Chapter 9 - The Accountant’s LedgerOne month later, I was sitting at a mahogany desk in the estate’s private library, struggling to pronounce words in French with my new tutor, when the heavy oak doors burst open.
Agent Marcus Vance strode into the room, looking grim, holding a thick manila folder. He didn't even wait for the tutor to leave before he spoke.
“Arthur. Evelyn. We have a major problem.”
My grandfather stepped out of the adjoining reading room, leaning on his cane. “What is it, Marcus? Did Victor appeal?”
“Worse,” Marcus said, tossing the folder onto the table. It slid across the mahogany, stopping right beside my French textbook. “We found Richard Cross—Victor’s personal accountant. Or rather, the Coast Guard pulled his body out of the East River this morning.”
Evelyn gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth. “Good God…”
“It wasn't suicide,” Marcus continued, his voice dropping. “And it wasn't just a random drowning. Before he died, Cross managed to upload an encrypted dead-man’s switch to an external server. It decrypted automatically an hour ago.”
He opened the folder, revealing a series of financial transfer logs and scanned letters.
“Victor didn't steal the Whitmore fortune just to buy yachts and real estate,” Marcus explained, tapping a finger on a corporate diagram. “He was funding something much larger. A hostile takeover of the entire energy grid across the tri-state area, backed by foreign offshore syndicates.”
My grandfather’s face turned the color of ash. He stared down at the documents, his knuckles turning white as he gripped his cane. “If those syndicates activate that grid takeover… they can shut down every hospital, water treatment plant, and security system in New York simultaneously.”
“And when is it scheduled to activate?” Evelyn asked, her voice trembling for the first time.
Marcus looked up, locking eyes with them both. “Tonight at midnight. And according to the server logs, there’s only one physical override terminal capable of stopping the sequence.”
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“Where?” my grandfather demanded.
“The abandoned subway station beneath the old Waldorf hotel,” Marcus said grimly. “Where the charity gala was held.”
