Chapter 8: The Embezzlement Trail
At 2:00 AM, a dark figure slipped over the stone wall of the Mercer Estate, bypassing the thermal cameras with practiced ease.
Leah opened the side terrace door, pulling Mateo inside. He was dressed in dark clothes, breathing heavily.
"You really need to stop calling me for midnight felonies," Mateo muttered, though a smirk played on his lips. "My dad thinks I'm asleep in my penthouse."
"Thank you for coming," Leah whispered, leading him quietly down the hall. "I overheard Eleanor. She’s tampering with the DNA test tomorrow. If we don't get proof of her embezzlement tonight, she’s going to win. She said the ledgers are in a safe in the East Wing library."
Mateo’s eyes darkened. "The East Wing? Leah, that’s Eleanor’s territory. If Hayes catches us in there, he won't just throw us out. He’ll make us disappear."
"I'm not letting her win," Leah said fiercely. "She killed my mother with her lies. I'm taking her down."
Mateo looked at her, his gaze lingering on her determined face. "Alright, Moreno. Lead the way."
They navigated the labyrinthine mansion in absolute silence. The East Wing felt colder, decorated in stark modern art and sharp angles that perfectly mirrored Eleanor’s personality. The library doors were locked, but Mateo produced a sleek lockpicking kit from his jacket.
"Board member's son, cater-waiter, and cat burglar?" Leah whispered as he worked the pins.
"I have a very diverse resume," Mateo shot back. The lock clicked, and they slipped inside.
The library was massive, lined with thousands of leather-bound books. "Where would a billionaire hide a safe?" Mateo muttered, scanning the walls.
"Behind a painting?" Leah guessed.
"Too cliché." Mateo walked over to a heavy mahogany desk. He ran his hands under the lip of the wood. "Aha." He pressed a hidden button.
With a soft whir, a section of the bookshelf slid open, revealing a state-of-the-art biometric wall safe.
"Fingerprint scanner," Mateo groaned. "We're screwed."
Leah stared at the glass scanner. She remembered the gala. She remembered Julian scraping the paint off the fake pearl Eleanor had planted. She remembered Eleanor’s manicured hands.
"Wait," Leah whispered. She ran to Eleanor's desk, opening the top drawer. She rummaged through the stationary until she found what she was looking for: a discarded, heavy crystal scotch glass.
"She was drinking," Leah said, holding it up to the moonlight. A perfect thumbprint was smudged in powder-makeup on the glass.
"You've watched way too many spy movies," Mateo said, but he took the glass. He carefully peeled a strip of clear packing tape from his kit, pressed it over the fingerprint, and transferred it to the scanner.
The machine beeped. A green light flashed. The heavy steel door clicked open.
"I'll be damned," Mateo whispered.
Inside the safe were stacks of foreign passports, jewelry, and a single black leather ledger alongside a silver flash drive. Leah grabbed the drive and the ledger.
Suddenly, the library lights flipped on, blinding them.
"Well, well," a cold voice sneered.
Hayes stood in the doorway, a silenced pistol pointed directly at Leah’s chest. "Mrs. Mercer thought you might try something stupid. Put the ledger back on the desk, Miss Moreno."
Mateo slowly stepped in front of Leah, shielding her. "You pull that trigger, Hayes, and Julian Mercer will hunt you to the ends of the earth."
"Julian is a dying old man," Hayes laughed. "And you two are just trespassers who broke into a secure wing. Self-defense is a wonderful legal loophole."
He raised the gun.
SMASH!
The heavy crystal scotch glass flew through the air, launched by Leah, striking Hayes squarely in the forehead. The gun went off with a quiet pfft, the bullet shattering a vase a foot to Mateo's left.
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"Run!" Leah screamed.
Mateo grabbed her hand, and they bolted through the secondary door leading to the gardens, plunging into the darkness of the estate grounds, the flash drive clutched tightly in Leah's fist.
