Part 15
The next few days passed,
in a blur of paranoia,
and endless coffee.
Eleanor worked from the newsroom,
surrounded by people,
feeling a false sense of security.
She dug into the Geneva connection,
using old contacts,
calling in favors.
A Swiss journalist,
an old friend from her early career,
finally answered her encrypted message.
'I have something,' he wrote,
'but it is too hot for the network.'
'Send it by courier,' she replied,
'to a neutral address.'
She gave him the address of a bookstore,
owned by a trusted friend,
downtown.
When the package arrived,
two days later,
she picked it up on her lunch break.
She sat in a crowded park,
blending in with the tourists,
and opened the padded envelope.
Inside was a USB drive,
and a single sheet of paper,
with a handwritten note.
'This is the corporate structure,
of the shell company,
that bailed out Ashcroft.'
She read the names,
most of them unfamiliar,
dummy directors and fake CEOs.
But one name stood out,
buried in the legal footnotes,
as a majority shareholder.
Elias Thorne.
She knew that name,
everyone in Washington knew that name,
he was a billionaire philanthropist.
He funded hospitals,
built schools,
and donated to every political campaign.
If Thorne was the Director,
then the corruption went deeper,
than anyone could have imagined.
It wasn't just corporate greed,
it was political control,
on a global scale.
Her phone vibrated,
startling her,
breaking her concentration.
It was Margaret.
"Get back to the office,
now," Margaret ordered,
her voice tight with stress.
"What happened?" Eleanor asked,
packing the documents away,
quickly.
"Federal agents are here,
they have a warrant,
and they are searching your desk."
Eleanor froze,
the park around her fading away,
leaving only a cold dread.
They were moving against her,
using the law as a weapon,
to silence her investigation.
"Did they say what they want?" she asked,
walking briskly toward the street,
hailing a cab.
"They said it is a matter of national security,
and something about stolen classified data," Margaret explained.
"Stall them,
I will be there in ten minutes," Eleanor said,
hanging up.
She sat in the back of the taxi,
her mind racing,
formulating a plan.
She could not let them find the USB drive,
or the Swiss documents,
it would be the end of everything.
She slipped the drive into her shoe,
under the sole,
hoping they wouldn't search her person.
When she arrived at the building,
the lobby was swarming,
with men in dark suits.
She took a deep breath,
May you like
straightened her posture,
and walked into the fire.
