Chapter 4 - THE HUNT BEGINS
For the next forty-eight hours, the world believed Sarah and Lily Miller were dead.
The local news was dominated by headlines of the tragic gas explosion in the peaceful suburbs of Oakridge. Photos of our charred house were broadcast across every network. The police released a statement saying two bodies—presumed to be a mother and child—were suspected to be buried under the rubble, pending forensic identification.
In a small, windowless basement beneath a mechanics shop in upstate New York, I watched the television screen with cold, detached eyes.
Marcus had provided us with clothes, food, and a secure environment. But more importantly, he had provided me with a laptop and a encrypted satellite connection.
"If you press this button, Sarah," Marcus warned, standing behind my chair as I stared at the screen, "there is no going back. The Sovereign Trust will know you're alive, and so will Derek. They will hunt you to the ends of the earth."
"Derek thinks he's sitting in Belize enjoying his freedom," I said, my fingers hovering over the keyboard. "He thinks he won the prize. He has no idea what my father actually taught me."
My father hadn't just been an engineer. He was a master systems architect. And before he died, he taught me how to read the data hidden behind the physical world.
The blue folder didn't just contain paper documents. Tucked inside the thick leather backing of the ledger was a micro-SD card—a master decryption key.
I plugged the card into Marcus's computer.
A black command terminal flared to life on the monitor, lines of green code cascading down the screen like a waterfall.
"What is that?" Marcus asked, leaning in, astonished.
"My father knew Derek was dirty," I revealed, a dark smile touching my lips. "He suspected him years ago, but he didn't have proof. So he planted a sleeper virus in my personal laptop—the same laptop Derek used whenever he accessed his 'business accounts' from our home Wi-Fi."
Every time Derek had logged into his offshore accounts, every time he had emailed his syndicate handlers, every transaction, every password, every bank routing number had been mirrored and encrypted onto this micro-card.
Derek hadn't just left behind a paper trail. He had handed me the keys to his entire financial empire.
"Look at this," I said, pointing to a flashing red node on the screen.
Account Name: NEXUS FINANCIAL HOLDINGS. Balance: $14,250,000. Location: First Private Bank of Zurich - Nassau Branch.
"Fourteen million dollars," Marcus whispered, breathless. "That's the syndicate's operational fund. Derek was managing it for them."
"And look at the recovery protocol," I added, clicking on a sub-menu. "The account requires two-factor biometrics to transfer funds. A facial scan... and a primary passkey."
"Which Derek has," Marcus said, deflating. "You can't access it."
"No," I said, pulling out the photo I had taken on my phone right before we fled the house—the photo of Derek's flight itinerary sitting beneath his coffee mug. "But I have his device ID, his flight path, and the master override code my father embedded into the virus."
I typed a rapid string of commands into the terminal.
The screen flashed yellow, then bright green.
ACCESS GRANTED. OVERRIDE CODE ACCEPTED.
"I'm not going to steal the money, Marcus," I said, turning to look at him with a look of pure, merciless malice. "I'm going to send it all back."
"Back to who?"
"To the syndicate," I declared. "Along with a message from Derek's account stating that he is keeping thirty percent as a 'consulting fee' and threatening to leak their master client list to the FBI if they follow him to Belize."
Marcus stared at me, a mixture of horror and profound respect washing over his face.
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"You're turning his own employers against him," Marcus breathed. "They'll think he betrayed them. They won't just want the money back... they'll tear him apart."
"He wanted an accident," I said quietly, hitting the ENTER key. "I'm giving him a war."
