Chapter 5 - Into the Lion’s DenAt 2:14 AM, the mansion was buried in a heavy, unnatural silence.
Julian clicked the button on the frequency jammer.
Instantly, the faint hum of the hallway security monitors cutting through the wall panels died away. In the guard station down the hall, I heard muffled curses as the radios went dead and the guards scrambled to check their equipment.
“Go,” Julian whispered, his hand gripping my arm. “Ninety seconds, Clara. Move.”
I slipped out of the master suite into the dimly lit hallway. The crimson carpet muffled my footsteps as I sprinted toward Marcus’s private study at the far end of the west wing. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird.
One minute.
I reached the heavy mahogany double doors of the study. A digital keypad glowed softly on the doorframe.
My fingers flew across the buttons, punching in Julian’s mother’s birthdate: 0-4-1-2-7-5.
Click.
The heavy electronic lock disengaged. I shoved the door open and slipped inside, closing it silently behind me.
The study was vast, smelling of aged leather, expensive cigars, and old paper. Moonlight poured through the floor-to-ceiling gothic windows, illuminating a massive oak desk in the center of the room.
I rushed to the desk, pulling open the top drawer. Nothing. The second drawer—empty.
Thirty seconds.
Frantic, I ran my hands along the underside of the mahogany desktop until my fingers brushed against a small, magnetic compartment hidden beneath the sliding keyboard tray. I pulled it down.
Inside sat a small, titanium USB drive engraved with the Bennett family crest.
Ten seconds.
I snatched the drive, slammed the compartment shut, and turned toward the door just as the hallway lights flickered back on. The radio frequencies had reset. Outside in the corridor, heavy footsteps approached the study door.
“Check the west wing again! The master console glitched!” a guard’s gruff voice echoed right outside.
Panic surged. There was no time to slip back out into the hallway without walking straight into the guards.
I spotted a heavy velvet tapestry hanging over the side wall near the bookshelves. Without hesitating, I scrambled behind it, pressing my back flat against the cold plaster wall just as the study door swung open.
“Clear!” a guard announced, stepping into the room.
I held my breath, pressing my hand over my mouth to quiet the sound of my ragged breathing. Through a small gap in the velvet fabric, I watched the guard shine his flashlight across the desk, muttering to himself before turning around and walking out, slamming the door shut behind him.
I let out a shaky, silent breath, sliding out from behind the tapestry.
Ten minutes later, using a secondary service stairwell the guards rarely patrolled, I slipped back into Julian’s master suite and locked the door behind me.
Julian was waiting by the edge of the bed, his right leg braced against the floor, beads of sweat dripping down his forehead from the sheer physical effort of holding his own weight.
I rushed forward, holding out the titanium drive. “I got it.”
Julian let out a sharp sigh of relief, collapsing back onto the mattress with a heavy groan. He plugged the drive into his encrypted bedside terminal. Lines of green code cascaded down the monitor screen as the master files unlocked.
“We have everything,” Julian whispered, disbelief and triumph warring in his voice. “Marcus’s offshore accounts, the forged debt ledgers against your father, and the police dispatch records from the night of my car accident.”
Before we could celebrate, the red emergency indicator light on Julian’s bedside control panel began to flash violently.
An audio feed from the front gate intercom crackled to life, broadcasting a terrified voice straight into the room.
“Mr. Bennett! We have an emergency! Federal marshals and an armed tactical unit just breached the estate gates! They’re surrounding the mansion!”
Julian and I exchanged a look of pure shock.
Federal marshals? We hadn't called the police yet.
Then the bedroom door handle rattled violently.
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Marcus Bennett’s voice boomed from the hallway, dripping with frantic, cornered rage.
“Open the door, Julian! Or the boy dies right now!”
