Chapter 5 - THE CHILD IN THE WINDOW
The man standing beside the child was Marcus Vale.
NexusCore’s chief financial officer.
Marcus had joined the company during our second year.
He was brilliant with numbers.
Quiet.
Cautious.
The kind of man who checked every decimal twice.
I had trusted him.
Matthew claimed Marcus had resigned six months earlier to care for a sick parent in Seattle.
The board had accepted the explanation.
Apparently, Marcus had never left New York.
Detective Ortiz enlarged the photograph.
The date printed in the corner was nine days earlier.
“Are you certain that is him?”
“Yes.”
My father studied the image.
“Why would your former chief financial officer be inside Lauren’s house?”
“I don’t know.”
I looked at the boy.
He appeared to be around three years old.
The same age as the blue sock suggested.
“Is Matthew the father?”
My mother asked carefully.
“I don’t know.”
Ortiz folded her arms.
“Lauren Thorne has no child listed in public records.”
“Then perhaps the boy is Marcus’s.”
My father moved toward the window.
“Or the child does not officially exist.”
The words chilled me.
NexusCore’s software handled identity verification for banks, hospitals, and government contractors.
Creating a false identity would not be difficult for someone with internal access.
It would be criminal.
But not difficult.
Henderson entered the hospital room before dawn.
He carried a gray metal case.
“The officers reached the old Queens office.”
My pulse quickened.
“Was the safe still there?”
“Yes.”
“Did they open it?”
“It had already been emptied.”
I closed my eyes.
Matthew had reached it first.
Henderson set the metal case on the table.
“But they found this beneath the floorboards.”
Inside were three water-damaged notebooks.
The covers were stained.
The corners had been chewed by time.
My handwriting filled every page.
Equations.
System diagrams.
Early code structures.
Meeting notes.
On the final page of the third notebook was a signed statement.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
The original Nexus predictive architecture had been assigned to the Sterling Innovation Trust.
The transfer could only be revoked with the written consent of both Clare Sterling and Jonathan Sterling.
My father looked at me.
“I never signed a revocation.”
“Neither did I.”
Henderson removed another document.
It was a copy of the first licensing agreement.
NexusCore had permission to use my technology only while I remained a company officer or voluntarily approved a permanent transfer.
Matthew had removed my name from the company website.
He had told reporters I was never involved.
But legally, he had never removed me as an officer.
He could not.
Doing so might have terminated the company’s right to use the system that powered nearly every product it sold.
My father exhaled slowly.
“He built the empire on technology he does not own.”
“No.”
I touched the notebook.
“We built it.”
A nurse entered and told everyone I needed rest.
No one moved.
Detective Ortiz’s phone rang.
She listened for several seconds.
Then she looked at us.
“The trace on Lauren’s call failed.”
My father’s eyes narrowed.
“How?”
“She was using an encrypted NexusCore communication channel.”
“That means she has company access.”
“Or someone gave it to her.”
The detective placed her phone on the table.
“We also checked the Southampton address.”
“And?”
“The house is empty.”
“The child?”
“Gone.”
“Marcus?”
“Gone.”
I looked again at the photograph.
The toy airplane in the child’s hands had the NexusCore logo printed across one wing.
It had been a promotional gift created for one event only.
The company’s private retreat three years earlier.
Families had not been invited.
Unless Matthew had been hiding one there.
Henderson closed the metal case.
“There is one more development.”
My father turned.
“At 4:12 this morning, someone attempted to enter the Grand Central storage vault using forged federal credentials.”
“Matthew?”
“No.”
Henderson placed a security image beside Lauren’s photograph.
The woman in the image wore a dark coat and sunglasses.
But I recognized her face.
It was Rebecca Hayes.
May you like
Matthew’s mother.
And she was carrying the antique key Lauren had supposedly sent to me.
