The Narrow Escape

The yellow sticky note blurs through the lens of my phone. *Paid Chief 50k to alter suspect description.* I tap the screen, capturing the analog receipt of my husband’s lifelong imprisonment. It’s the final piece of the puzzle, the undeniable proof of Eleanor’s original sin.

I slide the phone into my pocket. My hands are slick with sweat as I stack the coroner’s report and the fire investigator’s notes back into the thick manila folder. I loop the faded red ribbon around the cardboard, my fingers fumbling with the frayed edges of the knot. I shove it back onto the bottom shelf, right next to the stack of forged passports.

Footsteps in the hallway.

Not the hurried, rubber-soled squeak of Toby the tech guy. These are measured, heavy. Leather soles on hardwood. They stop right outside the study door.

I grab the heavy steel door of the safe and heave it shut. The locking mechanism engages with a motorized whir that sounds deafening in the quiet room. I grab the gilded edge of Arthur Vance’s portrait and yank it across the wall. The canvas slides along its track, but in my panic, I don't push it hard enough. It stops a half-inch short of the molding, leaving the edge of the keypad exposed.

The brass doorknob begins to turn.

I dive.

The space beneath Eleanor’s massive mahogany desk is a claustrophobic cavern of power strips and thick Ethernet cables. I hit the floor, my knees cracking painfully against the polished wood, and grab the nearest blinking black box.

The study door swings open.

"Eleanor requested the 1998 donor files," Marcus’s voice mutters, likely to someone on his Bluetooth earpiece. "I’m grabbing them now. Just keep her away from the microphone until I get back."

I hold my breath, staring at the perfectly shined toes of his oxfords as they step onto the Persian rug. He walks toward the desk.

I yank a blue Ethernet cable loose.

"What the hell?" Marcus snaps, stopping short.

I scramble backward, emerging from beneath the mahogany overhang, holding the router and the blue cable like a lifeline. I force my face to flush with manufactured embarrassment, projecting the flustered, overwhelmed housewife he expects me to be.

"Marcus," I say, panting slightly, pressing a hand to my chest. "You scared me."

He stares down at me, his phone still in his hand—the same phone my cloner payload is currently stripping bare. But right now, in the physical world, he is a towering, immediate threat.

"Clara. What are you doing under my mother's desk?" His voice is a low, dangerous purr.

"The presentation," I say, waving the blue cable. "Toby lost the connection to the main ballroom screens. He thought the primary router in the study might need a hard reset. I volunteered to do it so he wouldn't have to face Eleanor's wrath. He was nearly in tears."

Marcus doesn't smile. He doesn't offer to help me up. He just watches me, his analytical mind processing the variables. A bead of sweat rolls down my spine, cold against my silk slip. The luncheon hums dimly through the walls, a world away from the trap I’m currently sitting in.

"A hard reset," he repeats, his tone dripping with skepticism.

"Yes. It should be back up in thirty seconds." I stand, brushing dust from the knees of my black dress. I keep my body intentionally angled away from the portrait of Arthur Vance, trying to block his line of sight to the wall.

Marcus takes a slow step into the room. He looks at the router in my hand, then back to my face. For a terrifying second, I think he’s going to ask me to explain the exact network topology, to call my bluff.

Instead, his gaze shifts past my shoulder.

Marcus stared at her, his eyes drifting to the dust disturbed on the safe's keypad.