The Second Copy
Chapter 08 - The Second Copy
Claire had no idea what Eleanor meant.
The flash drive from the blue salon contained financial records, but specialists had recovered only a fraction before the encryption locked them out. Eleanor explained that she had created a second copy of the Northstar evidence and hidden it somewhere Adrian would never search.
“Where?” Claire asked.
Eleanor looked toward June.
“The nursery.”
Years earlier, after June’s daughter died, Eleanor had created a trust for Lily’s education. Adrian considered the nursery sentimental and useless. Eleanor had hidden a small server inside an antique music box, protected by a password only Lily could solve.
The password was the lullaby June sang to her.
Morales sent state agents to retrieve it, but a fire alarm sounded at the estate before they arrived. Smoke poured from the nursery wing. Adrian’s private guards claimed an electrical fault had started behind the walls.
Claire knew better.
She, June, and Morales reached the estate as firefighters entered. Adrian stood on the lawn, appearing devastated for the cameras.
“My mother’s family home,” he said. “First Claire steals from us, and now this.”
Lily pulled away from June and ran toward the side garden.
“The music box isn’t inside,” she said. “Mrs. Whitmore let me play with it last week. I hid it in my fort.”
Her fort was an old gardener’s shed covered with ivy. Inside, beneath a blanket and a collection of painted stones, sat the music box.
The server was intact.
Adrian saw Morales carrying it across the lawn. His expression changed from grief to calculation. He quietly moved toward his car, but state officers blocked the driveway.
They could question him, not yet arrest him. The evidence still had to be authenticated.
At the hospital, Eleanor signed a statement describing the argument, the missing medication, and the wire across the stair. She had seen Miles fastening it earlier but assumed he was repairing decorations. When Adrian confronted her, she tried to step around him, caught her heel, and fell.
She had not seen Adrian place the wire.
The case still depended on proving conspiracy.
The music box server opened with Lily’s lullaby. It contained emails between Adrian, Miles, and Chief Pike, along with payment records from Northstar accounts. One email was dated two days before the gala.
MAKE SURE SHE FALLS BEFORE 9:30. CLAIRE WILL BE THERE.
The sender was Adrian.
The board vote was scheduled for noon.
Morales requested arrest warrants, but Pike used his remaining influence to delay approval.
Claire looked at the clock. They had less than three hours.
May you like
Eleanor could not leave the hospital.
So she gave Claire her voting proxy and said, “Go back to the house where they tried to silence you. This time, make them listen.”
