Chapter 8 - The Sting Operation
"We don't need to find the server," my mother said, a slow, dangerous smile spreading across her face. "We just need to make them think they’ve found a buyer for it."
"What do you mean, Mom?"
"Arthur Vance is a businessman," Evelyn explained. "He doesn't care about the Coreys. He cares about money. If he realizes the code is worth more on the open market than what the Coreys owe him, he’ll double-cross them in a heartbeat. And I know just the person to play the part of an offshore buyer."
Clara nodded in agreement. "I have a colleague in Vancouver—a venture capitalist who has worked with the federal authorities on white-collar stings before. We can set up a meeting. We offer Vance a deal he can't refuse: three million dollars in cash for the server and the proprietary rights."
"But they'll know it's a trap if I'm involved," I said.
"You won't be," Clara said. "Our 'buyer' will contact Arthur Vance directly, claiming they heard about a highly valuable logistics software source code that is 'under litigation' and want to buy it before the court freezes it. We set the meeting at a neutral location. A hotel suite downtown. We have the police waiting in the next room."
I looked at my mother. She looked ten years younger, her eyes bright with the thrill of the hunt. This was the woman who had survived my father's lies, who had taught me that a woman's best defense is her own intelligence.
"Let's do it," I said.
The next forty-eight hours were a blur of preparation. Clara's contact, a sharp Canadian businessman named Robert, reached out to Arthur Vance. As predicted, Vance took the bait. He was greedy, and he knew the Coreys were a sinking ship. He agreed to bring Daniel and the server to a luxury hotel suite in downtown Seattle to finalize the "under-the-table" sale of the software.
I sat in the police surveillance van parked across the street from the hotel, wearing headphones, listening to the audio feed from the hidden microphones in the suite. My mother sat beside me, her hand resting on my shoulder.
"They're entering the room," the technician in the van said.
On the small monitor, I saw Daniel. He looked terrible—his eyes sunken, his hair greasy, wearing a rumpled jacket. He was carrying my server tower in a black duffel bag. Behind him came Arthur Vance, a slick man in a tailored suit, and Barbara.
Barbara couldn't stay away. She wanted to see the money.
"Do you have the cash?" Vance asked Robert, who was sitting at a desk with an open laptop.
"The funds are in an escrow account, ready to be wired the moment my engineer verifies the source code is intact and unique," Robert said, his voice perfectly calm and professional. "Let’s see the drive."
Daniel opened the duffel bag and pulled out my server. He plugged it into the monitor Robert had provided, his hands shaking so hard he almost dropped the cables.
"It's all here," Daniel said, his voice cracking. "Every line of code. I... I helped her write it. I have the logs to prove I had admin access."
"Did you write any of the code, Mr. Corey?" Robert asked, looking at him coolly.
"Yes," Daniel lied, looking down at his feet. "I did. It's a joint asset."
"He's lying," I whispered in the van, my fists clenching. "He doesn't even know how to write an HTML tag."
"Let him talk," Detective Miller said beside me. "The more he lies, the longer his sentence."
"Excellent," Robert said on the monitor. "And Mrs. Corey—Barbara—you are here to witness that this transaction is being done with the full consent of the Corey family?"
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"Of course," Barbara said, stepping forward, her eyes locked on Robert’s laptop screen. "We are the rightful owners of this technology. Emily is mentally unstable. She’s gone bankrupt, and we are just trying to salvage what’s left of our family's investments."
"Well," Robert said, standing up and closing his laptop. "That is very interesting. Because the actual owner of that software is currently listening to every word you say."
