Chapter 3 - The Ghost in the Machine
The red light made everything look like a crime scene—or a theater of war. I moved away from the door, my back to the wall, scanning the room for an exit. The windows were reinforced glass, designed to stop bullets, not to be easily broken. I was a sitting duck.
"Dominic?" I called out. No answer. The hallway outside was silent.
I grabbed the heavy metal base of the nursery lamp. It was the only weapon I had. I watched the door handle. It turned slowly. Click. Click.
The person outside wasn't trying to break the lock; they were waiting for me to panic.
I moved to the crib. The monitor was still on, its battery back-up keeping it alive. I pulled up the internal logs of the house’s security system. If I could get to the main override, I could force the doors open. But I needed a terminal.
I pulled the panel off the baby monitor’s base. It was a standard digital unit, but hidden behind the plastic was a port—a connection to the house’s internal network. Someone had installed a bypass. I plugged my phone into it, using the emergency forensic tools I carried.
The data was cascading. It was a mess of code, but I recognized the signature. It wasn't a standard hack. It was an internal loop, a script designed to mimic the room’s normal activity. The camera had been looping for three days.
"You're not Mrs. Gable," I whispered.
The door handle turned again, this time with a sharp clack.
"Alessio?" I shouted.
No voice, just the sound of a heavy body pressed against the wood.
I looked at the monitor again. The script was still running. I had to kill the process. I tapped the override, my fingers flying. Access Denied.
"Come on," I urged. Override code: ROMANO-01.
The system groaned. The screen flickered. The doors—every door in the nursery—clicked open at once.
I didn't wait. I bolted out into the hallway. The corridor was empty, but the floor was wet—not with rain, but with oil. A trail of it led toward the service elevator.
I followed it, my pulse thrumming in my ears. The elevator was at the end of the hall, its light indicating it was moving toward the basement.
I didn't take the elevator. I took the stairs, sliding down the banister, my feet hitting the marble floor with a silent thud. The basement was the heart of the Rinaldi security infrastructure. It was where the generators, the servers, and the primary weapons cache were located.
When I reached the basement level, the air was cool and smelled of ozone. The rows of servers hummed like a hive of bees. And in the center of the room, standing at the main terminal, was a figure in a black hoodie, typing with terrifying speed.
"It’s over," I said, holding the lamp base like a club.
The figure stopped. They turned around. It wasn't Mrs. Gable.
It was Dominic.
My stomach dropped. The mountain of loyalty. The man Alessio trusted above all others.
"You," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
Dominic looked at me, his eyes devoid of the usual stoic calm. "You shouldn't have been in that room, Nanny. You were supposed to be the variable that was easily removed."
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"Why?" I asked. "Leo? A baby?"
"Alessio needs to be broken," Dominic said, stepping toward me. "And the only way to break a king is to take his heir."
