Chapter 432:
“Sir, you can’t interfere with an investigation,” the detective warned, stepping forward.
“I’m not interfering,” Quincy said, his eyes cold. “I’m providing evidence. I just got off the phone with Elias Thorne’s security team. They manage the backend of this building’s network.”
“You can’t do that,” Tiffany said, her voice rising in pitch. “Sterling disabled the external network link weeks ago! He said it was for security, to prevent corporate espionage! The system is local only!”
“Exactly,” Quincy said, locking eyes with her. “Sterling was paranoid. He air-gapped the apartment’s surveillance system so no one could hack in. That’s why Cloud didn’t catch you in real-time. But nothing is ever truly deleted, is it? It’s just sitting on the local server.”
Quincy tapped his phone screen. “Cloud, are you there?”
“I’m here, Quincy,” a distorted, synthesized voice spoke from the speakerphone, echoing in the silent room. “I have established a hardline bridge to the penthouse local server. Brute-forcing the encryption now. It appears someone tried to wipe the logs manually, but they were sloppy.”
The detective frowned but didn’t stop him. If there was footage, he wanted to see it.
The large TV on the wall flickered to life. A black terminal window appeared, followed by a loading bar.
ACCESSING LOCAL STORAGE NODE… RECOVERING DELETED FILES…
Sterling watched the screen. A cold knot formed in his stomach. “Quincy, stop. Let the dead rest.”
“If she’s innocent, Sterling,” Quincy said, his voice cracking with emotion, “then you have blood on your hands. I need to know.”
“She’s not innocent!” Sterling insisted, but his voice lacked conviction. He remembered Martha’s face. The heartbreak. I love you like my own son.
RECOVERY PROGRESS: 25%
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Tiffany stood up. “I think I’m going to be sick. I need the bathroom.”
“Sit down,” the detective said. He had been listening. He signaled to an officer to stand by the door. “Nobody leaves until we see what’s on that video.”
Tiffany sat back down. Her hands were trembling so hard the tea sloshed over the rim of the cup.
RECOVERY PROGRESS: 50%
The room fell into a heavy, suffocating silence. The only sound was the tapping of the rain against the glass and the soft whir of the processor.
Sterling stared at the progress bar. He felt like he was watching a countdown to a bomb. If he was wrong. If he had driven the only woman who ever truly cared for him to her death…
He grabbed the whiskey bottle from the table and took a swig straight from the neck. It burned, but it didn’t numb the fear.
RECOVERY PROGRESS: 85%
Tiffany’s eyes darted around the room. She looked at the balcony door. She looked at the police officer. She looked at her purse.
RECOVERY PROGRESS: 99% RECOVERY COMPLETE.
“Play it,” Quincy commanded.
New York City felt like a cage of glass and steel, battered by the relentless rain. In the high-tech command center of Pulse Interactive, located in a secure building in Manhattan, Aurora sat before a bank of monitors.
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