Chapter 13 - The midnight alarm
Maya sat at the mahogany desk in the foundation’s private archives on the thirty-second floor of the Weston tower. The city skyline outside the panoramic windows was a sea of shimmering lights, but inside the office, the air felt suffocating. Garrett had insisted she review the historical distribution records of the foundation’s medical grants, wanting fresh eyes on the ledger before confronting the board of directors.
Every time Maya compared the procurement dates of patient supplies with Margaret’s hospitalization logs, a disturbing pattern emerged. The specialized sedatives had not entered the estate through Madison’s handbag. They were delivered under the guise of therapeutic supplements, shipped directly from a private pharmaceutical laboratory in Delaware, authorized under an account named "Project Beacon."
A sudden vibration on the desk startled her. Her phone screen lit up with an alert from the Weston estate’s perimeter security system. Garrett had granted her administrative access to Margaret’s suite monitor earlier that evening so she could observe the nurses' shift changes.
The camera feed for Margaret’s private wing showed nothing but static.
Maya stood up, her pulse racing. The primary hallway feed flickered, went black, and then flashed back on. In that split second of low-resolution footage, a tall silhouette dressed in surgical scrubs moved past the master bedroom door, holding a small digital lock bypass device.
She dialed Garrett’s direct private line immediately. The phone rang three times before connecting, but Garrett’s voice was drowned out by the roar of an engine.
"Maya? I am five minutes away from the downtown precinct with Marcus," Garrett said, his tone clipped. "Vance submitted fraudulent affidavits to the district attorney. We are filing an emergency stay."
"Garrett, turn around right now!" Maya’s voice cut through the background noise with desperate urgency. "Someone is inside your mother’s wing. The camera feeds were hacked two minutes ago. The security feed showed someone overriding the mechanical lock on Margaret’s room!"
A dead silence hung on Garrett’s end for a fraction of a second, followed by tires screeching violently against wet asphalt. "Marcus, turn the car around! Code Black at the main house!" Garrett barked into his radio before speaking back to Maya. "Maya, stay where you are. Do not leave the corporate tower. The estate is fortified; the backup generators should trigger the vault locks."
"The bypass tool was already on the door handle, Garrett!" Maya yelled, grabbing her coat and the physical hard drive containing the Project Beacon ledger. "Whoever is inside didn't break in. They had the primary security keycard!"
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She sprinted toward the executive elevator, pressing the call button repeatedly. Her hands shook, not with fear for herself, but with the terrifying memory of Margaret’s helpless, pleading eyes when she had been paralyzed in that garden chair.
If the intruder was inside that room right now, Margaret had no voice to scream for help.
