Chapter 11 - SOMEONE WAS WATCHING MY SEARCHES
I picked up the broken tablet.
The screen flickered once.
Then died.
But I had seen the message.
M knew.
Not tomorrow.
Not after Diane called.
In real time.
Delete Northbridge now. Ben is already inside the file.
I looked at Diane.
“Who did you tell?”
“What?”
“That I was accessing Northbridge.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Someone messaged you less than a minute after I opened the file.”
Karen turned toward Diane.
“You called him?”
Diane’s head snapped around.
“I didn’t call anyone.”
“Him?”
I looked at Karen.
“You know M is a man?”
She froze.
Another mistake.
I moved closer.
“Who is he?”
Karen looked at Diane instead.
“You said he couldn’t see Ben’s personal accounts.”
Diane’s face hardened.
“He can’t.”
“Then how did he know?”
“I don’t know.”
I stared at both of them.
Something larger had just shifted.
Karen wasn’t acting smug anymore.
She looked frightened.
Diane looked angry.
Not at me.
At the fact that control had slipped.
I immediately disconnected the home router.
Every smart device went offline.
Then I powered down my laptop.
“What are you doing?” Karen asked.
“Assuming somebody has access they shouldn’t.”
“That’s paranoid.”
“Your mysterious contact knew exactly what page I opened.”
Diane grabbed her purse.
“I’m leaving.”
“Go.”
She walked toward the front door.
Karen followed her.
“What are you doing?”
Diane whispered something too quietly for me to hear.
Karen grabbed her arm.
“Don’t.”
My mother jerked free.
I saw genuine panic in Karen’s face.
Not staged.
“What did she tell you?” I asked.
Karen said nothing.
Diane left.
This time I watched her car disappear before going back inside.
Ella was sitting on the staircase.
I crouched.
“You okay?”
She nodded.
“Are you scared?”
A smaller nod.
I hated myself for not sending her somewhere safe earlier.
But everyone I would normally trust was suddenly part of the problem or knew too little.
“Can I call Aunt Rebecca?” Ella asked.
My sister.
I hesitated.
Diane had spent years telling Rebecca that Karen and I were happy.
I didn’t know what she had been told tonight.
But Ella trusted her.
That mattered.
I called.
Rebecca answered immediately.
“I’ve been trying to reach you.”
“Did you see the video?”
“Yes.”
“The video was staged.”
Silence.
Then she said, “I know.”
I stood.
“What?”
“Mom sent me something before Karen posted the short clip.”
My pulse jumped.
“What?”
“A longer video.”
“How long?”
“About forty seconds.”
My entire body went still.
“Do you still have it?”
“Yes.”
“Send it.”
Thirty seconds later, the file arrived.
I played it without sound first.
Diane’s camera was already recording.
Karen stood beside the counter.
Ella entered wearing her medals.
Karen looked at Diane.
Diane nodded.
Then Karen ripped the medals away and threw them into the trash.
Ella dropped to her knees.
I entered seventeen seconds later.
The full video existed.
The trap was preserved.
I watched it again with sound.
Diane whispered just before I appeared through the side door.
“He’s here. Do it.”
My stomach turned.
Rebecca had unknowingly saved the piece of evidence Diane thought she controlled.
“Why did Mom send this to you?”
“She said she needed me to see how difficult things had become.”
“Before I threw the trash can?”
“Yes.”
That was important.
Diane had sent the longer clip while expecting me to react.
She wanted witnesses prepared.
Then Rebecca said, “Ben, there’s something else.”
“What?”
“Mom has been asking me questions about Laura’s estate for months.”
I closed my eyes.
“What kind of questions?”
“Whether I remembered who handled the original papers. Whether Laura ever changed her will. Whether you kept signed copies at home.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought she was helping you update things.”
Fair.
I had trained everyone around me to assume normal explanations.
Rebecca continued.
“She also asked if I remembered a man named Marcus.”
My body went cold.
Marcus.
Not M.
A full name was possible now.
“Marcus who?”
“I don’t remember his last name.”
“Where did you hear it?”
“Years ago. Around the time Laura was sick.”
That was the first clue connecting M to a period before Karen entered my life.
Then Rebecca said something I was not ready for.
“Ben, I think Mom knew him through Dad.”
Our father had been dead for seven years.
If Marcus had ties to him, then this conspiracy reached farther back than my marriage, farther back than Laura’s death, perhaps even farther back than the house purchase.
I asked Rebecca to forward every message Diane had sent about Laura.
Then Karen’s phone rang upstairs.
She looked at the screen.
Her face drained completely.
She declined the call.
It rang again.
Same number.
I walked closer.
“Who is it?”
Karen’s hand shook.
“No one.”
The phone rang a third time.
This time the caller name flashed before she turned the screen away.
May you like
MARCUS VALE.
📖 Discover who Marcus Vale was to my family—and why Karen looked terrified when the man behind “M” finally called her directly in CHAPTER 12. 👇
