But the pressure couplings my father’s company had falsified were already installed on three active-duty fast-attack submarines.

Those vessels were currently submerged in the deep waters of the Western Pacific.

Every hour they remained at operational depth, the safety margins degraded.

“I need the delivery logs,” I told Bell. “I need to know exactly which hull numbers received the substandard alloy batches.”

“We’re looking for the master log now,” Bell said.

An agent emerged from the study, carrying a thick, black leather-bound binder with a heavy brass lock.

“Admiral, we found the access registry,” the agent said, holding it up.

This was the family binder, the manual record of every encrypted server partition and offshore account.

My father made a sudden, desperate movement toward the agent, but Nathan stepped into his path.

Gordon stopped, panting, his face mottled red.

“That is private proprietary data,” my father snarled.

“It’s evidence now, Mr. Hart,” the agent said.

Another agent called out from the study, his voice sharp with urgency.

“Sir, we have an active deletion script running on the main terminal!”