Chapter 5: The Extraction
\nBy 8:00 a.m., the sun was a blinding, harsh glare reflecting off the snow outside my office window. Elias Vance sat at Kenneth\u2019s desk, his fingers flying across the glowing keyboard of his heavily modified laptop.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey were thorough,\u201d Elias muttered, chewing on a matchstick. \u201cYour brother and your husband set up a cascading shell structure. The forty million is sitting in an escrow account held by the Blackwood Syndicate, ready to trigger the foreclosure of this estate tomorrow at noon. If the money moves to Justin\u2019s primary accounts, you lose the house, the company, everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCan you reverse the transfer?\u201d I asked, pacing the Persian rug.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve prepped a mirrored transaction,\u201d Elias explained, tapping the screen. \u201cI can bounce the funds back into your private trust, bypassing Kenneth entirely. But the escrow account is locked with dual-factor biometric authentication. Specifically, a retinal scan and a thumbprint from Kenneth. Without it, the firewall holds, and Justin wins.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t bring you his eye, Elias,\u201d I said coldly.<\/p>\n
Elias smirked. \u201cI don\u2019t need his eye. He synced the retinal scan to his phone\u2019s facial recognition software for remote access. If you can get his phone, unlock it with his face, and get his right thumbprint on the confirmation screen, I can initiate the transfer remotely.\u201d<\/p>\n
I picked up my purse. \u201cWhere is his phone?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGPS puts it at St. Jude\u2019s Medical Center. Probably in his personal effects bag.\u201d<\/p>\n
I arrived back at the hospital just before 10:00 a.m. The adrenaline pumping through my veins masked the utter exhaustion of being awake all night. I bypassed the triage desk and flashed my spousal ID to the security guard at the post-op recovery ward.<\/p>\n
Kenneth was in Room 412.<\/p>\n
I pushed the door open silently. The room was dark, filled with the rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor. Kenneth was lying on his back, heavily bandaged, an IV drip of morphine feeding into his arm. His face was bruised and swollen, the arrogance completely beaten out of him by the surgeon\u2019s scalpel. Maya was nowhere to be seen.<\/p>\n
I walked over to the small plastic bin resting on the chair. Inside were Kenneth\u2019s clothes, his watch, and his iPhone. I slipped the phone into my pocket and approached the bed.<\/p>\n
\u201cKenneth,\u201d I whispered, leaning over him.<\/p>\n
His eyes fluttered open, glassy and unfocused from the narcotics. When he saw me, a pathetic, weak smile formed on his lips. \u201cSabrina\u2026 you came back. I knew\u2026 I knew you wouldn\u2019t leave me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course not, darling,\u201d I cooed softly. \u201cI\u2019m right here.\u201d<\/p>\n
I pulled his phone from my pocket and held it up to his face. The screen lit up, scanning his sluggish, half-open eyes. A small green padlock icon unlocked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat are you doing?\u201d he mumbled, his brow furrowing in confusion.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust checking your messages for work,\u201d I lied, my heart pounding as Elias\u2019s custom application booted up on the screen. A prompt appeared: **Awaiting Biometric Confirmation for Transfer**.<\/p>\n
I reached down and gently took Kenneth\u2019s right hand. It was cold and clammy.<\/p>\n
\u201cSabrina\u2026 it hurts so much,\u201d he whimpered, tears leaking from his eyes. \u201cI\u2019m sorry. Maya meant nothing. I love you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know you do,\u201d I whispered, my voice laced with venom as I firmly pressed his right thumb against the glowing scanner on the phone.<\/p>\n
The screen flashed: **Transfer Authorized. Processing.**<\/p>\n
I dropped his hand as if it were a diseased rat. Kenneth blinked, the fog of the morphine parting just enough for him to register the absolute disgust on my face.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat did you just do?\u201d he asked, panic creeping back into his groggy voice.<\/p>\n
Before I could answer, the door to the hospital room swung wide open.<\/p>\n
Standing in the doorway, wearing a tailored charcoal suit and a look of absolute, furious authority, was my brother, Justin. He wasn\u2019t playing the heartbroken victim anymore. He looked like a king arriving to claim his conquered territory.<\/p>\n
\u201cGet away from him, Sabrina,\u201d Justin commanded, stepping into the room and shutting the door behind him. \u201cThis doesn\u2019t concern you anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n
I slipped the phone back into my pocket, the forty-million-dollar confirmation burning a hole against my thigh.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, Justin,\u201d I smiled, a dark, terrible curve of my lips. \u201cIt concerns me more than you could possibly imagine.\u201d
\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chapter 5: The Extraction By 8:00 a.m., the sun was a blinding, harsh glare reflecting off the snow outside my office window. Elias Vance sat at Kenneth\u2019s desk, his fingers … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13702,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13698","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-family-drama-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13698"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13698\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13705,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13698\/revisions\/13705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redditlovers.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}