In Singapore, there is a circle not everyone is allowed to enter. They call it The Ivory Circle.
Inside, family names are worth more than money, connections carry more weight than the law, and secrets are the most valuable currency of all.
Alexander...
By the time they found the body, the champagne was still cold.
The ballroom of the Ivory Circle had been emptied only hours earlier, its crystal chandeliers still burning above tables littered with half-finished glasses, abandoned auction paddles, and white roses beginning to brown at the edges. A million-dollar yacht had been pledged to charity. Three families had quietly agreed to a merger. Two marriages had been publicly celebrated while their respective spouses spent the evening entertaining other lovers behind closed doors. Someone had lost nearly half a million dollars at the private gaming tables and laughed as though it were pocket change. It had been, by every measure that mattered to the people who belonged there, a successful night.
Then, at 6:17 in the morning, the chairman of the Ivory Circle was found dead in his private study.
The door had been locked from the inside. There were no signs of forced entry. Nothing appeared to be missing.
And yet, somewhere between the final toast and the first scream, one thing had disappeared from the room: a file containing the names of five people who had been inside the club that night.
Five people who had spent their entire lives learning that money could solve almost every problem.
Alexander Wiratama was the first name on the list.
Ops! Esta imagem não segue nossas diretrizes de conteúdo. Para continuar a publicação, tente removê-la ou carregar outra.
At thirty-four, he was the heir to one of Southeast Asia's oldest shipping dynasties, a man whose family owned ports, logistics companies, private marinas, and enough ocean-going vessels to make entire governments answer his calls. Alexander had been raised to inherit everything except the freedom to choose his own life. His marriage was an arrangement between two powerful families, immaculate in photographs and empty behind closed doors. His wife had her own secrets, her own lovers, and her own reasons for staying. Alexander had never complained. Complaining was for people who believed life was supposed to be fair. He had learned early that a good marriage could be a contract, a friendship could be an alliance, and loyalty could be purchased as long as the price was high enough. What he had not learned was how to stop himself from wanting something he could not legitimately have.
Isabelle Chen was the second.
Ops! Esta imagem não segue nossas diretrizes de conteúdo. Para continuar a publicação, tente removê-la ou carregar outra.
