Sentenced to Marriage by MadlainQ novel Chapter 76

Getting the evidence The clock was ticking. It wouldn’t be so much better if Augustus gave me the real five minutes, but we all knew that he could come back at any time. Nevertheless, we had to proceed methodically.

“OK, we took over the surveillance cameras in the mansion.” I heard Alan’s voice in my ear.” We need to record a loop to play it while you look around the office. Cora, sit behind the old man’s desk and pretend that you are reading the contract. You need to sit motionlessly and count to fifteen, then flip the page and count to fifteen one more time.” I did everything according to Alan’s instructions. By the time the look was prepared to fool any potential security guard watching, I was left with no more than four minutes. I pulled out my phone and turned on my super-scanner apps. The guys, sitting with their computers in the car right outside the gates of the mansion, could see everything I saw on their screens. That way, there were five of us, including Aren and Neil, trying to spot anything unusual. We all figured that the easiest way to find a flash drive would be to search for it with a metal detector and pray that there wouldn’t be too many metal elements in the furniture in the office. Fortunately, the bookshelves, chairs, and a desk were mostly made of wood. Assuming the book covers wouldn’t have any metal pieces embedded, my phone should lead to the drive as soon as I get near it. I started from the door and scanned every shelf, going clockwise. Every time my phone app beeped, every one of us held our breath.. “False alarm…” I sighed in frustration. “It’s a tin wire stuck to a book cover this time.” Time was running out. My heart hammered against my chest, and my hands were starting to sweat. There were only two tall shelves left, and my restlessness kept rising. Was this whole mission for nothing? “Maybe we should change the scanner?” Norton suggested. “Perhaps a thermal scanner would be better?”

“There’s no time for that, “I grunted, slowly moving my hand to scan the length of another shelf.

Suddenly, the phone slipped from my hand and dropped, sliding into a two-inch gap that separated the shelf from the floor.

“God damn it!” I growled angrily as I dropped to my knees and stretched my hand out to reach the phone.

“Breathe, sunshine.” I knew that Aren’s warm voice was meant to soothe me, but it only reminded me that I was about to fail him miserably.

It turned out that my stupid phone landed deeper under the shelf than I thought. With my head on the floor, I had to stretch the entire arm just to touch it. Cursing under my breath, I finally touched the screen, accidentally turning on a flashlight. As the phone lit the floor under the bookshelf, I noticed something strange… Each bookshelf in the room had four round, wooden blocks footing the entire construction, and yet the one block in the back of the

bookshelf seemed to be made of plastic. Could it be the flash drive that we were looking for? My heart sped up, filling me with a bit of new hope. Taking my phone with my trembling hand, I turned on the metal detecting scanner again, directing it to the weird object on the back of the shelf.

“That could be it…” I muttered, reaching my hand out for the plastic object and hoping that the bookshelf wouldn’t fall on me without one piece of support… I grabbed something that looked like a black plastic box and looked at it closely. As I turned it in my fingers, I found a small button, and when I pushed it, the USB plug popped out. I exhaled in a rush, wanting to scream, cry, and laugh at the same time. “We got it…” I breathed, exhausted from the unexpected number of exercises.

The shouts I heard in my ear almost made me deaf, but I didn’t blame them. I couldn’t wait until we could celebrate together. Now I only needed to get out of this place… “What are you doing?” I heard a cold voice behind my back

I swallowed and turned around slowly while hiding the flash drive in my blazer’s pocket. James Winton was standing behind me, his hateful eyes looking me up and down.

“Um… I was invited by Mr. Augustus Winton,” I responded, fisting my hand to prevent it from trembling