Chapter 4 - The Discovery Behind the Wall
Within ten minutes, Tony—Dominic’s head of security and shadow—burst into the nursery carrying a heavy metal case. Two armed guards flanked him, their weapons drawn and scanning the shadows.
"Boss, what—" Tony started.
"Check the vent," Dominic commanded, pointing a rigid finger toward the corner. "The boy says something was placed inside."
Tony dropped to his knees, flicking open the heavy-duty thermal imaging scanner and a fiber-optic borescope camera. He inserted the thin, lighted cable into the slats of the ornate brass heating vent, watching the small handheld monitor closely.
The color on the screen shifted from cool blue to a sharp, glowing red ring.
"Found it," Tony muttered, his face draining of color. He pulled a specialized screwdriver from his kit and carefully unscrewed the four brass screws holding the vent cover in place.
Inside the metal duct, wedged deep behind the insulation layer where airflow kept it completely silent, was a small, black electronic device no larger than a deck of cards. A tiny, faint green LED light blinked rhythmically in the darkness.
It was a military-grade audio transmitter and video relay module—encrypted, tamper-proof, and wired directly into the estate’s primary security mainframe.
Tony carefully extracted the device, holding it up for Dominic to see. The wire harness attached to it bore a specific serial number stamped into the plastic casing.
Dominic stared at the device. The muscle in his jaw throbbed with a terrifying intensity.
"Who installed it?" Dominic’s voice was dangerously quiet.
"It's tied into the server access log from three days ago," Tony said, his voice shaking slightly. "The only person with administrative override credentials for the north wing HVAC grid during that maintenance window was..." Tony swallowed hard, looking sideways at Dominic. "Elena’s former security liaison. Julian Vance."
The name hung in the room like the smell of cordite. Julian Vance—the regional director of Graves Logistics, a man who had been angling to take over Dominic’s shipping corridors in Chicago for over a year.
For two years, everyone had whispered that Dominic’s wife Elena had died in a tragic roadside accident—a random hit-and-run on the highway outside Chicago. The police had closed the case for lack of evidence. The media had framed it as a syndicate rivalry gone wrong.
But looking at the transmitter in Tony’s hand, the truth crystallized with brutal clarity.
Elena hadn't just been killed in a random accident. She had been targeted. And four-year-old Noah—who had been sitting in the backseat of the SUV when the ambush happened—had witnessed everything. He hadn't lost his mind from trauma alone; he had been terrorized by a silent surveillance network planted inside his own home by the men who murdered his mother, monitoring every move the heir to the Vale empire made.
And eighteen professional nannies, child psychiatrists, and trauma specialists had spent two years calling the boy "deranged," "violent," and "unmanageable" because not a single one of them had bothered to listen to what a terrified four-year-old was trying to scream.
May you like
Except for one girl.
Dominic turned slowly, his dark eyes locking onto Clara, who was standing quietly in the doorway, clutching her cardigan around her shoulders.
