Chapter 81: The Nuclear Option

The drive back to the city was a quiet blur of exhaustion and unspoken plans. Ben drove with mechanical precision, his eyes fixed on the road, while Lucia tapped away on her phone, coordinating with Vance's contact. I sat in the passenger seat, staring at the crumpled ball of paper I had thrown at the lawyer's feet. It was still in my mind, a physical weight.

We didn't go back to the hospital. We didn't go to the rental house.

We went to Ben's workshop.

It was a converted garage in Queens, filled with tools, sawdust, and the smell of oil. It was a place of creation, of fixing things. But tonight, it felt like a war room.

"Vance is alive," Lucia said, looking up from her phone. "He's at the cabin. He found the trapdoor."

"Is he going down?" Ben asked, pulling a tarp off an old workbench.

"No," Lucia said. "He's waiting for us. He says he needs backup. The door... it's rigged."

"Of course it is," I said. "Edith never leaves a door unlocked."

I looked around the workshop.

"We need a journalist," I said. "Someone who can't be bought. Someone who hates the Sterlings as much as we do."

"I know a guy," Ben said. "An investigative reporter for the *Times*. He tried to expose the Trust five years ago. Edith sued him into oblivion. He lost his job, his house, his wife."

"Perfect," I said. "Call him."

Ben dialed a number. He put it on speaker.

"Yeah?" a voice rasped. It sounded like whiskey and cigarettes.

"Miller?" Ben asked. "It's Ben. The contractor."

"I don't need any work, Ben. I'm busy drinking."

"I have a story for you," Ben said. "About the Sterlings."

A pause. Then a dry laugh.

"The Sterlings are untouchable, kid. You know that."

"Not anymore," I said, leaning toward the phone. "Edith is dead. Martha is alive. And they've been farming babies for thirty years."

Silence.

"Who is this?" Miller asked, his voice sharp.

"Sarah Sterling," I said.

"The niece?"

"The daughter," I corrected. "The experiment."

I told him everything. The Hoard. The nursery. The mine. The babies. I told him about Leo. About Mark. About the fire.

"I have proof," I said. "Documents. Photos. DNA. And I have a recording."

"What recording?"

"An audio file," I lied. "Of Edith admitting everything. Before she died."

"Send it," Miller said.

"Not over the phone," I said. "Meet us."

"Where?"

"The cabin," I said. "In the Adirondacks."

"That's four hours away."

"You have three," I said. "If you're not there by dawn, the story dies with us."

I hung up.

"Do we have a recording?" Lucia asked.

"No," I said. "But we have something better."

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the flash drive I had taken from Vance's dead hand.

"We have the archives," I said. "Everything Vance kept. Every secret Edith paid him to hide."

"Is it encrypted?" Ben asked.

"Probably," I said. "But you can crack it, right?"

Ben looked at the drive. Then at his computer.

"It will take time," he said. "Time we don't have."

"Start it," I said. "Copy it. Upload it to the cloud. If we don't make it out of that mine... this goes public automatically."

Ben plugged the drive in. His fingers flew across the keyboard.

*Access Denied.*
*Password Required.*

"Damn it," Ben muttered.

"Try 'Legacy'," Lucia suggested.

*Access Denied.*

"Try 'Archibald'," I said.

*Access Denied.*

"One more try," Ben said. "And it locks us out."

I closed my eyes. I thought about Vance. About his loyalty. About the note he left.

*The leak isn't a hack. It's a person.*

The password wasn't a word. It was a name.

"Try 'Sarah'," I whispered.

Ben typed it in.

*Access Denied.*

My heart sank.

"Wait," Ben said. "Look at the hint."

A small text box appeared.

*The first mistake.*

I stared at the screen.

The first mistake.

Not me. Not Mark.

"Maria," I said. "Try 'Maria'."

Ben typed it.

*Access Granted.*

Files flooded the screen. Thousands of them. Scans. Videos. Audio logs.

"It's all here," Ben breathed. "The payments to the judges. The bribes to the medical board. The blueprints for the facility."

He clicked on an audio file dated 1988.

*Click.*

Edith's voice filled the garage.

*"He won't leave her, Vance. He loves her. I have to make him hate her."*

Vance's voice: *"Edith, framing her for infidelity is one thing. But institutionalizing her? She's your sister."*

*"She's an obstacle,"* Edith said. *"And she's pregnant. If that baby is born... I lose everything."*

*"So what do you want to do?"*

*"I want the baby,"* Edith said. *"And I want Clara gone."*

Silence.

Then, a new file. Dated 2024. Yesterday.

Martha's voice.

*"The boy is weak. He won't last the week."*

Edith: *"Then we harvest him. Now."*

*"And the others?"*

*"We wake them up,"* Edith said. *"It's time for a family reunion."*

I looked at Ben. He was pale.

"Upload it," I said. "All of it."

*Uploading... 1%...*

"We can't wait for it to finish," I said. "We have to go."

"I'll stay," Ben said. "I'll make sure it goes through."

"No," I said. "We need you. If that trapdoor is rigged..."

"I can set a remote access," Ben said. "I can monitor it from my phone. But I need to leave the server running here."

He looked at me.

"Sarah... if this goes out... the Sterling name is destroyed. The money. The assets. Everything."

"Good," I said.

I grabbed a crowbar from the wall.

"Let's go burn it down."