Chapter 4 - Lorraine’s Last Stand
Before I could dismantle Vance’s encryption, the media storm hit.
Lorraine Preston was a woman who believed money could alter reality. When she found out her son was sitting in federal holding without bail, she didn't apologize. She went to war.
She hired Richard Sterling, the most ruthless defense attorney in the state, and a crisis PR firm. By the next morning, articles began appearing in local papers and on social media. They painted a horrific picture. The headlines read: Brilliant Scientist or Unstable Wife? The Tragic Breakdown of Sarah Preston.
They claimed I had suffered a psychotic break due to the stress of my doctoral program. They claimed I had attacked Daniel, cut my own hair in a manic episode, and fabricated the baby monitor video using deep-fake AI technology. Lorraine filed an emergency civil injunction to freeze all of my bank accounts, claiming I was squandering marital assets in my "delusion."
I was sitting at my father’s kitchen table, wearing one of his old flannel shirts, watching Lorraine give a tearful press conference on the morning news.
"My daughter-in-law is a very sick girl," Lorraine said, dabbing her dry eyes with a silk handkerchief. "Daniel only ever tried to love her. She needs hospitalization, not a PhD."
"She’s trying to poison the jury pool," my father said, setting a plate of toast in front of me. "If she casts doubt on your sanity, she casts doubt on the baby monitor footage. She’s trying to buy time for the Apex syndicate to scrub their servers and disappear."
"Let her talk," I said, opening the encrypted laptop the FBI had provided me. "The louder she screams, the harder the trap snaps shut."
My fingers flew across the keyboard. Daniel had stolen my research from my home network, but what he didn't know was that I never kept the master key on my local drive. I had buried it in a dummy file disguised as a digital recipe book.
"I'm in," I told my father.
On my screen, a command terminal blinked. I was remotely accessing the hidden backdoor I had written into my algorithm. If Vance had installed my code on the Apex servers, all I had to do was send a ping, and it would unspool the encryption from the inside out.
"Executing the handshake protocol," I murmured.
I hit Enter.
For ten agonizing seconds, the screen remained black. Then, lines of green text began cascading down the monitor like rain.
"Got them," I breathed.
But it wasn't just Vance's university files. As the algorithm unpacked the data, massive financial ledgers began to populate on my screen. I saw bank routing numbers from the Cayman Islands. I saw the names of politicians, tech CEOs, and university board members who had paid millions to have their children's academic records altered.
And then, I saw a name that made my blood run cold.
Lorraine Preston.
"Dad," I said, pointing at the screen. "Look at this."
My father adjusted his glasses. "Lorraine didn't just know about the Apex syndicate. She was one of their primary investors. She used her charitable foundation to launder the money Vance was making from selling stolen student patents. That's why she was so desperate to force you to drop out. If you presented your algorithm publicly, it would draw attention to the code they were using to hide her money laundering."
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"She wasn't protecting Daniel," I realized, a sickening wave of clarity washing over me. "She was protecting herself. Cutting my hair... humiliating me... it wasn't just cruelty. It was a business transaction."
My father picked up his phone. "I'm calling the Director of the FBI. It's time to end this."
