Chapter 4 Lilian
LILIAN
PLAYLIST: PROM QUEEN – MOLLY KATE KESTNER
Iwatch the door close through the window of the car.
Never before has someone turned me down. It is a new feeling, one I dislike. I am used to getting what I want, when I want, and however I want it.
I can’t even tell why I am here. I should be everywhere else after what happened, but there was this one infinite moment of glancing into her eyes—
Let it go, I tell myself in my mind. She’s not what you want.
Only I can’t, because the truth is, I want her. I want to touch her, dominate her, make her obey. Maybe it is a delayed stress response I have because she was the one who saved me.
Saved me from being murdered on an open street.
I shake my head as if to evade an invisible fly and roll back my shoulders.
“What do you want me to do, Lil?” asks Doug.
“Let her be for now, maybe she’s in shock. Just drive,” I say, way more empathetic than I usually would. My body feels still shaky, and I can’t stop yawning.
We drive all the way through Brooklyn and the Suburbs. I stare outside the window into the night, with a whole lot of emotions in me. I can’t tell if I am glad or annoyed, and it takes another half hour until my hands finally stop shaking.
Exhaustion rushes through my body, and only then do I realize how tense I have been.
“Do we know anything about who it was?” I finally ask.
“The cameras caught a reflection of the shooter; it came from the opposite building, third level. We’ll plug the government systems in to check every single person who went in or out. I’m certain we’ll find a match. Almost every corner is covered with cameras there.”
Question after question surges through my brain. None of which I can answer. I close my eyes.
There is only one thing I now know: Jared’s death was not an overdose.
Goosebumps spread over my arms as I realize how much worse everything is. I open my eyes and pull out my phone to dial Jared’s head of security.
“It’s me, Lilian,” I say when he answers. “Did you check your systems? And I mean his personal vault, did you check for breaches?”
“Yes, but we couldn’t find anything.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing,” he says.
“I’d like to check it,” I say. “Under the clause of his contract, I can invoke that right to access company data anyway. I have different means to check a system.”
There is a moment of silence.
“Sure, Lilian. The feds cleared everything anyway, and Jared has left his empire to no one, so who cares?”
Secretly, I hope it will give me the chance to get the files Jared had on me. But if the feds didn’t get to it, I am not so sure I will, even with Zeus and our RATs.
I thank the man and hang up.
“If you ask me,” says my bodyguard, “Jared died of an overdose, and today was a separate incident. It has been three weeks, too much time passed, different MO.”
“I don’t know, Doug. My feeling tells me otherwise.”
“You’re scared,” he says without further elaboration. Doug has been with me for all these years now. He’s been my protection since I turned twenty-five. As far as I trust people, he is the one. And the only one I allow to point me towards the things I may not see so clearly.
“I am, and yet my gut feeling has never misled me. Let's just get to Jared’s. We’re gonna breach the systems. I want to investigate that ourselves.”
Only there is nothing to be found. I comb through his systems with meticulous care, but there is nothing there. Worst of all, I can’t find the data I was hoping to erase. The system is clean, almost too clean.
I also watch all the security footage. The entire apartment is filled with cameras, except his bedroom and the bathrooms.
“Who’s that?” I ask the Head of Security as I watch Jared enter the apartment with an extremely hot, brown-haired woman.
“A pickup from a bar,” says the man. “Was cleared because she was in a hotel at the time of the death.”
“What’s she writing on the wall?”
“Her bank account number, he transferred money to her, um, for services on his body, I believe. She was checked and turned out legit.”
I sigh. “Did the autopsy bring anything?”
“Lethal level of amphetamines, and high blood alcohol that would knock out an elephant.”
“Makes sense,” I say, while my gut still tells me there’s something not right.
I check all log files once more and verify the timestamps. They all fit.
As a final act, I let an extension of Zeus collect data on every incoming and outgoing data stream. It matches the packages with what was logged with the tower, and then I see it.
Ten minutes after Jared’s estimated time of death, a 100-gigabyte package had been transferred and not logged.
There you are, I say in my mind, as I make a snapshot of it and save the sequence. I browse further and repeat the same action to keep the exact spot hidden, because as of this moment, anyone in Jared’s team is guilty until proven otherwise.
“Anything you found?” asked the Head of Security.
“Nothing of relevance. Looks clean so far,” I say, and add, “I thought there was something, but it turned out to be a dead end. I guess it was an OD after all. I’m also going to invoke clause thirty-one of his contract to copy and wipe any company data, just so you know.”
“Of course,” he says, and lets me be.
My chance to copy the entire system and then wipe everything that might be there.
Two hours later, I walk back outside with Doug. I don’t let anything show on my face before we are in the car.
“I found something,” I say the moment the door shuts.
“Someone logged in, transferred data, and manipulated the files very professionally.
I only caught it because I could access the tower's transmission protocols through Zeus. As of now, his team and everyone are suspects. Jared was murdered, and someone accessed his systems. I was right.”
“Are you telling the cops?”
“No. I couldn’t find the data he had on me. I can’t risk it.”
“What if he bullshitted you?” said Doug, as he glances briefly at me through the rear mirror with his intense blue eyes.
“No, I saw the photo. He had something.”
“Any chance you didn’t catch a single photo?”
“Zeus' facial recognition would’ve. I am quite sure someone took it, someone who knew what they were looking for and what they’re after.”
A queasy sensation spreads through my stomach area. I cannot have those pictures appear anywhere, and yet I know what will happen. Someone knew, and someone came after them. Jared had probably made a million enemies over the past years; one of them might have finally snapped.
“Anyway, I made a copy of everything. I am going to find out who that was.”
“That’s a job for the cops, Lil.”
“And risk finding the person who took the evidence? Absolutely not. I am not going to prison for it.”
“Could be framed, AI-generated, whatever. We can make a story out of that, I’m sure that bulldog of a lawyer you pay will find a way out of it,” says Doug. “But leading a murder investigation?”
“It’s liability,” I say dismissively. I will not discuss the matter further. After everything that happened today, I should go to sleep and start fresh tomorrow. Only if it weren’t for the part of me that wants to release the tension I feel in my body. I grab my phone automatically.
My thumb hovers over her name. Mae. It’s been a year since we ended whatever thing that was, and now—
I really shouldn’t do it, it’s not going anywhere.
I press the name anyway.
“Yes?” asks Mae as she answers the call.
“It’s me, Lil,” I say.
I’m an idiot.
“I know it’s been a long time—“
“It has,” says Mae with her beautiful, calming voice. “I can’t really talk right now, I’m at my girlfriend’s, we’re about to go out.”
My girlfriends. Fuck.
“Oh,” I say. “I’m sorry. Never mind,” I add and hang up. So, Mae has moved on.
I want to drown in the defeat for a moment, but I tell myself to get a grip on myself. I have to suck it up. At least I have everything else in life. Success. Money. Assets. And the security that comes with it.