Chapter 12 - The Satellite Transmitter
The high-definition screen mounted on the suite wall flared to life, casting an eerie, amber glow across the ruined room. On the display, Chloe’s face appeared crystal clear, framed by the dim, pulsing cabin lights of the airborne helicopter. She wasn't running anymore; she was sitting comfortably in a leather jump seat, a glass of champagne in her hand as she plugged a duplicate silver flash drive into an open satellite uplink terminal.
"If you're watching this," Chloe said smoothly on the recording, her voice projecting directly through the suite's surround-sound speakers, "it means you managed to find my decoy drive on the floor. A sentimental touch, really. Did you honestly think I would leave my real master keys within arm's reach of your desperate fingers, Elena?"
Elena stood up abruptly, her fists clenched at her sides as she glared at the screen. "She's taunting us. She knows we have no way to intercept a satellite broadcast mid-flight."
"Watch the bottom corner of the feed," Julian said sharply, pointing his finger at the screen while keeping one arm securely wrapped around Lily, who had fallen into a deep, exhausted sleep against his chest. "Look at the coordinates."
In the lower right-hand corner of the video, a string of GPS numbers was scrolling rapidly, alongside a live telemetry map showing the flight path of the helicopter. It wasn't heading toward the coast or an international airport as expected. The blinking red dot was descending rapidly toward an abandoned naval airstrip located just twelve miles outside the city limits—a property owned entirely by Vance Global Logistics.
"The old airfield," Elena breathed, realization dawning in her eyes. "That's where the primary corporate servers were relocated during the facility upgrade last month. She's not escaping the country yet; she’s going there to wipe the physical mainframe before the federal investigators arrive."
"If she wipes those servers, every financial record proving our innocence goes up in smoke," Julian said, standing up carefully so as not to wake Lily. He gently transferred the sleeping toddler into Elena’s arms. Elena caught the child instinctively, holding her close against her chest despite her own exhaustion. "Take Lily and lock yourself in the panic room on the lower level of this suite. Do not open the door for anyone until I send the secure code."
"Julian, no," Elena protested, grabbing the sleeve of his ruined white tuxedo. "You can't go after her alone. If the federal agents arrive and find you at the airstrip, they'll arrest you on the spot."
"If I don't go, there won't be a company, a home, or a future left for us to save," Julian replied quietly. He reached out, his hand gently brushing a stray lock of dark hair from Elena's face, his thumb lingering for a second against her cheek—the first tender gesture they had shared in years. "Trust me, Elena. Just for tonight."
May you like
Before she could answer, Julian turned sharply and strode toward the private service elevator in the corner of the suite—the one lift that had remained operational during the building-wide lockdown. As the steel doors slid shut behind him, cutting off his face from her view, Elena clutched Lily tighter and backed slowly away toward the heavy steel door of the panic room, her eyes fixed on the blinking red light of the wall monitor as the helicopter's GPS dot finally touched down on the airstrip map.
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