Chapter 10 - Eleven Minutes
The agent shook his head. "It's queued through a third-party dead-man service. We're trying to suspend it."
Maya read the draft.
It accused me of using my father's hidden ownership to manipulate Vale Meridian. It attached forged signatures and a fake memo making the fraud look like a family conspiracy.
At the end was one line built to spread fast:
ELENA ARDEN BUILT THE MACHINE, THEN FRAMED HER HUSBAND WHEN HE REFUSED TO OBEY HER.
"He prepared a story people could repeat," Maya said.
Dad said, "We release everything first."
"No."
"If we dump evidence in panic, we look guilty. We need verification."
"You have eleven minutes."
"Then we use eleven minutes."
I pointed to the forged October ninth form. "Pull the metadata."
"Created at 9:42 a.m."
"At what device?"
"Vale Meridian executive tablet VM-CEO-02."
Maya's eyes widened. "Julian's tablet."
"Exactly. Now geolocate it."
The agent pulled security logs.
"Midtown headquarters."
I leaned forward despite the pain. "And where was I?"
"Lake house. Ninety-eight miles away," Dad's team confirmed.
"Good. Package that with the original server logs. One provable forgery is enough to poison the rest."
Maya smiled for the first time all morning. "There's my roommate."
The countdown hit four minutes.
Then Daniel's phone rang.
He listened.
"We have Selene."
I stood. "Alive?"
"Yes. She walked into a state police station forty miles from here. Bruised, scared, and asking for immunity."
"Put her on."
A minute later Selene's face appeared on a secure video call.
One eye was swollen. She looked at me and started crying. I felt nothing.
"Where is Julian?" I asked.
"I don't know."
"Then tell me how to stop the email."
She wiped her face. "Password to the dead-man service is SummerSaint88."
The agent typed.
ACCESS DENIED.
Selene stared at the screen. "He changed it."
Countdown: one minute.
Dad cursed.
Selene suddenly shouted, "Wait! He always adds the thing he wants most."
"What does he want most?" Maya asked.
Selene looked directly at me.
"Your inheritance."
I typed one word after the password.
ARDEN.
ACCESS GRANTED.
The timer stopped at nine seconds.
Then a second alert appeared.
May you like
MESSAGE 2 OF 2 - DELIVERY COMPLETE.
Maya whispered, "What second message?"
