For three hours, a stranger kept brushing my leg on the bus while I traveled with my son to visit my seriously ill father-in-law. Just before getting off, he slipped me a handkerchief and whispered, “Pretend you're feeling dizzy, and don't sign anything.” I stayed silent, but when I arrived, I found a will and realized who wanted to take everything from us.

We emerged into the grand foyer of Lawson Manor. The house was in utter chaos. Emergency lights flashed red across the high ceilings, and security guards were running back and forth, trying to secure exits and load boxes of paper documents into burn bags.

Christian’s corporate empire was undergoing an immediate, panicked liquidation.

"There they are!" a guard shouted near the grand staircase.

Vance fired two warning shots into the ornate plaster ceiling above, sending down a rain of dust and causing the guards to scatter for cover. "Move, Jennifer! To the third-floor office!"

We sprinted up the grand staircase, stepping over overturned furniture and dropped files. Every window we passed showed the flashing blue and red lights of approaching emergency vehicles in the distance—not local police, but the State Highway Patrol and Federal Marshals, likely alerted by the automated distress calls Vance's team had triggered thirty minutes earlier.

Christian knew time had run out.

We reached the heavy oak doors of Walter’s third-floor master office. The door was unlocked, hanging slightly open.

Inside, the room was ablaze.

Christian was standing near the grand marble fireplace, desperately dumping armfuls of paper files into the roaring flames. A large gasoline canister sat open on the Persian rug beside him. The main server rack in the corner of the office was smoking, its digital status lights flashing frantic red warnings as Christian attempted to wipe the internal hard drives with an industrial degaussing wand.

"Stop!" I yelled, stepping into the room with Vance right beside me.

Christian spun around. His hair was disheveled, his expensive suit stained with soot and grease, his eyes wide with the frantic, unhinged rage of a trapped animal.

"It's over, Christian!" I said, holding up Walter's black master keycard. "We have the master ledger. We have the Cayman account numbers. And the Federal Marshals are already at the bottom of the hill."

"Over?" Christian laughed hysterically, clutching the degaussing wand like a weapon. "It's never over, Jennifer! This is MY family! MY company! Brandon was weak! He wanted to give it all away to the public, to the city! He was going to bankrupt us!"

"Brandon was an honorable man," I said, taking a step forward despite the heat of the growing fire. "He died because he had a conscience. Something you never possessed."

"He died because he got in my way!" Christian screamed, raising his pistol from his belt and pointing it straight at my head. "And you're about to join him!"

BANG!

Before Christian could pull the trigger, Vance fired from the hip.

The heavy bullet struck Christian’s right shoulder, spinning him around violently. He dropped the gun, which skidded across the floor into the open fireplace flames.

Christian shrieked in pain, crashing back against the burning desk, knocking over the open canister of gasoline.

WHOOSH!

An explosion of blue and yellow flame ignited instantly across the wooden floor, cutting Christian off from us in a wall of fire. The curtains caught fire instantly, the flames climbing up toward the high timbered ceiling.

"Christian!" I screamed, instinctively taking a step forward toward the flames.

"Jennifer, no!" Vance grabbed my arm, hauling me back. "The floor is soaked in gas! It’s going down!"

Through the curtain of fire, I saw Christian stumbling back toward the floor-to-ceiling glass doors that opened onto the third-story balcony. He kicked the glass open, coughing violently, covered in soot, and staggered out into the night air.

"The servers!" Vance shouted, pointing to the smoking terminal. "Insert the keycard!"

I ran to the main console, ignoring the scorching heat and dense smoke filling the room. My fingers flew across the keyboard as I slapped Walter's black keycard into the master slot.

SYSTEM OVERRIDE ACCEPTED. INITIATING DATA LOCKDOWN AND EXTERNAL UPLOAD.

The screen flashed green. A progress bar appeared, rapidly filling as gigabytes of encrypted evidence—the master ledgers, the medical reports, the audio recordings from the cellar—were transmitted directly to the Federal District Attorney's secure server.