Chapter 5 - THE PRICE OF BEING SEEN
Daniel wanted Maya placed under twenty-four-hour security.
Maya refused.
They argued in his office for fifteen minutes.
“Someone photographed you outside your apartment.”
“And therefore I should live like a prisoner?”
“Therefore you should stop pretending this isn't dangerous.”
“And you should stop pretending you can control everything.”
Daniel stopped.
Maya immediately regretted the sharpness of her tone.
But Daniel surprised her.
“You're right.”
“What?”
“I said you're right.”
“Could you repeat that? I want to record it.”
He almost smiled.
Almost.
They compromised.
Maya accepted transportation to and from work, but no guard would follow her inside her home.
That evening Daniel personally drove her.
When they reached her building in Queens, Ethan was sitting on the front steps with a textbook.
He looked from Maya to Daniel’s expensive car.
“You're the hundred-million-dollar guy.”
Daniel glanced at Maya.
“That's what he calls me?”
“Only because Arrogant Restaurant Guy takes longer.”
Ethan grinned.
Daniel laughed.
It was the first time Maya had heard him laugh without restraint.
Something shifted.
For a few minutes he wasn't the intimidating CEO from the Grand Meridian.
He was simply Daniel.
Then Maya’s apartment door opened upstairs.
Someone had broken in.
Nothing valuable was stolen.
The television remained.
Maya’s emergency cash remained hidden inside a flour container.
But her old university notebooks were scattered across the floor.
One was missing.
The notebook containing a research paper Maya had written at nineteen.
Adaptive load balancing.
Daniel read the surviving pages.
“You were working on predictive energy routing?”
“It was undergraduate work.”
“This is related to Orpheus.”
Maya looked at him.
“That's impossible.”
Daniel turned another page.
At the bottom was the name of Maya’s faculty adviser.
Professor Samuel Carter.
Her father.
Maya went still.
“My father died when I was sixteen.”
Daniel frowned.
“Then why is his name on a paper you wrote when you were nineteen?”
Maya took the notebook.
The handwriting wasn't hers.
Her father’s name had been added later.
She remembered something her mother once told her.
Samuel Carter had worked as an electrical engineer before Maya was born.
He rarely discussed his employer.
Maya searched an old storage box.
Inside she found her father’s employment records.
STERLING RESEARCH DIVISION.
Daniel sat down.
“My father knew your father.”
The revelation changed everything.
They returned to Sterling headquarters and searched archived personnel files.
Samuel Carter had worked directly under Arthur Sterling.
More shocking was the project listed beside his name.
ORPHEUS.
Maya stared at the screen.
Her father had helped create the technology someone was now trying to steal.
A sealed note existed in the archive.
Authorized recipient:
MAYA CARTER.
Daniel looked at her.
“It was left for you.”
“Why wasn't I contacted?”
“The file was classified.”
Daniel entered his executive authorization.
A scanned letter appeared.
Maya recognized her father’s handwriting immediately.
If Maya ever reads this, then Arthur and I were unable to destroy what we created.
Her throat tightened.
Daniel silently moved away, giving her space.
The letter explained that Samuel Carter and Arthur Sterling had discovered a fundamental vulnerability in Orpheus. The system could optimize energy networks, but anyone controlling its predictive layer could deliberately create instability and profit from resulting shortages.
They had decided to bury it.
Someone inside Sterling disagreed.
The letter named no one.
But Samuel had hidden a safeguard.
A mathematical verification key based on something only Maya would recognize.
Her childhood piano exercises.
Maya laughed through sudden tears.
“My dad used to make me practice scales every morning.”
Daniel looked at her gently.
“He trusted you.”
“He didn't even know if I'd become an engineer.”
“Maybe he knew you.”
The words struck deeper than Daniel intended.
For a moment neither moved.
Then Daniel’s phone rang.
Marcus.
Daniel answered.
“Where are you?”
Marcus sounded breathless.
“Daniel, don't trust anyone on the board.”
A crash sounded.
Then silence.
“Marcus?”
Another voice came through.
Calm.
Distorted.
“You should have taken the failed demonstration as a warning.”
The call ended.
Daniel immediately summoned security.
Police were sent to Marcus’s home.
His car was found abandoned near the East River.
There was blood on the driver’s seat.
But Marcus was gone.
Then every screen inside Sterling headquarters went black.
One sentence appeared.
GIVE US THE CARTER KEY.
Daniel looked at Maya.
For the first time since she had met him, he looked afraid.
May you like
Not for his company.
For her.
