Chapter 23 - THE ENCRYPTED KEYCARD
Later that night, I sat alone inside my Mission Bay condo, staring out at the foggy lights of the San Francisco skyline.
I picked up the small glass frame housing the porcelain fragment from Adrian’s dinner plate, feeling a deep, familiar resolve stir inside me.
My phone chimed on the granite counter, displaying an encrypted text message from an untraceable Boston phone number.
The message contained a single high-resolution photograph of a heavily tarnished silver keycard stamped with a golden eagle emblem.
Below the image was a brief caption: The mahogany walls still hold what Eleanor Caldwell tried to burn thirty years ago.
I instantly recognized the golden eagle emblem as the private seal of the Vance-Sterling Investment Trust.
Whoever sent the message knew that Eleanor Caldwell’s reach had extended far beyond construction fraud in California.
By six o'clock the following morning, I booked a red-eye flight to Logan International Airport in Boston.
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Lydia tried to persuade me to bring federal marshals, but I knew official channels would move too slowly to preserve the physical evidence.
As the Boeing 737 banked over Boston Harbor, I looked out at the historic brick brownstones of Beacon Hill, ready to uncover the truth.
