Chapter 5 - The Defense Contract
By 4:00 AM, the library of the Prescott mansion had been converted into an operational command post.
Federal forensic specialists in white cotton gloves were carefully tagging and bagging every hard drive, laptop, and paper ledger found inside the hidden vault. Outside, the rain had begun to fall, a steady, cold drizzle tapping against the tall leaded glass windows, washing the mud and tire tracks across the ruined lawn.
I sat behind Ethan Prescott’s massive mahogany desk, sipping black coffee from a paper cup that a federal agent had brought me from an all-night diner down on Providence Road.
My phone rang. The screen displayed an encrypted military satellite relay: HQ XVIII AIRBORNE CORPS.
I answered immediately. "Hart."
"Victoria," the voice of Lieutenant General Thomas Vance—three-star commander of Fort Liberty and a man I had served beside during the 2003 invasion of Iraq—resonated through the receiver. "I just received the initial flash report from CID. How is Emily?"
"She’s stable, General," I said, feeling the tight band around my chest ease just a fraction. "She’s at Womack. The medical team is conducting a full forensic workup. Orbital floor fracture, severe soft-tissue trauma, but no intracranial hemorrhage. She’s safe."
"Thank God," Vance exhaled, the sound heavy with the protective fury of a fellow parent. "Now listen to me carefully, Victoria. About ten minutes ago, my headquarters night-duty officer received a call on the red line from the office of Senator William Sterling."
I paused with my coffee cup halfway to my lips.
Senator Sterling was the senior United States Senator from North Carolina, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and a lifelong political patron of the Prescott dynasty.
"What did Sterling want?" I asked, my voice dangerously calm.
"He wanted an immediate administrative hold placed on the CID deployment," Vance said, his tone turning to pure steel. "He claimed an overzealous field grade officer was using military assets to execute a personal vendetta against a prominent North Carolina family. He threatened to hold up our entire corps' upcoming modernization appropriations if I didn't order you back to the installation by sunrise."
"And what did you tell him, sir?"
Vance let out a dry, dangerous chuckle that brought a tight smile to my face. "I told the senator that if he ever used the Pentagon command line to interfere with an active federal kidnapping and felony battery investigation, I would personally deliver his phone logs to the Department of Justice public integrity section by noon. You have my full backing, Victoria. Take those bastards down to the bedrock."
"Thank you, sir."
"One more thing, Colonel," Vance added, his voice dropping into a serious, operational register. "The preliminary review of that flash drive Emily secured? It’s worse than we thought. The funds Ethan was skimming weren't just general base maintenance appropriations. They were tied to Project Sentinel."
My breath caught in my throat.
Project Sentinel was the classified, next-generation encrypted communications relay network being installed across our military’s forward tactical command posts. If that contractor supply chain had been compromised or short-changed for private profit, American soldiers in combat zones were operating with blind, defective communications.
"He was skimming the shielding materials," I whispered, the full, sickening horror of Ethan's greed hitting me like a physical blow. "He was cutting the military-grade copper alloys with cheap commercial industrial wire to pocket the margin."
"Exactly," Vance confirmed. "Which means this is no longer just a domestic violence case, Victoria. This is federal treason and military procurement sabotage during a time of national emergency. The Department of the Army is issuing a formal criminal referral to the FBI and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. Ethan and Brandon aren't going to a state country-club prison. They are going to federal maximum security."
I hung up, staring at the small silver flash drive resting on the green leather desk blotter.
The door to the study opened.
Margaret Prescott was escorted inside by two uniformed federal marshals. She had been allowed to change into a simple woolen dress, but the aristocratic arrogance that had defined her in the hospital corridor was completely gone. Her face was ashen, her silver hair unpinned and straggling across her temples, her hands trembling as she clutched a small leather handbag against her stomach.
She stopped in front of the desk, looking down at me as I sat in her deceased husband's chair.
"Victoria," Margaret began, her voice cracked, hollowed out by the cold reality of the handcuffs waiting in the hallway. "Let’s be sensible. Ethan is young. He made... errors in judgment. But he is still your daughter's husband. If he is ruined, Emily is ruined. The Prescott estate will be tied up in litigation for twenty years. There will be no divorce settlement. There will be nothing left for her."
I looked at the woman who had watched her sons beat my daughter in a cold carriage house, who had ordered her locked in the dark, and who had stood in a hospital room smiling while a doctor tried to falsify medical records.
"You still don't understand, do you, Margaret?" I said softly.
Margaret blinked, her throat working soundlessly.
"You think Emily stayed with Ethan because she wanted your money," I said, rising slowly from the executive chair, towering over her in the quiet study. "You think everyone has a price, because your entire world is built on buying silence, buying judges, and buying compliance."
I walked around the desk, stopping twelve inches from her face.
"My daughter lived in military housing for eighteen years," I whispered, each word cold as ice. "She watched her mother deploy to war four times. She learned that loyalty isn't bought with trust funds; it's forged in honor, sacrifice, and truth. She didn't want your banking empire, Margaret. She just wanted a husband who loved her."
I reached out and gently removed the leather handbag from her trembling grip, handing it to the federal marshal beside her.
"And now?" I continued. "You don't have to worry about the divorce settlement. Under the Federal Asset Forfeiture and Racketeering statutes, every acre of this estate, every bank account bearing the Prescott name, and every stock certificate tied to your family holdings is being frozen by the United States government as proceeds of criminal fraud."
Margaret swayed on her feet, the blood draining entirely from her lips. "No... no, this house has been in our family for ninety years..."
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"Then I suggest you take a very good look at it on your way out," I said. "Because by the time the Department of Justice finishes liquidating your assets to repay the military families your son robbed, the only thing bearing the Prescott name will be a federal case file."
The marshals took Margaret by her elbows, turned her toward the grand foyer, and walked her out into the cold morning rain.
