Chapter 7 – THE FINAL PLAY

The mansion went into immediate lockdown.

Steel shutters descended over the windows. Dozens of armed men flooded the perimeter.

Luca paced the library, his jaw tight, his phone pressed to his ear.

“Find her,” Luca growled into the receiver. “Tear the city apart. Do not let her get to an airport.”

He hung up and threw the phone onto the leather sofa.

“She has nothing left,” Giovanni said, pacing nervously near the fireplace. “Her brother is disgraced. Her inheritance is gone. Why would she run? Why not surrender and take a plea deal?”

“Because Vanessa doesn’t lose,” I said quietly from the corner of the room.

I was sitting in a leather armchair, holding a fresh ice pack against my bandaged shoulder. Grace and Sophie were safely locked in the master suite upstairs, guarded by four of Luca’s best men.

Luca looked at me. “What is she after, Emily?”

“Revenge,” I said simply. “She’s lost the Foundation. She’s lost you. She’s lost her freedom. The only thing she has left is to make sure you lose, too.”

Luca closed his eyes. “She’s going after Sophie.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “She knows Sophie is heavily guarded here. She’s going after the one thing she can easily destroy before she disappears.”

Giovanni frowned. “What?”

I looked at the mahogany desk in the center of the library.

“The proof,” I said.

I stood up and walked over to the desk. “She needs to destroy the evidence of her embezzlement from the Foundation. If those ledgers make it to the FBI, they won’t just arrest her. They’ll freeze every hidden offshore account her family has. She won’t have a penny to run with.”

Luca’s eyes widened. “The Foundation’s main server. It’s in the downtown office building.”

He grabbed his keys off the table.

“Giovanni, stay here with Emily and Grace. Lock this room from the inside.”

“Wait!” I called out as he reached the door.

Luca turned back.

“Take me with you,” I said.

Luca shook his head immediately. “Absolutely not. You’ve done enough tonight, Emily. You’re hurt.”

“I know the building,” I argued, grabbing my coat. “I used to clean the Foundation offices on weekends. I have the master override codes for the security doors. If she’s locked down the server room, your men won’t be able to get in before she wipes the drives.”

Luca stared at me. He hated the idea. But he knew I was right.

“Stay behind me the entire time,” Luca ordered. “Understood?”

“Understood.”

Fifteen minutes later, Luca’s armored SUV screeched to a halt outside the towering glass skyscraper in downtown Chicago.

The building was completely dark. The power had been cut.

“She’s inside,” Luca said, pulling a flashlight and his pistol from the glove compartment.

Four guards flanked us as we entered the lobby. The glass doors had been shattered.

“Server room is on the fortieth floor,” I whispered. “Elevators are dead. We have to take the stairs.”

We climbed the dark, echoing stairwell in absolute silence. My shoulder throbbed with every step, but I didn’t stop.

When we reached the fortieth floor, the heavy steel fire door was chained shut from the inside.

“Stand back,” Luca said to me.

He aimed his pistol at the heavy padlock and fired twice. The lock shattered.

He kicked the door open and we spilled into the hallway.

At the far end of the corridor, a single emergency light illuminated the glass walls of the server room.

Inside, standing at a computer terminal, was Vanessa.

She was typing furiously, her red dress torn, her hair wild.

“Vanessa!” Luca shouted, striding down the hallway.

She jumped, spinning around. When she saw Luca, she smiled a twisted, manic smile.

“Too late, Luca!” she yelled through the glass. “Transfer complete!”

She slammed her hand against a large red button on the wall.

Instantly, the server racks behind her sparked and caught fire. She had triggered the emergency incendiary protocol. The digital records were burning.

Luca rushed the glass door, but it was magnetically sealed.

“The override code!” Luca yelled at me.

I ran to the keypad on the wall and punched in the six-digit cleaning code.

A green light flashed. The magnetic seal released.

Luca tore the door open, ignoring the smoke filling the room. He grabbed Vanessa by the arm and dragged her out into the hallway.

“It’s gone!” Vanessa laughed hysterically, coughing from the smoke. “The ledgers are gone! You have nothing on me!”

Luca threw her to the floor. “You’re finished, Vanessa. The police are on their way.”

“For what?” she sneered, looking up at him. “A fire in my own building? You have no financial proof. Without it, the murder charge is just hearsay from a disgraced politician. I’ll be out on bail by morning.”

She looked at me and spat on the floor. “You lose, little maid.”

I looked down at her.

Then I reached into my coat pocket.

And pulled out a small, black USB drive.

Vanessa’s laughter died in her throat.

“What is that?” she whispered.

“This,” I said calmly, “is a backup drive. I used to clean the IT manager’s office. He was paranoid about server crashes. He made me plug this into the mainframe every Friday night to copy the weekly ledgers.”

I tossed the drive to Luca. He caught it effortlessly.

Vanessa stared at the little piece of plastic, her eyes wide with absolute horror.

“No,” she breathed.

“You burned the servers,” I said. “But you forgot about the maid who empties the trash.”

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