Chapter Forty-Six
Sloane
I didn't go to the fucking Alps.
The private jet Vane chartered is sitting on a tarmac at Teterboro, its engines cold and its luxury cabin empty. I am in a safe house in Brooklyn—a nondescript, drafty loft rented under a shell company's name. The air smells of old dust, stale coffee, and the electric hum of the servers stacked on the long wooden table.
I am hunched over a laptop, my hand resting protectively over the slight, invisible curve of my stomach. The nausea is a constant, biting companion now—a sharp, acidic reminder of the secret I am carrying. I am six weeks pregnant, I am alone, and according to the news cycle, I am the most hated woman in America.
But I am also the woman Vane Sterling spent three years training to be his shadow. He taught me how to find the jugular in a balance sheet. He taught me how to weaponize data. And I am about to show the world that the "Ghost" knows exactly where every fucking body is buried.
"Miller," I say, my voice cold and flat. I don't look up from the screen as Vane's former head of legal paces behind me.
"Sloane, you're supposed to be halfway to Switzerland," he says, his voice a frantic, hushed whisper. "If the DA finds out you're still in the city, they'll rip up that immunity deal and toss you right back into the cell Vane just bought your way out of."
"The DA is a variable I've already solved for," I snap, my fingers flying across the keys with a precision that feels like pulling a trigger. "Vane is in General Pop at Rikers. Arthur paid the warden to move him. He's being slaughtered right now while you're worrying about my goddamn travel itinerary."
I pull up the encrypted files Vane had buried deep in the clinic's medical servers—the "Black Vault" he never told the board about.
"I'm not leaving until Arthur Sterling is in a cage of his own," I growl. "Vane gave me the Swiss funds—ten million dollars in liquid crypto. I've already burned through half of it."
"On what? Sloane, that money was for your protection!"
"On the only thing that moves faster than a corrupt legal system," I say, a cold, predatory smile touching my lips. "The truth."
I didn't just contact Echo for the meta-data. I bought the Loring Corp's internal tax returns—the ones they didn't show the auditors before Vane dismantled them. I found the link. Arthur didn't just partner with Loring to frame us; he used their shell companies to launder the board's personal "performance bonuses" during the Tokyo merger. It's not just fraud; it's a federal racketeering case.
"I'm going to leak the real files, Miller," I say, the blue light of the monitor reflecting in my eyes. "Not just the deep-fake evidence. I'm going to show the SEC that the entire board of Sterling is a criminal enterprise. I'll burn the firm to the ground, salt the earth, and dance on the ashes if I have to. Vane can rebuild an empire, but he can't rebuild his life if he's stabbed to death in a shower stall."
I stand up too fast, and the room tilts. A violent wave of dizziness hits me, and I have to grab the edge of the table, my knuckles white, waiting for the world to stop spinning.
"Sloane? Are you alright? You look... god, you're ghost-pale."
"I'm fine," I lie, my voice turning back into iron. I swallow the bile rising in my throat. "I'm just focused. Get the car ready. We're going to the District Attorney's office. I'm going to give that bitch a choice: She releases Vane Sterling tonight, or I release the documents that will end the career of every politician she's ever taken a fucking cent from."
"You're blackmailing the state?" Miller asks, his face drained of color.
"No," I say, picking up my coat and feeling the weight of the flash drive in my pocket. "I'm auditing them. And they're in the red."