Chapter 5 - Operation Archive
The drive to Evelyn’s sprawling estate on the outskirts of the city felt like a journey back into a childhood built on glass and surveillance. The wrought-iron gates loomed under the overcast sky, looking more like a fortress than a home.
Following our plan, Rachel had invited Evelyn out to lunch under the pretense of “clearing the air,” ensuring my mother would be away from the property for at least two hours.
I pulled my car into the shaded side service driveway, slipping out quietly while keeping an eye out for security cameras. The exterior lens blinked red, but I knew the blind spot near the rear utility entrance. Pressing my thumb against the biometric pad of the side door, the green light flashed almost instantly.
Access granted.
I slipped inside, the familiar scent of expensive potpourri and polished mahogany washing over me. The house was dead silent. I moved quickly through the service hallway toward the grand study on the second floor.
The door to the study was unlocked. Evelyn always underestimated the risk of intrusion inside her own domain, secure in the belief that everyone feared her too much to cross her thresholds.
I sat down at her custom walnut executive desk and woke up the high-end desktop workstation. It requested a password. I typed in the alphanumeric combination based on her favorite classical composer and the year her mother passed away—a predictable pattern she had used for decades.
The desktop loaded.
I plugged my encrypted flash drive into the USB port and opened the local storage directories. I didn't just look for recent files; I searched deep into her encrypted archives under legal and personal folders.
It didn't take long to find what we needed. A folder labeled Project Heir was sitting right on the root directory.
My stomach churned as I opened it. Inside were subfolders dating back over a year, neatly organized by date. There were audio recordings of phone conversations between Evelyn and me, recorded without my consent using an automated call-log interceptor she had installed on my phone during an old network upgrade. There were transcripts of our private arguments, heavily edited to remove context where I defended Hannah.
And then, I found the legal correspondence.
She had already been in contact with a high-profile family law attorney specializing in emergency grandparental custody interventions. Attached was an email thread where her lawyer advised her that while David’s texts were a good start, they needed a “catalyst event” demonstrating public incompetence to fast-track a temporary injunction.
The garden party was the catalyst she had engineered.
I copied the entire directory onto my flash drive, along with the audio files and email logs. The progress bar crept forward agonizingly slow. 45%... 70%... 95%... Complete.
Suddenly, a chime echoed through the study.
The front gate security log flashed a notification on the screen: Vehicle departure override detected. Return anticipated in 15 minutes.
Evelyn was coming back early. Lunch had been cut short.
I yanked the flash drive from the port, locked the workstation, and stood up just as I heard the front double doors open downstairs.
May you like
“David?” Evelyn’s sharp voice echoed up the grand staircase. “Is someone here? The security system registered an internal relay ping.”
Panic spiked through my veins. I didn't have time to use the stairs. I darted toward the French doors leading to the second-floor balcony, slipping outside just as the study door handle began to turn.
