Chapter 16 - THE GHOST IN THE ARCHIVES
The dust had barely settled on the baseball diamond following Nikolai Moretti’s arrest when Arthur brought a satellite-linked encrypted tablet into the study. The device had been recovered from Nikolai’s armored transport, its biometric locks bypass-cleared by federal technicians.
Luca stood by the grand window, looking down at the quiet lawn where Maya and Tommy were sitting under the oak tree. The physical pain in his legs was completely gone, replaced by a cold, sharp clarity.
"Boss," Arthur said softly, setting the tablet on the desk. "You need to see this. We ran a deep-level forensic audit on the original toxicology report—the one from Johns Hopkins that proved you were poisoned."
Luca turned around, his eyes narrowing. "What about it?"
"The lead pathologist listed on the report, Dr. Julian Vance... he didn't write it," Arthur revealed, his voice shaking slightly. "Dr. Vance died in a car accident in Munich four years before that report was generated. The digital signature was a synthetic forgery created using military-grade decryption software."
Luca walked slowly to the desk, staring at the glowing blue screen. "If the report was forged, then the neurotoxin..."
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"The neurotoxin found in your blood was real," Arthur interrupted, "but the document that revealed it to you wasn't sent by Johns Hopkins. It was injected into our secure server network from an internal IP address inside this very house three days before Maya ever stepped through the hedge."
Luca’s blood ran cold. The dominoes he thought he had been knocking down were part of a far more sinister game. Someone inside his own home had engineered the revelation of his paralysis, calculated his rage, and used him as a battering ram to execute Marcus, Senator Vance, and the European Iron Syndicate.
