CHAPTER 6: THE BROKEN PROTECTOR
CHAPTER 6: THE BROKEN PROTECTOR
The door to the motel room didn't click. It swung open slowly. A shadow fell across the carpet. Eleanor Sterling stood in the doorway. She wore no coat. Her expensive dress was ruined by the storm. She looked eighty years old. Julian stood up defensively. "How did you find us?" "I built the tracking network this city runs on, Julian," Eleanor said softly. Her voice was dead. She looked only at Clara. "Let me speak to her. Please." Clara hesitated. Then she nodded. Julian looked at Clara, gave a silent nod, and stepped out into the rainy corridor. The door clicked shut. Silence returned. "Tell me," Clara said. "Everything." Eleanor sat on the room's single plastic chair. "Twenty-five years ago, we were young. Foolish. Visionaries." She swallowed hard. "Your father created an encrypted surveillance algorithm. It was beautiful." "But the government took it," Clara inferred. "They didn't just take it. They weaponized it." Eleanor closed her eyes. "Your father wanted to destroy the servers. He wanted to whistleblow. Richard wanted to sell it to the highest bidder." "And you?" "I wanted to survive," Eleanor whispered. "The agency threatened us. They told me if your father didn't stop, they would eliminate his entire bloodline. Including his five-year-old daughter." Clara stared at her. "You signed the file." "I signed the authorization to contain him. To lock him in a federal facility where they couldn't touch him. I thought I was saving his life." Eleanor looked up, tears streaming freely. "I didn't know Richard had cut a side deal with the agency handler. I didn't know they changed the containment order to an execution." "You raised me out of guilt," Clara said, her voice freezing over. "I raised you because I loved your mother," Eleanor sobbed. "And because I spent every day of the last twenty-five years planning to destroy the man who actually ordered the hit."
