Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN IN WHITEThe woman on the security footage looked exactly like Victoria Sloan.
Same height.
Same silver-blonde hair.
Same posture.
Same preference for tailored white jackets.
But Victoria produced travel records within minutes.
Passport scans.
Hotel receipts.
Private-aircraft logs.
Video from a technology summit in London.
At 9:13 a.m. London time—the exact moment corresponding with the Northstar footage—Victoria had been speaking onstage before three hundred people.
So the woman waiting for Daniel could not have been her.
“Then someone wanted him to believe it was you,” I said.
Victoria stared at the frozen frame.
“Or wanted the cameras to believe it.”
Naomi enlarged the image.
The woman’s face was partially hidden.
A convincing wig and tailored clothing could have done the rest.
“Who knew Daniel was coming?” Naomi asked.
Grant had been brought back into the command area under guard.
He studied the footage.
“I didn’t.”
I didn’t believe him automatically, but his reaction felt genuine.
Victoria turned.
“Who at Northstar resembles me?”
Naomi laughed once.
“Nobody.”
“Who could?”
That was the better question.
We requested all personnel records for women matching Victoria’s approximate height and build.
Before the search finished, federal investigators arrived.
The lead agent was Special Agent Marcus Reed, forty-eight, calm voice, eyes that never stopped cataloging a room.
He listened while Victoria summarized.
Then he looked at me.
“You’re the applicant who discovered the transmitter?”
“Yes.”
“And the drive?”
“Planted in my bag.”
“By Mr. Holloway?”
“My daughter witnessed it.”
Marcus did not dismiss Emma’s age.
“Has she been interviewed?”
“No.”
“Good. Keep it that way until a child-interview specialist arrives.”
I appreciated him immediately.
Not because he trusted me.
Because he respected procedure.
Marcus ordered Grant formally detained pending investigation into unauthorized possession of restricted Northstar property and possible evidence tampering.
Grant stared at me while agents escorted him away.
“This gets worse, Rachel.”
“For you?”
“For everyone.”
He disappeared through the doors.
The applicant tryout was officially cancelled.
Most people left angry and confused.
Cole stayed.
Victoria offered him temporary contract status until the emergency ended.
Then she turned toward me.
“I assume you’re withdrawing your application.”
“No.”
Everyone looked surprised.
I folded my arms.
“You still need a security director.”
For the first time that day, Victoria almost smiled.
“You aren’t hired.”
“I know.”
“Yet.”
Naomi gave her a look.
Victoria ignored it.
“Help us understand what happened here. Consider it the final interview.”
I glanced upstairs toward Emma.
“On one condition.”
“Name it.”
“My daughter leaves this building.”
Victoria arranged a car with two vetted protective officers to take Emma to my closest friend, Sarah Bennett, a retired Army medic who lived fifteen minutes away.
I called Sarah myself.
Then I knelt beside Emma.
“Pancakes are delayed.”
She sighed dramatically.
“I knew it.”
“I’ll make double.”
“Triple.”
“You negotiate like a hostage taker.”
Emma smiled.
Before leaving, she held Mr. Buttons toward me.
“You take him.”
“I thought you needed him.”
She shook her head.
“You’re doing the scary part.”
I tucked the rabbit beneath my arm.
Cole pretended not to notice my eyes becoming wet.
After Emma left, we went back to work.
Agent Reed isolated the timeline.
Daniel entered Northstar nine months ago.
He carried a black case.
He met someone disguised as Victoria.
Then every camera on level six went offline for seventeen minutes.
When footage resumed, Daniel was gone.
No camera recorded him leaving.
No vehicle linked to him exited the garage.
He vanished inside the building.
“Access tunnels?” I asked.
Naomi nodded.
“Utilities connect this property to a neighboring research facility.”
“Owned by?”
Victoria answered.
“Northstar.”
“Camera coverage?”
“Limited nine months ago.”
That smelled intentional.
We descended underground.
The tunnel system ran beneath both buildings, filled with electrical conduits and utility pipes.
One access door showed scratches around its manual latch.
Old scratches.
Marcus photographed them.
We entered a storage corridor.
Most rooms held obsolete equipment.
One door had been welded shut.
“That normal?” I asked.
Victoria frowned.
“No.”
Agent Reed ordered specialists.
Two hours later, the weld was cut.
Inside was not Daniel.
Thank God.
But something worse waited.
Shelving.
Burner phones.
Encrypted routers.
False employee badges.
Six Northstar laptops.
And boxes containing printed copies of restricted procurement files.
An intelligence collection room.
Built under the company.
Victoria leaned against the doorway.
“Oh my God.”
Marcus didn’t react outwardly.
“How long has this room existed?”
“No idea.”
We found the first answer quickly.
A supply box carried a receiving label dated almost four years earlier.
Daniel had still been working for Grant then.
I examined the shelves.
Different devices corresponded to different Northstar divisions.
Aviation.
Cybersecurity.
Navigation.
Procurement.
Someone hadn’t stolen one secret.
They had built a pipeline.
Naomi opened a cabinet.
Inside were photographs.
Executives.
Military officials.
Engineers.
Congressional staff.
Vendors.
Some photographs were ordinary surveillance.
Others were compromising.
Affairs.
Drug use.
Cash exchanges.
Private arguments.
Blackmail.
Then I found Daniel.
A photograph showed him leaving our former house.
Another showed him picking Emma up from preschool.
Another showed me jogging.
My blood went cold.
“This wasn’t only Northstar.”
Marcus came beside me.
“They were surveilling your family.”
“Why?”
He pointed to another photograph.
Daniel sitting inside a coffee shop with a man whose face had been circled in red.
Victoria recognized him.
“Thomas Vale.”
“Who is he?” I asked.
“My former chief financial officer.”
“Former?”
“Died three years ago. Car accident.”
Agent Reed’s expression changed.
“What kind?”
Victoria looked at him.
“Vehicle left the road.”
More photographs.
More names.
A pattern emerged.
Several people linked to Daniel’s internal investigation had died, disappeared, or abruptly resigned.
This was bigger than corporate theft.
Much bigger.
Then Cole called from across the room.
“Rachel.”
He stood beside a corkboard.
Pinned under a map was a recent photograph.
Me.
Taken three weeks earlier.
Outside Emma’s school.
Beneath it, someone had written:
RM — APPLYING NORTHSTAR AUG 8
My application had not surprised Grant.
Someone had been tracking me before I submitted it.
Underneath was another note.
Use GH to neutralize.
GH.
Grant Holloway.
I stared.
Grant might be corrupt.
But he wasn’t controlling this.
Someone was controlling him.
Marcus read the note.
“Grant was being used.”
“Or cooperating.”
“Possibly both.”
I lifted the photo carefully.
Behind it was a second page.
A schedule.
My gym.
Emma’s school.
Sarah’s home.
My grocery store.
The routes I drove most often.
Someone had studied us.
Then my phone rang.
Sarah.
I answered instantly.
“Everything okay?”
Silence.
“Sarah?”
A man spoke.
Distorted voice.
“Rachel Monroe.”
My blood stopped moving.
“Where is my daughter?”
“Safe.”
“Put her on.”
“No.”
I looked at Marcus.
He signaled technicians.
The voice continued.
“You found a room Daniel was told never to enter.”
“What do you want?”
“The item your daughter gave you.”
I looked at Mr. Buttons.
The stuffed rabbit.
No.
“That’s a toy.”
“So Daniel told you.”
My heart hammered.
Daniel had bought the rabbit for Emma shortly before disappearing.
I squeezed its body.
Soft stuffing.
Then felt something near the left foot.
Hard.
Small.
Hidden.
The caller whispered:
“You have ten minutes to bring us the rabbit.”
I kept my voice steady.
“And if I don’t?”
A sound came through the phone.
Emma crying.
“Mom?”
Every person in the room froze.
Then the line went dead.
I looked at Marcus.
“They have my daughter.”
And for the first time all day, training stopped mattering.
Northstar stopped mattering.
Every contract, every secret, every criminal in that building stopped mattering.
May you like
There was only Emma.
And somebody had just made the worst mistake of their life.
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