meeting-" Alex started, taking a step forward.

Godfrey shot him a look so lethal it nailed Alex to the floor. The assistant snapped his mouth shut.

The elevator doors slid closed. The polished metal reflected Godfrey's bloodshot eyes. The rage he had suffocated for five years was finally breaking free.

Back inside Le Bernardin, Nora poked at her dessert with a tiny silver fork.

"Mommy," she said, her voice soft and sweet. "When do we get to see Uncle Guthrie?"

Alyse smiled, her hand gently stroking her daughter's hair. But her eyes were fixed on the busy New York streets outside the window. Her gaze was as sharp as a scalpel.

Her phone vibrated on the table.

She glanced at the screen. A decrypted message appeared.

Target has received the signal. He is on his way.

A cold, calculated smile touched the corners of Alyse's mouth. She picked up her water glass and took a slow sip.

The revenge game, delayed for five long years, had officially begun.

The black Maybach tore through the congested streets of Manhattan.

The driver kept his eyes glued to the road, too terrified by the suffocating pressure radiating from the backseat to even breathe loudly.

Godfrey leaned his head against the leather headrest and squeezed his eyes shut. The freezing air of the Manhattan Family Court from five years ago seemed to fill the car, chilling his blood.

He heard the judge's gavel slam down. He saw Alyse standing at the defendant's table, her spine perfectly straight. There was no guilt in her eyes. Not a single ounce of regret.

Her lawyer had projected the photos onto the screen-Alyse walking into a hotel with an unidentified man.

Godfrey remembered the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. He remembered staring at her with bloodshot eyes, demanding to know why.

Alyse had looked at him with a calmness that made him want to rip the room apart. She told him she was sick of the fake, suffocating life of a billionaire's wife.

She had voluntarily given up hundreds of millions of dollars in alimony from the Hammond family, asking only for an immediate termination of the marriage. Her absolute ruthlessness had felt like a physical slap across his face.

The neon lights of the city flashed across Godfrey's rigid jawline, dragging him out of the nightmare and back into the speeding car.

His thumb unconsciously rubbed against his left cufflink. It was a habit he couldn't break. The silver cufflink was the last birthday gift Alyse had ever given him. He had never taken them off.

His phone vibrated again. It was Zane.

"She just paid the bill," Zane said, his words rushing out. "She's leaving."

Godfrey leaned forward. "Run the yellow," he ordered the driver.

The Maybach's engine roared, the sound mirroring the violent storm tearing through Godfrey's chest.

"Wait," Zane added, his voice dropping lower as he peered around the frosted glass. "I just saw her driver loading a garment bag into her SUV. It had the official crest of the Lee family's charity gala printed right on the front. And I overheard her tell the bodyguard to head straight to the Waldorf Astoria."

Godfrey's eyebrows snapped together.

The Waldorf Astoria was entirely booked tonight by the Lee family. It was the night of the matriarch Beatrice's annual charity gala.

His stomach tightened. Alyse showing up in New York tonight, at that specific hotel, was not a coincidence.

The ruthless business instincts that made him a billionaire snapped awake.

"Keep eyes on her," Godfrey commanded. He tapped the glass partition. "Change route. Head straight to the Waldorf."

He hung up the phone and stared down at the screen. He opened the photo Zane had sent. He zoomed in on the little blonde girl's face.

He stared at the shape of her nose, the curve of her eyes, desperately searching for traces of the man named Guthrie. The venom of jealousy chewed away at his insides, burning a hole in his stomach.

A few blocks away, Alyse held Nora's hand as they walked out of the restaurant. The freezing wind whipped the hem of her coat. She wrapped Nora tightly in her arms.

A sleek, unmarked black SUV pulled up to the curb. The driver, a heavily built bodyguard, stepped out and opened the rear door.

Alyse lifted Nora into the car seat. Before she climbed in, she threw a glance over her shoulder toward the booth where Zane had been hiding. A faint look of mockery flashed in her eyes.

She slid into the car, and it merged seamlessly into the traffic.

Alyse pulled a heavily encrypted phone from her bag. Before opening the schematics, she quickly tapped out a message to Guthrie, attaching a live GPS tracking link. 'Godfrey's hound spotted me. Might get messy later. Keep an eye on my location and stay on standby,' she typed, hitting send before switching apps. The screen illuminated her face, displaying the detailed security schematics of the Lee family's gala.

Her index finger tapped rhythmically against the edge of the phone. She typed a rapid string of code, bypassing the firewall and temporarily blinding the security cameras in a specific sector of the hotel's underground garage.

Nora hugged her stuffed rabbit, looking around the dark car.

"Mommy, are we going to a big party?"

Alyse looked at her daughter's innocent eyes through the rearview mirror. Her voice was incredibly soft.

"No, sweetie. We aren't going to a party. We're going on a hunt."

At a busy intersection, the black Maybach and the SUV passed each other.

In that split second, through the tinted glass, Godfrey caught the faint outline of a familiar profile.

He whipped his head around, his heart slamming violently against his ribs. But a massive city bus pulled forward, completely blocking his line of sight.

His lungs burned. He pounded his fist against the door panel.

"Drive faster!" Godfrey barked.

He had to intercept her before she walked into that ballroom. He had to grab her by the shoulders and demand the truth.

The grand architecture of the Waldorf Astoria finally loomed in the night sky. The entrance was swarming with paparazzi and New York's elite.

The driver expertly navigated the Maybach into the VIP lane, bypassing the chaos and stopping smoothly at the side entrance.

Godfrey shoved the door open. The freezing wind hit his face, cooling the feverish heat in his brain, but the dark obsession in his eyes only grew stronger.

He adjusted his suit jacket. His jaw was locked tight as he walked toward the heavy, ornate doors. He was about to rip open a five-year-old scandal.

Inside the grand ballroom of the Waldorf Astoria, the air was thick with the scent of expensive perfume and old money.

Crystal chandeliers cast a blinding, brilliant light over the crowd. A string quartet played a soft classical piece, perfectly masking the vicious undercurrents of the vanity fair.

Kendal stood in the center of the room, wearing a custom-made, starry-night gown. She was surrounded by a circle of Wall Street socialites, her smile flawless and practiced.

"To Kendal," an investment banker's wife said, raising her champagne flute with an overly sweet smile. "And to her upcoming marriage to the head of the Hammond family."

Kendal lowered her head, feigning shyness. She lifted her left hand just enough to let the light catch the massive pink diamond engagement ring on her ring finger.

Gasps of admiration rippled through the group.

Standing nearby, her mother Marlene lifted her chin. She soaked in the envy of the room, thrilled by the absolute power her daughter was about to secure.

Near the side entrance of the ballroom, Zane slipped through the heavy doors, panting heavily. His eyes darted frantically through the crowd.

He dodged a waiter carrying a tray of drinks and ducked behind a marble pillar. He pulled out his phone and sent a voice memo to Godfrey, keeping his voice to a harsh whisper.

"Her car is in the underground garage. The bodyguards just took the little girl up to a private suite."

Godfrey had just stepped through the side entrance when the audio message played against his ear.

His footsteps stopped instantly. The leather soles of his shoes screeched against the polished marble floor.

The little girl.

Those three words wrapped around Godfrey's throat like a vine covered in thorns, choking the air out of his lungs.

He leaned his back against the freezing wall. His brain ruthlessly calculated the timeline. Five years since the divorce. The kid was four or five. It was the ultimate, undeniable proof of her betrayal.

His hands began to shake uncontrollably. He thought the pain had gone numb years ago, but the agony tearing through his chest felt brand new.

Alex noticed his boss's pale face and stepped closer, his voice trembling. "Mr. Hammond... do you need to cancel the rest of the evening?"

Godfrey took a massive breath, forcing the blood back down from his head. When he opened his eyes, they were as cold and sharp as ice picks.

"No," he said, his voice completely hollow.

He straightened his spine and pushed open the heavy double doors leading into the main ballroom.

The moment the doors opened, the loud chatter in the room died down. Every pair of eyes locked onto the true king of New York.

Kendal's eyes lit up. She lifted the hem of her gown and walked toward Godfrey with the grace of a proud peacock, ready to claim her prize in front of the entire city.

But Godfrey's eyes didn't even flick in her direction. His gaze swept the massive room like a radar, searching every corner, every shadow.

Kendal reached him. She smiled brightly and reached out to loop her arm through his.

Godfrey shifted his weight and stepped to the side, completely dodging her touch.

The socialites watching from the sidelines saw everything. The whispers started instantly, spreading through the corners of the room like a virus.

Kendal's smile froze. A flash of pure humiliation and venom crossed her eyes, but she quickly forced her social mask back into place.

Suddenly, a piercing burst of static ripped through the ballroom's top-tier sound system.

The massive screen on the main stage, which had been playing a documentary about the Lee family's charity work, went completely black.

Everyone turned toward the stage. The string quartet stopped playing in shock.

The black screen flickered, and a bright green audio waveform appeared. The entire room fell into a bizarre, suffocating silence.

Then, a voice echoed through the speakers. It was a cold, steady female voice. A voice that made Godfrey's soul violently shudder.

"So, as long as I drink this, tomorrow's headlines will have the absolute proof of my affair. Right, Kendal?"

The recorded words dropped into the crowd like a live grenade.

Every single head in the room snapped toward Kendal. Her face drained of all color, turning a sickly, ashen white.

Kendal let out a piercing scream. She abandoned her elegant posture and sprinted toward the soundboard, desperately trying to rip the power cords out of the wall.

The hotel's head of security, alarmed by the sudden hijacking of their systems and the escalating chaos, rushed forward. He and another uniformed hotel guard stepped out of the shadows and blocked her path, their faces like stone, desperate to prevent a physical altercation on the main stage.

Up on the second-floor wraparound balcony, a slender figure in a minimalist black evening gown stepped into the spotlight.

Alyse looked down at the chaos below. Her eyes tracked through the crowd and locked perfectly onto Godfrey.

A cold, vengeful smile curved her lips.