Chapter 8 - Ten Minutes Before Every Secret Disappeared
Nine minutes and fifty-eight seconds.
Nicholas stared at the countdown.
“Stop it.”
The technician shook his head.
“I can't.”
“Why?”
“The archive isn't on our system.”
Gabriel leaned forward.
“Then where is it?”
“We're tracing.”
Nine minutes, forty seconds.
Sophie replayed her mother's recording in her mind.
Birthday.
Kindness.
Gabriel.
Someone had answered all three.
Vittorio knew her birthday.
He could have learned the second answer from Evelyn.
But the third?
Gabriel.
“How did Vittorio know my mother trusted Gabriel?”
Gabriel looked at her.
“He probably guessed.”
“No.”
Sophie shook her head.
“He spent fifteen years searching for this archive. He wouldn't risk triggering a deletion protocol on a guess.”
Nicholas looked at his brother.
“What are you saying?”
“Someone told him.”
Eight minutes, fifty seconds.
Marco entered.
“We traced the access.”
“Where?”
“St. Catherine's Hospital.”
Sophie froze.
“My mother died there.”
Nicholas immediately turned.
“Vehicle.”
They were moving within seconds.
St. Catherine's had closed seven years earlier.
The building stood abandoned on the west side, awaiting demolition.
Sophie stared through the SUV window.
“My mother spent her last six weeks there.”
Nicholas looked at her.
“Evelyn chose the archive location.”
Sophie understood.
“Somewhere Salvatore would never willingly enter.”
“A public hospital.”
Gabriel nodded.
“And after she got sick, she could access it without attracting attention.”
They arrived with six minutes remaining.
Marco's team entered first.
Power somehow still operated in part of the basement.
They found a locked records room.
Gabriel kicked the door open.
Inside were old server racks.
One was running.
Five minutes, thirty-two seconds.
A laptop sat on a desk.
Nicholas looked at the screen.
Deletion progress: 46%.
“Can we stop it?”
Marco's technician connected equipment.
“Trying.”
Sophie walked around the room.
Her mother had been here.
Perhaps while dying.
Perhaps knowing Sophie would someday discover everything.
That thought hurt in ways she could not describe.
Then she noticed a photograph taped beneath the desk.
She pulled it free.
Her mother.
Gabriel.
And Isabella.
Sophie turned.
“You were all working together.”
Gabriel looked at the photograph.
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because there are things about your mother you deserved to hear from her.”
“She isn't here.”
“I know.”
“Then tell me.”
Gabriel exhaled.
“Evelyn wasn't poisoned by Vittorio.”
Sophie went still.
“What?”
Nicholas turned.
“Gabriel.”
“You knew?”
Nicholas's voice sharpened.
“No.”
Gabriel looked at Sophie.
“She was sick.”
“Cancer?”
“Yes.”
“Then Vittorio lied.”
“Partly.”
Sophie frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“Evelyn had cancer. But during treatment, Vittorio discovered where she was.”
Sophie's stomach tightened.
“He found her?”
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
Gabriel looked away.
“He threatened you.”
Sophie closed her eyes.
“He told her if she released the archive, he'd kill you.”
“So she didn't.”
“No.”
“And then?”
“She changed the access protocol so only you could release it later.”
Sophie looked at the countdown.
Four minutes.
“Why is someone deleting it?”
“Because the archive is evidence.”
Nicholas stared at Gabriel.
“And because someone doesn't want Sophie to see what's inside.”
The technician spoke.
“I found the connection.”
“Can you stop it?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe isn't useful.”
“Nicholas,” Sophie said.
He looked at her.
“Let him work.”
Three minutes, forty seconds.
Sophie examined the room.
Old files.
Medical boxes.
A bulletin board.
Then she saw handwriting on the wall behind a shelf.
She moved it.
Three words.
TRUTH NEEDS WITNESSES.
Below it was a USB port.
Sophie stared.
“Guys.”
The technician came over.
“Offline backup.”
Nicholas looked at Sophie.
“Can we copy it?”
“Probably.”
They connected a drive.
The screen requested one final password.
Not one of the three questions.
A phrase.
Sophie stared.
Hint: The ending you already know.
Her breath caught.
Nicholas saw it too.
“The book.”
“The mystery novel.”
“What ending?”
Sophie tried to remember.
She had read it three times.
The murderer was the victim's brother.
But that seemed too obvious.
She typed the brother.
Incorrect.
Two attempts remaining.
Two minutes.
Nicholas stood behind her.
“What did you tell me at jury duty?”
Sophie thought.
She had said she hated the novel.
He had asked why she kept reading it.
Because I know how it ends.
Her mother's hint used almost the same words.
The ending you already know.
Sophie opened the first-edition copy Nicholas had brought from the house.
She flipped to the final page.
The last sentence read:
Some truths survive because someone chooses to remember them.
Sophie typed:
REMEMBER
ACCESS GRANTED.
The backup began copying.
Nicholas looked at her.
“You remembered.”
She glanced at him.
“So did you.”
The countdown reached one minute.
Copy progress: 68%.
“Come on.”
78%.
Deletion: 91%.
Copy: 84%.
Thirty seconds.
Sophie gripped the desk.
Copy: 92%.
Deletion: 96%.
Ten seconds.
97%.
98%.
99%.
The main archive disappeared.
The screen went black.
Sophie stared.
Then the backup window flashed.
COPY COMPLETE.
Everyone exhaled.
Nicholas almost smiled.
Then the lights came on.
Bright.
Every fluorescent bulb in the basement illuminated at once.
A slow clap came from the doorway.
Vittorio.
He stood surrounded by armed men.
“Evelyn always did underestimate how predictable love makes people.”
Nicholas moved in front of Sophie.
Vittorio smiled.
“Give me the drive.”
“No.”
“Then we repeat history.”
Gabriel stepped forward.
“You've lost.”
“Have I?”
Vittorio held up a phone.
On screen was live video.
Isabella.
Back at Falcone House.
A man stood behind her.
Gun against her head.
Nicholas's expression changed.
Vittorio smiled.
“Your mother for the drive.”
Sophie whispered, “How did they get inside?”
Marco looked sick.
“There must be another traitor.”
Vittorio laughed.
“There is always another traitor.”
Nicholas held out his hand.
“Sophie.”
She knew what he wanted.
The drive.
She gave it to him.
Gabriel grabbed his arm.
“No.”
Nicholas looked at him.
“Mother.”
“If you give him that, everyone Evelyn tried to protect—”
“Mother.”
One word.
Final.
Gabriel released him.
Nicholas tossed the drive across the room.
Vittorio caught it.
“Good boy.”
Sophie watched him.
Something about Nicholas's expression caught her attention.
Too calm.
Vittorio turned toward the door.
Nicholas said, “You should check it.”
Vittorio stopped.
“What?”
“The drive.”
Vittorio looked at it.
Nicholas smiled faintly.
“You've waited fifteen years.”
Vittorio inserted it into his laptop.
The screen flashed.
Then every light went out again.
Vittorio cursed.
Nicholas grabbed Sophie.
Gunfire erupted.
Marco's team attacked.
Gabriel tackled one of Vittorio's men.
Sophie crouched behind a server rack.
Nicholas had planned this.
Of course he had.
Seconds later emergency lights returned.
Vittorio was gone.
Again.
But his laptop remained.
Marco checked it.
Then laughed.
Nicholas looked at him.
“What?”
“The drive wasn't the archive.”
Sophie stared.
Nicholas reached inside his jacket.
He removed another drive.
“You switched them?”
“When you were yelling at the computer.”
Sophie stared.
“You pickpocketed me?”
“I prefer strategic redistribution.”
“You're unbelievable.”
“You like me.”
“This is not the time.”
Gabriel laughed from across the room.
Then Marco's smile disappeared.
“What?”
Nicholas asked.
“The fake drive had a tracker.”
“Yes.”
“It connected before Vittorio removed it.”
“Where is he?”
Marco stared at the map.
“He isn't running.”
“Then where?”
Marco enlarged the location.
Sophie recognized it first.
Her apartment building.
Nicholas turned toward her.
“Why would he go there?”
Sophie suddenly remembered something.
Her mother's belongings.
A box she had never opened because it contained personal letters.
She had kept it beneath her bed.
“My apartment.”
Nicholas's face changed.
“What?”
“There are letters.”
“From whom?”
“I don't know.”
“I never read them.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“Evelyn kept letters?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“A dozen, maybe.”
Gabriel's expression became alarmed.
“Sophie, did any have red envelopes?”
She thought.
“One.”
Nicholas looked at Gabriel.
“What is it?”
Gabriel grabbed his coat.
“The ledger isn't Vittorio's greatest threat.”
“Then what is?”
Gabriel headed for the door.
“Evelyn wrote a confession.”
Sophie followed.
“About what?”
Gabriel looked back.
“About who actually ordered Salvatore Falcone's murder.”
Nicholas stopped.
His father had supposedly died from a heart attack.
The room became silent.
Gabriel's voice dropped.
“Salvatore didn't die naturally.”
Nicholas stared at him.
“Who killed him?”
May you like
Gabriel looked at Sophie.
“Evelyn did.”
