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Once feeling returned to her hands, Cassie looked over at Viotto. “What are we going to do now?”
He reached into the back seat and retrieved a slim laptop, placing it on the dashboard between them. “I’m not waiting to see what’s on this drive.”
“The sooner the better,” Cassie said. “Hopefully, this exonerates Anthony Lewis.”
“Something tells me it will not be that easy.”
Once the computer’s desktop appeared on the screen, Viotto connected the USB. A second or two ticked by before a window popped up containing four folders.
“Video, Emails, Evidence, Plan,” Viotto read. He looked at Cassie. “Lady’s choice.”
“Video,” she said. “Hopefully that’ll give us something to start with.”
Viotto opened the folder to reveal a Word document and an MP4 file. The document was a duplicate of the email Mara had shown them. The video, however, was something new.
Connor’s face filled the frame. He hadn’t quite inherited his father’s good looks, but he had piercing gray eyes that betrayed his intelligence. His jaw was a little soft and his hair was unkempt, but he’d dressed in a button-down shirt with a salmon tie. It made him look older than nineteen.
He had hung a white sheet as his background. Light entered from the right side, and Cassie wondered where he could’ve filmed this. Mara’s dorm? His own bedroom? A room in the library? There was no way to tell.
Connor adjusted his tie and sat up straighter before he began talking.
“My name is Connor Grayson. My father is Senator Lawrence Grayson. I am sending this video to several news outlets, in addition to local and federal authorities. With it, you should have received a zip file attachment. This folder will contain the evidence you need to convict my father of a multitude of crimes.”
Connor paused, leaned forward, and moved something around off camera.
“He made himself cue cards,” Viotto said. “Means he’s doing this alone.”
“That’s good for Mara.”
Both of them went silent when Connor sat back up, shifted around in his seat, and cleared his throat. Cassie got the sense that, if he’d had enough time, he would’ve edited these videos to ensure they came out smooth and professional.
“I have discovered my father, Senator Grayson, is guilty of insider trading. I don’t know how long this has been going on, but I have proof that, for the last several years, he has been buying and selling stock under the advice given to him by various insider friends. We have always lived comfortably, but it wasn’t until the last five years that my dad started bringing in more money. For a while, I thought it was because of his job, but now I have proof it was a lot more than that.”
Cassie leaned toward Viotto and whispered, “He sounds nervous. Unsure of himself.”
“He’s making a pretty big claim,” Viotto whispered back. “This would destroy his father’s career. He’s trying to find a seat at the big kids’ table.”
Cassie’s heart skipped a beat when she realized he’d failed. Whether his death was connected to this video and the evidence Connor had uncovered was yet to be determined, but either way, he’d already suffered consequences—either for his own actions or his father’s.
“In the attached folder, you’ll find hundreds of emails sent between my father and various friends, discussing which stocks to buy and which to sell. Most of this communication was in code, and I’ve decrypted as much as I could. I assume the FBI will get a little further than I did.” He let a small smile slip through before he reeled himself back in. “I gained access to my dad’s email through his personal laptop. The people he’s talking with never reveal their names, but between the companies they’re discussing and my personal knowledge of my father’s relationships with people in those companies, I’ve been able to guess about a dozen of their names. I’ll leave the rest up to the authorities.”
Connor leaned forward, changed his cue card, and sat up again.
“You may wonder why I’m doing this.” Connor stared off into space for a moment before coming back to the present and looking directly into the camera. “Living with my father hasn’t been easy, and we haven’t always gotten along. However, this is not a personal vendetta. What my dad is doing is wrong. I’ve done my fair share of bad things in the past, and I’ve had to pay the price. Now it’s his turn.”
Connor’s gaze lingered for a few more seconds before he stood up and turned off the camera.
Viotto and Cassie exchanged a look.
She was the first to break the silence, but all she could think to say was, “Wow.”
“Yeah.” Viotto rubbed a hand down his face. “I’m not sure I believe him.”
“About what?”
“That this isn’t personal.” He gestured to the screen. “That email he sent his father was personal. Maybe that’s not all it was, but it was a large contributing factor.”
“Mara said he liked the idea of being a hacktivist. Maybe this was where he cut his teeth.”
