As tempting as it was to wait until the weekend and take Hank Matthews up on his offer to tour his building, so I could get inside, I didn’t know if that would give me the access I needed. It was unlikely that a man like Josef Weber would leave incriminating evidence lying around. I needed someone on the inside, and I had them—once they fell deeper into my trap. I took the computers back to my place, set up my bedroom to look like a teenage girl threw up pop culture on the walls, and then waited until my pretend school day was over. I watched as Hank Matthews got online, and a smile spread across my face when I was the first person he messaged. He had been thinking about me all day—I just had to get him to admit it.

TheHankster: Hey there, beautiful.

SunshineSoul16: Hello!

TheHankster: So, your parents aren’t home tonight?

SunshineSoul16: Nope! They just left for a dinner party. I think it’s a date. :)

TheHankster: No brothers or sisters around?

SunshineSoul16: I’m an only child, so I’m here by myself.

TheHankster: Want to turn on your camera for me?

SunshineSoul16: Do I get to see you too?

TheHankster: Of course.

Hank’s company profile picture was taken at least ten years and thirty pounds before he turned his camera on. He wasn’t a bad looking guy, but far from my type. I had pretended before, so I prepared to do my best acting job ever. Seeing me seemed to loosen his inhibitions a lot and I was already loading up all of his personal information on the other laptop. He had a wife, two children, and he was a deacon at his church. I could make all of that come crashing down with the push of a button, but I was going to spare him all of that—at least until I got what I needed. I knew he would cave.

It didn’t take long for him to ask to see my tits. Normally, I never showed them to anyone, but I needed Hank deep in my web. I needed him to believe he was seeing SunshineSoul’s underage nipples—and I was going to show him more too—anything that it took to keep his attention until he was so far gone that there was no way he could talk his way back from the ledge. I finally convinced him to show me his cock—and I stifled my disgust as he started stroking it to my image on the screen. I let my hand fall beneath my desk—pretended to masturbate along with him—getting off on the thought of having him inside me. At least that was what he needed to believe.

“Okay, Mr. Matthews. I believe we’ve had enough fun.” I put my hand back on my desk and leaned back.

“What? I was just about to finish—wait, did you call me Mr. Matthews?” I watched his hand stop stroking and his erection began to fade.

“Yes. Mr. Hank Matthews, husband to Faith Matthews. Deacon at the First Baptist Church in Chicago—the one on Second Street.” I tilted my head to the side.

“What the fuck…” I saw his hand reach towards his camera to shut it off.

“If you end this conversation, then the next thing I do is email a video of what we just did to everyone on your friends list.” I narrowed my eyes. “You don’t want them to see you talking to a sixteen-year-old girl do you—especially with your dick out.”

“Holy shit.” I saw terror in his eyes. “What do you want? Money? I…”

“No.” I shook my head back and forth. “I want something from Weber Acquisitions.”

“My—company?” He blinked in surprise. “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m a little dose of sunshine—but not for you.” I exhaled sharply. “Tomorrow, you’re going to walk into work and you’re going to look up a list of companies that Weber Acquisitions purchased—I want everything related to them. I’ll send you a link where I want you to put all of the documents.”

“This is—this is blackmail.” His face turned white. “You can’t do this! My boss tracks everything! He’ll know it was me!”

“What is more valuable to you right now? Your job or your reputation?” I growled under my breath. “You have to choose one of them right now, and if I were you, I’d choose the one that won’t put you in a jail cell with a bunch of men that would love to make you the sixteen-year-old girl.”

“Fuck…” A blank expression settled on his face. “Okay, I’ll do it—but you have to destroy this video!”

“If you put those documents here.” I sent him a link over the chat server. “Then you’ll never hear from me again.”

“I need—proof.” He leaned forward. “How do I know you won’t ask for something else?”

“You don’t, but then again—I think that’s fair.” I nodded slowly. “You should be a little more careful online, Mr. Matthews.”

I shut down the camera and ended our chat session. For the first time, I felt good about what I had done to someone when I took advantage of their fantasies. I felt empowered using my skills for good instead of malice. Mr. Matthews was definitely not going to spend the rest of his life living in fear of me. As soon as I had what I needed, I was going to email all of his chat logs to the authorities. My persona might have been a lie, but the other girls weren’t—and judging by some of his logs, I wasn’t the first girl that had seen his dick. He was a predator, and he deserved nothing less than everything he was going to get, but I needed his compliance before I could pull the trigger.

Now I wait—and hope he doesn’t grow a spine before tomorrow.

I barely got any sleep and as soon as the workday started, I stared at the folder where he was supposed to deposit the documents. Two hours went by and my stomach turned into a knot. I was imagining every scenario possible, and they were all going wrong in my head—until something showed up. A single PDF document. Then more—then the floodgates opened, and they just started pouring into the folder. It was a small victory, but I wouldn’t know if it was a significant one until I was able to go through the documents. I quickly downloaded them to my computer, Wyatt’s computer, and Reynard’s computer. I didn’t want to risk something happening to them, or a random crash destroying the evidence.

The first few documents were useless—just transfer invoices, paperwork, legal jargon, and other nonsense. Then I found one that was signed—signed by a woman named Hannah Clark. That had to be here. Hannah Ashton—her real name was Hannah Clark. I typed her name into a search engine and didn’t find much. The name was too common. I kept digging—going deeper into the documents while adding more details as I found them. I was almost at the end of my search when I noticed that another PDF document had been added to the folder. I hovered over it and as I did, a text document appeared next to it that said Open Me on it.

What’s this?

I opened the text document and it was just a single line that read — This is what you’re looking for. I expect you to hold up your end of the deal. I opened the PDF document and my eyes nearly bulged out of my head—it was a contract. A contract between Hannah Clark and Josef Weber. It detailed how Josef Weber was going to help her acquire her family’s company, Jackson Investments, and in exchange, she would sign over the holding companies that she owned. It might as well have been a confession. It proved that Josef Weber knew what was going on before he bought the shell companies, but more importantly—it also proved that Hannah was not some confused sister that got taken advantage of. She entered into an agreement with Josef Weber and leveraged what she had against her family as an asset.

But in order to get Jackson Investments, she needed a copy of her father’s will—and Wyatt was the only one who had that.

I felt a chill sweep over me—what if Wyatt’s death wasn’t suicide? I turned back to Wyatt’s computer and pulled up the logs from the day he died. I was looking for a software update—and I found exactly what I was afraid I would. The day Wyatt killed himself, or was murdered, someone put a flash drive into his computer. His computer immediately downloaded the software for the model number. If it was a flash drive, he owned that he normally put into his computer, that wouldn’t have been necessary. That meant there was a good chance someone used his computer the day he killed himself—and I pretty convinced that there was only one thing they were interested in copying—his father’s secret will.

If this turns out to be more than a theory, then they killed him—they killed him to get their hands on that will

But if they killed him to cover this up—and Josef Weber tracks everything like Hank Matthews said—I may have just put myself in danger.

I gathered everything I could and left my apartment. It wouldn’t be easy for Weber to find me, but he had the kind of financial assets that Reynard had—it would only be a matter of time. He might not know that I was directly involved with the Jackson brothers, but he would figure that out once he saw what I stole. I decided to hide out at Reynard’s place—I knew I would be safe there at least and he had security cameras—not that I wanted to be there long enough to need them.

Now I need to find someone that I can trust—someone that can get them out of jail and make sure the right people are behind bars instead.

I wished I could ask Reynard or Mauro, but it was too risky to travel to Chicago—that would put me even closer to Weber and I didn’t want to be separated from the evidence I had. I decided that the best course of action would be to call Abigail. If Reynard and Mauro trusted her, she would probably know who to call. A quick conversation with her put me in touch with a man named Robert Fisk, who was an attorney for the Jackson brothers. I emailed him the evidence—and I waited—waited for good news.

But mostly I was waiting for Reynard and Mauro to walk through the door.

Because I wanted them to put me back in my cage.

And I didn’t want them to ever let me go.