Chapter 4 - The Break-InWhen I arrived at ValeCore, the lobby looked like a battlefield.
Security glass glittered across the marble floor.
Two guards were being treated by paramedics.
The elevator panel had been ripped open.
Mara met me at the entrance.
"They knew exactly where to go."
"How?"
"That's what I'm trying to figure out."
We moved upstairs.
ValeCore's core servers were housed behind three biometric doors.
Fingerprints.
Retinal scan.
Voice recognition.
No ordinary thief could get through.
Yet the third door was open.
Inside, several server racks had been untouched.
One had been destroyed.
Not random damage.
Specific damage.
Someone had targeted one particular machine.
"The prototype node," I said.
Mara nodded.
"Everything else was left intact."
I stepped closer.
Our oldest server was cracked open.
The internal storage had been removed.
"Backup?"
"Safe."
"Cloud copy?"
"Safe."
She paused.
"But they didn't come for the current source code."
"Then what?"
Mara looked at me.
"The original."
I knew immediately what she meant.
The architecture I had built at fifteen.
The version nobody had.
The blueprint from which every later version had evolved.
"Why would anyone want that?"
Mara's voice dropped.
"Because whoever has it can rebuild the whole system."
I stared at the empty slot.
Then something caught the corner of my eye.
A piece of paper.
It was lying beneath the server.
I picked it up.
One handwritten sentence.
You should have stayed invisible.
My fingers tightened.
Mara read it.
"A threat?"
"No."
"What then?"
"A reminder."
"Of what?"
I looked at her.
"That they knew me before today."
My phone rang.
Bianca.
I almost ignored it.
Instead, I answered.
"Where are you?"
Her breathing was fast.
"Ava, Mom wants you to come home."
"No."
"Please."
"Bianca, someone broke into my company."
Silence.
Then:
"What?"
"You heard me."
"I didn't know."
"I didn't say you did."
She hesitated.
"You think we're involved."
"I think somebody used my family as cover."
"That's insane."
"Maybe."
"You've changed."
I laughed softly.
"No, Bianca. You just finally met me."
She went quiet.
Then she said something unexpected.
"Europe isn't happening."
I frowned.
"What?"
"The trip."
My eyes narrowed.
"Why?"
"Mom canceled it."
"When?"
"This afternoon."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
A pause.
Then Bianca whispered:
"Because somebody sent her the graduation video."
I looked at Mara.
"Everybody has the video."
"No."
Bianca's voice trembled.
"This one had something else."
"What?"
"A message."
"What message?"
She breathed in.
Then spoke.
"They said if Mom went to Europe, they'd expose what she did."
My chest tightened.
"What did she do?"
"I don't know."
"Bianca."
"I'm telling you the truth."
"Then why are you whispering?"
She didn't answer.
Instead, another voice came through the phone.
A man's voice.
Calm.
Close.
"Tell Ava the truth."
Bianca gasped.
The line went dead.
I stared at the phone.
Mara stepped closer.
"Who was that?"
"I don't know."
Then my screen lit up.
A new message.
A photograph of Bianca.
She was sitting at a restaurant table.
Across from her sat a man I recognized.
Victor Kane.
ValeCore's former chief financial officer.
He had resigned eight months ago.
Without explanation.
Under the photo was one sentence.
Your family isn't the target, Ava.
May you like
A second message appeared.
Your family is the key.
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