Chapter 7 - The Secondary Feed
The glowing screen of the laptop inside the vault flashed with real-time footage of the cathedral vestibule, casting an eerie greenish hue over the concrete floor. Nathanael stared at the display, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped animal.
On the screen, Lily sat on a wooden bench, holding her worn teddy bear, while Martha and the maid stood nearby talking to an unfamiliar man in a dark trench coat.
"Agent Vance, look at the screen," Nathanael pointed frantically, his voice dropping an octave as panic gripped him. "There's someone else with them. That man wasn't in the cathedral when we left."
Agent Vance stepped into the vault, his hand immediately dropping to his holster. He squinted at the monitor, tapping his radio headset. "All units at the cathedral site, check the vestibule immediately. We have an unauthorized individual interacting with the child and the remaining witnesses."
Static crackled over the radio channel. "Command, this is Unit Four. We are at the vestibule. The area is clear. There is no man in a trench coat present."
Nathanael frowned, leaning closer to the laptop. The timestamp on the video feed was live down to the exact second. He could see Martha’s silver hair, the specific tear patch on the maid's uniform, and the distinct pattern of the tiles on the floor.
"That's a lie," Nathanael insisted, pointing at the display. "Look at the screen! He's standing right behind Martha right now!"
Agent Vance furrowed his brow, walking over to the computer terminal and tapping the keyboard to inspect the file path. "Mr. Cross... this isn't a live security camera feed from the building. It's a closed-circuit broadcast originating from a localized Wi-Fi router inside this very house."
"What does that mean?" Nathanael demanded, a cold dread washing over him.
"It means the camera isn't at the cathedral," Agent Vance said grimly, tracing the signal routing lines on the monitor. "It's somewhere on this property. Somewhere nearby."
Nathanael’s eyes darted around the vault. The concrete walls were lined with filing cabinets, safety deposit boxes, and stacks of legal documents bearing the letterhead of Cross Industries. But tucked behind a stack of blue folders on the bottom shelf was a small, blinking black box—a decoy router transmitting a delayed feed to make it look like it was happening elsewhere.
"She set us up," Nathanael breathed, the pieces finally clicking together in his mind. "The wedding, the police report, the arrest—it was all a distraction to keep me away from the house while someone else came for Lily."
Agent Vance didn't waste a second. He turned and shouted into his radio. "All units, execute a full perimeter sweep of the residential property immediately! We have an active breach!"
Before the agents could move toward the stairs, a heavy metallic thud echoed from above, followed by the sound of the motorized floor hatch slamming shut and locking into place with a definitive click.
The overhead lights inside the vault flickered once, twice, and then plunged into absolute darkness, leaving them illuminated only by the faint, pulsing glow of the laptop screen.
"They've locked us in," one of the tactical agents muttered, checking his radio. "We're in a Faraday cage; comms are completely jammed."
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Nathanael stepped toward the heavy steel door, pressing his palms against the cold metal. Through the thick layer of steel, a muffled laugh echoed from the bedroom above—a laugh that belonged neither to Eleanor nor Julian, but to someone far more dangerous.
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