Chapter Five
1074 Words
The weeks that rolled by were filled with routine and frequent check-ins as a consultant. But I was studying more than enzyme pathways… I was also scanning routes, memorizing entry points, learning faces and most importantly, waiting.
By night, the silence was heavier. Every time I tried to sleep, my thoughts circled back to that same place: Valente Biotech’s restricted lab. I needed proof that Christopher Valente killed my father.
Those cufflinks were the key. My evidence.
But the evidence wasn’t the entire truth… and I needed both.
I tossed and turned on the bed, restless, until the clock struck 10:45. That’s it. No more waiting. I got up, dressed in black; gloves, sneakers with my hoodie and tied my hair back.
I’d been eyeing the restricted access lab for weeks. I finally had clearance to access it for one day, and by midnight, that clearance would vanish.
This was my only window.
I parked three blocks away from Valente Biotech’s downtown headquarters and approached the security post with steady confidence.
“Working late, Miss Aster?” the guard asked, yawning.
“Deadlines,” I said smoothly. “Gotta meet them.”
He waved me through after a quick scan.
The elevator doors closed, and I clicked on the 21st floor button. As I exhaled, something tickled my wrist. A spider. I shrieked softly, shaking it off… my heart raced faster than it should. Great. Of all nights.
When the doors opened, I adjusted my hair, regained my composure, and headed for the restricted lab. The corridor was dead silent. My keycard beeped, and I slipped inside, propping the door open with a chair because the door was the kind that automatically locked from inside.
The computer hummed to life. My fingers flew across the keyboard as I dug through the database, opening archived files. Lines of research data scrolled by for several long minutes, and then I saw it.
Authorization Signature: Adrian Valente.
I froze. Adrian? Not Christopher?
No… I’d seen the cufflink that night. Christopher’s cufflink. The one glinting in the firelight after I removed my blindfold. My mind argued with itself as I backed away, dizzy. I pulled the chair closer to sit, and the sound that followed made my blood run cold.
Click.
The door was sealed shut.
I was locked in.
“Ah, damn it,” I whispered, fumbling for my keycard. My pockets were empty. I must’ve dropped it when that stupid spider startled me in the elevator.
“Perfect,” I muttered under my breath. “Just perfect.”
The lab was dim, lit only by the glow of the screen. 11:50 p.m. I had ten minutes before my access expired. I quickly logged out, heart hammering, already thinking about excuses for tomorrow. Maybe I could claim system maintenance? Maybe—
The door behind me clicked open.
I froze.
Footsteps.
“Who’s there?” the male voice demanded.
I ducked under a desk in the corner, pressing a hand over my mouth. My pulse echoed loud in my ears. The footsteps paused at the computer desk, shutting the system down. Then turned.
Silence stretched long enough to make me doubt if he was still there.
Then the door closed again…this time softly.
A sliver of light stayed at the hinge.
I crawled out, my legs shaking slightly, and breathed out in relief. “Thank God.”
Without a second thought, I slipped through the open gap, gently shut the door behind me and made my way toward the elevator.
Christopher’s POV
Christopher lingered in the corridor long after exiting the elevator that brought him down from the 21st floor. Something felt… off. The faint scent of lavender that was in the restricted room and the fact that the computer was lit when he walked in. Who could have been here? He thought to himself and his brow furrowed. He brushed it off and headed to his car.
“Home, sir?” his driver asked when he reached the black Mercedes-Benz S580.
He nodded, sliding into the backseat.
Five years. Five years since that night.
The headlines still burned behind his eyes:
VALENTE HEIR LINKED TO RESEARCH FIRE & LOCAL SCIENTIST DEAD.
His customized cufflinks, his father’s gift to him, had been found near the body. Reporters called it proof. Police called it a motive. He remembered sitting in that interrogation room as they asked him if he’d ever argued with Dr. Ricci.
Then Alessandro Valente stepped in. Overnight, lawyers appeared, statements rewritten. The official report called it an electrical fault: an accident.
But Christopher never believed it.
Neither did the ghosts.
His uncle, Adrian, had supervised the division. Every time Christopher tried to reopen the case, Adrian dismissed it. “No need to dig up old wounds,” he’d said with that same twisted smile of his.
Old wounds. As if the man who died didn’t mean anything to him, especially to the woman he loved. That man was her father, damn it!
And now there was her: Miss Aster.
Something about her unsettled him. Her voice, her eyes… She looked at him like she was searching for ghosts. Like she’d seen them before.
The car had barely driven a block when he stopped the driver.
“I forgot something, my briefcase. I’ll be right back, Andrew,” he said, stepping out as the driver nodded understandably.
The lights flicked past as he walked the silent hall, each step echoing.
Then, he paused when he heard the elevator chime faintly down the hall.
When still trying to grasp why the elevator would be in use by now, he caught a glimpse of a moving figure. Small and dark.
Probably a woman’s.
His pulse quickened. “Could that be an intruder?” he murmured to himself, jaw tightening.
Without thinking, Christopher turned and started walking fast, towards the figure that was headed to the back exit.
Flora’s POV
I was still trying to make sense of what I’d just seen: Adrian’s signature, not Christopher’s… when I stepped out onto the dimly lit first floor.
I was so deep in thought that I didn’t hear the approaching footsteps from behind.
A firm hand landed on my shoulder.
“Hey. Stop there!” a deep voice barked.
I froze. My heart slammed against my ribs.
No escape routes. No excuses ready.
My mind raced.
Should I turn around and face him?
Or run for it before he sees my face?
- Writer
