Chapter 8 - THE UNOPENED COMPARTMENT
Grace reached out, her fingers touching the cool metal of the bolt handle.
"If my father kept it for twenty years, he had a reason," Grace insisted, her voice filled with deep, unwavering loyalty to her father's memory. "He wasn't a man who broke regulations without cause."
"He kept it because he knew what was inside it," Jack replied.
Grace frowned. "Inside it? It's a solid walnut stock."
Jack did not answer verbally. Instead, he pulled a small multi-tool from his tactical belt and unfolded a fine, flat-head screwdriver bit.
With slow, deliberate precision, Jack turned the vintage rifle on its side, exposing the bottom of the buttplate—a thick piece of blackened steel secured to the rear of the wooden stock by two heavy slotted screws.
The screws were covered in a thin layer of old black wax, completely hiding their threads from casual inspection.
Jack used the tip of his tool to scrape away the wax, revealing pristine, untarnished steel beneath. He inserted the screwdriver bit into the top screw, applying firm downward pressure as he turned it counterclockwise.
CREAK.
The twenty-year-old screw gave way with a sharp, dry pop.
Grace watched in total fascination, her breath held in her chest as Jack rapidly removed the second screw. He set the two steel fasteners on the wooden bench, then gently pried the heavy steel buttplate away from the heel of the walnut stock.
Beneath the plate, carved directly into the heart of the solid wood, was a hollowed-out rectangular cavity roughly three inches deep.
Resting inside the dark cavity was a small, vacuum-sealed plastic packet containing a folded piece of thick, waterproof military paper and a small, metallic flash drive coated in anti-static film.
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Jack stared into the hollow cavity, his face completely motionless, his chest barely rising as he looked at the hidden contents.
"He didn't destroy it," Jack whispered, his voice filled with a mixture of profound awe and sudden, dark dread. "He hid the truth inside the only thing he knew no one would ever search—his daughter's target rifle."
