Chapter 6 - The Refinery Option
Ross Energy’s cybersecurity team identified an unauthorized login from Charles’s discarded phone.
He had copied part of my refinery access profile.
He could not control the entire system.
He could falsify sensor readings.
A false reading at the wrong moment could trigger an evacuation, shutdown production, and collapse the company’s stock price.
If investors believed the facility unsafe, Charles could purchase distressed shares through shell companies.
The financial takeover and abuse inside my home were parts of the same plan.
Vanessa had given him my travel schedules, security answers, and old passwords.
She knew which systems I discussed over dinner.
She remembered what I dismissed as unimportant.
At noon, a pressure alarm activated at the Saudi refinery.
The reading showed a dangerous buildup in a storage line.
Engineers began evacuation procedures.
I joined the emergency call from the hospital conference room.
“Verify the mechanical gauge.”
“The digital reading may be false.”
The local supervisor reached the manual instrument.
Pressure was normal.
The alert had been fabricated.
Our team isolated the compromised profile.
No one was hurt.
But Charles had proven he could reach the network.
Then a second false alarm activated at a chemical-storage facility in Louisiana.
News outlets reported possible coordinated failures.
Ross Energy shares began falling.
I called an emergency public briefing.
I disclosed the cyberattack before Charles could shape the story.
I admitted the compromised credentials belonged to me.
I explained that no mechanical failures had occurred.
The honesty stopped the panic.
The stock continued falling, but slower.
Charles lost the crisis he needed.
Vanessa watched the briefing from police custody.
Her attorney requested a meeting.
She offered to locate Charles in exchange for immunity from financial charges.
The prosecutor refused full immunity.
Vanessa changed her demand.
She wanted ownership of our house and five million dollars.
I almost laughed.
She still thought this was a divorce negotiation.
Detective Brooks asked where Charles would go.
Vanessa replied:
“To the place Daniel never checks.”
I knew immediately.
My father’s abandoned lake property.
A house I had not entered since his funeral.
Police arrived there before sunset.
They found Charles’s car.
They found his laptop.
They did not find Charles.
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On the dining table was a photograph of Elena leaving the hospital.
A red circle had been drawn around her face.
