On Thanksgiving Day, my billionaire grandfather stood before the whole family with a bruise under his eye. Everyone thought he had had an accident, but when he clinked his glass and said, "I have something to confess," the silence became so heavy that no one looked at him the same way again.

The federal penitentiary was a bleak, towering fortress of gray concrete and barbed wire. The air inside smelled sharply of bleach and desperate, suppressed violence. I sat in a small, windowless visitation room, separated from Clara by a thick pane of bulletproof glass.

She walked in wearing a bright orange jumpsuit, her wrists shackled heavily to a chain around her waist. She looked a decade older than the beautiful, polished corporate spy who had nearly destroyed my family just weeks ago. A dark purple bruise was blooming along her jawline.

She picked up the heavy black telephone receiver on her side of the glass. I picked up mine, staring directly into her calculating, desperate eyes.

"You look terrible, Clara," I stated coldly.

"Prison politics are brutal, Julian," she laughed bitterly. "Did you bring the signed transfer order?"

I slid a thick manila folder through the narrow metal slot beneath the glass. It contained heavily forged transfer documents, created by Sofia's brilliant cyber manipulation of the federal database. Clara did not know it, but the transfer was entirely fake. I was not about to grant leniency to the woman who tried to murder my grandfather.

Clara reviewed the documents, a genuine smile of relief washing over her bruised face. She leaned forward, pressing her hand against the cold glass.

"Your grandfather's new Chief Operating Officer. David Thorne," Clara whispered into the receiver. "He belongs to the Vanguard. He has belonged to them for fifteen years. He is the one sabotaging your security grid from the inside."

David Thorne. The man I had personally promoted just three days ago because of his supposedly flawless record and unwavering loyalty during the cartel crisis. The betrayal stung like a physical blow to the chest, but I kept my face entirely neutral.

"Thank you, Clara," I said, standing up from the metal chair.

"Make sure the guards process this transfer immediately, Julian. If I stay in general population tonight, I am dead," she pleaded, dropping her mask of arrogant confidence entirely.

I walked to the steel door and knocked for the guard. I looked back at Clara one last time.