Chapter 4 - The Dead Man's Badge
The air in the grand foyer grew completely stagnant.
Elise felt the blood drain from her face as the horrifying reality set in.
Someone had murdered an innocent man, stuffed him into her locker, and stolen her identity to orchestrate a sophisticated assassination.
“I didn't do this,” Elise said, her voice dropping to a terrified whisper.
“Someone is trying to frame me to cover their own tracks.”
Caleb stared at her for a long moment, reading every micro-expression on her pale face.
He had built a criminal empire by knowing exactly when people were lying to him.
Elise was not lying.
“Jonah, initiate protocol Omega,” Caleb commanded smoothly.
Jonah’s eyes widened in shock.
“Boss, that seals the entire estate.”
“I know what it does,” Caleb replied coldly.
“The real technician was killed recently, which means the imposter who sabotaged my chair is still inside this house.”
Jonah tapped a sequence of red icons on his tablet.
A loud, mechanical siren briefly wailed throughout the massive mansion.
Heavy titanium shutters immediately slammed down over every window and exterior door, sealing the house like a vault.
The electronic locks engaged with a heavy, final clank.
Nobody could get out, but more importantly, nobody could get in.
“We sweep the house room by room,” Jonah ordered his two remaining guards.
“Find the imposter and bring him to me alive,” Caleb added.
One of the guards handed Caleb a walking cane hidden in the umbrella stand.
Caleb accepted it, using it to slowly and painfully pull himself up from the floor.
Elise rushed forward to offer her arm, and Caleb surprisingly took it, leaning his weight against her.
“You are coming with me to the security control room,” Caleb told her quietly.
“If you know this house as well as you claim, I need your eyes on the cameras.”
They moved down the dimly lit hallway, flanked by Jonah and his men.
The control room was located behind a reinforced steel door in the center of the mansion.
Jonah punched in his access code, and the heavy door hissed open.
The room was filled with dozens of glowing monitors displaying every corner of the estate.
Elise stared at the screens, looking for anything out of place.
Suddenly, a guard's voice crackled frantically over Jonah's earpiece.
“We have a problem in the west wing!” the guard shouted before the radio cut to violent static.
Jonah quickly switched the main monitor to the west wing camera feed.
The screen flickered, revealing a terrifying sight.
Both of the elite guards they had just sent out were lying motionless on the carpet.
Standing over them was a man dressed in a dark tactical uniform, holding a suppressed submachine gun.
He looked directly into the security camera and smiled.
Before anyone could react, the man raised a small detonator and pressed the button.
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The entire wall of monitors went instantly black.
The overhead lights died, plunging the windowless control room into absolute, pitch-black darkness.
