Chapter 3 - The Woman With the Key
Margaret Morrison had arrived without anyone hearing her car.
She wore a charcoal coat over an ivory dress.
Her silver hair was perfectly arranged.
Her expression was not.
For the first time Kevin could remember, his mother looked frightened.
“Give me the key,” Kevin said.
Margaret closed her fingers around it.
“You are upsetting the boys.”
“They were already upset.”
“They need to return to therapy.”
“They need people to stop calling them liars.”
Margaret’s eyes moved toward Annie.
“You are dismissed.”
Annie did not react.
Kevin did.
“You do not employ her.”
“This house belongs to the Morrison family.”
“This house belongs to me.”
Margaret’s mouth tightened.
“Lauren would be horrified to see a maid sleeping in her bed.”
Jordan suddenly shouted.
“Mommy liked her!”
Margaret looked at him sharply.
“How would you know that?”
The question came too quickly.
Jordan shrank behind Annie.
Kevin stepped toward his mother.
“Why are you carrying the security key?”
Margaret looked down at it as though she had forgotten it was in her hand.
“The alarm company contacted me.”
“No one from the alarm company has your number.”
“They had it from the old records.”
Kevin held out his hand.
“Give it to me.”
Daniel moved between them.
“Everyone needs to calm down.”
Kevin stared at him.
“You arrived because of a call I did not make.”
“My mother arrived because of an alarm no company reported.”
“And my dead wife left a message telling me to watch footage someone deleted.”
Margaret’s composure cracked.
“Lauren was under enormous stress before the accident.”
Kevin turned toward her.
“What are you saying?”
“She was grieving.”
“Grieving what?”
Margaret looked at Daniel.
That glance lasted only a moment.
It told Kevin more than either of them intended.
“What were you hiding from me?” Kevin asked.
Daniel sighed.
“This is not the time.”
Kevin grabbed the security key from Margaret’s hand.
She did not fight him.
She only whispered his name.
“Kevin.”
He walked toward the private elevator leading to the basement security room.
Daniel followed.
Kevin pressed the button.
“You are not coming.”
“You may need someone who understands what you are seeing.”
“I understand video.”
“I mean context.”
The elevator doors opened.
Kevin stepped inside.
Before the doors closed, Annie spoke from the hallway.
“Mr. Morrison.”
Kevin looked at her.
“If the footage was deleted using your account, do not trust the access logs.”
Daniel’s face hardened.
Annie continued.
“Check the physical server.”
“How do you know about servers?” Daniel asked.
“I cleaned offices at night.”
“That does not make you an expert.”
“No.”
Annie met his eyes.
“But it taught me that powerful men throw away the truth when they think nobody is watching.”
The elevator doors closed.
Kevin descended alone.
The basement security room smelled of dust and cold metal.
He unlocked the main cabinet.
The digital archive displayed an empty block from 8:41 p.m. to 8:58 p.m. on the night Lauren died.
Exactly seventeen minutes.
Kevin opened the physical backup drive.
A warning appeared.
ARCHIVE ACCESSED: OCTOBER 17, 11:34 P.M.
That was three hours after the crash.
The account name was Kevin’s.
But the biometric scan belonged to someone else.
Kevin opened the fingerprint record.
The screen displayed the registered identity.
MARGARET MORRISON.
Kevin stared at his mother’s name.
Then a shadow moved behind the glass wall.
Daniel was standing inside the supposedly locked server room.
He held a metal tool in one hand.
Sparks erupted from the backup cabinet.
May you like
Daniel looked directly at Kevin.
Then he drove the tool into the main power unit.
