Chapter 12 - Sealed Underground
The doors locked before the agents reached us.
Emergency lights turned red.
Victor’s bullet had damaged the control panel and triggered a containment protocol designed during the Cold War.
The ventilation system worked.
The external communication system did not.
We had water.
Limited medical supplies.
And a wounded armed man.
Victor’s hand bled from the brass key Claire had driven through it.
His gun remained on the floor between us.
Thomas kicked it toward me.
I picked it up.
Victor laughed.
“Going to shoot me, Captain?”
“No.”
“You should.”
“That would make this simpler for you.”
Claire held her bleeding arm.
The bullet had grazed her.
She looked at me with disbelief when I used a medical kit to bandage her.
“You still help me.”
“I am stopping blood loss. Do not confuse that with forgiveness.”
Thomas searched the bunker.
The concealed vault opened using Grandmother’s medal number.
Inside were not classified intelligence files.
There were construction records.
Grandmother had used the bunker to preserve evidence against Harold for decades.
Original contracts.
Bank transfers.
Employee statements.
Photographs.
And one video cassette showing Samuel Hart alive after Harold claimed he disappeared.
In the video, Samuel described every fraud he had uncovered.
He also named Victor.
Victor watched from the floor.
“You think evidence matters after this long?”
“It mattered enough for you to kill for it,” I said.
A second file concerned my maritime attack.
It contained payment trails from Harold to Victor and from Victor to the contractor who planted the explosive.
The contractor was alive in another country.
Federal agents could extradite him.
Victor’s confidence weakened.
Then Claire found a small safe marked with her name.
Inside was a letter from Grandmother.
Claire read it silently.
Her face changed.
“What does it say?” I asked.
“She knew.”
“Knew what?”
“That Dad was promising me the company.”
Grandmother wrote that Claire could inherit twelve percent if she completed an independent financial audit and refused any demand to harm me.
Claire had ignored every condition.
Her share transferred automatically to the employee trust after she helped Harold forge documents.
Grandmother had given her a path.
Claire chose the shortcut.
“She never loved me,” Claire whispered.
“No. She gave you a choice.”
“She gave you everything.”
“She gave me responsibility. You only see property.”
Victor began laughing.
“She sounds just like Harold.”
Claire crossed the room and slapped him.
The bunker lights flickered.
Thomas examined the damaged controls.
“The ventilation is failing.”
A bullet fragment had severed part of the power relay.
We had less than two hours before air circulation stopped.
The only manual override was inside a narrow service shaft.
My injured leg would not fit safely.
Thomas’s shoulder wound made climbing impossible.
May you like
Victor refused to help.
That left Claire.
