Zero Days

Zero Days Plot Summary

Introduction

# Shadows of Deception: A Digital Conspiracy Thriller Jack Cross scaled the six-foot wall around Arden Alliance with practiced ease, her red hair catching moonlight as she dropped silently into the corporate car park. This was supposed to be routine—another penetration test where she broke into buildings while her husband Gabe guided her through security systems from their home office. Their partnership was perfect: Jack handled the physical infiltration, Gabe worked his digital magic, and together they ran Crossways Security, exposing vulnerabilities before real criminals could exploit them. But when Jack returned home that night, expecting takeaway food and Gabe's warm embrace, she found him slumped over his computer in a pool of blood so vast it reflected the flickering screen lights. His throat had been savagely cut, his noise-canceling headphones still covering his ears—he never heard his killer approaching. Within hours, Jack transformed from grieving widow to prime suspect when a million-pound life insurance policy appeared in her inbox, a document she swore she'd never seen before. The police saw motive and opportunity. Jack saw a trap closing around her, one that would force her to choose between surrender and a desperate flight into London's digital shadows.

Chapter 1: The Perfect Crime: Murder in the Digital Age

The metallic smell hit Jack before she saw the blood. Their hallway, usually filled with the comfortable chaos of two tech consultants' lives, reeked like a butcher shop. Red smears on the floor led to their living room, where Gabe sat motionless at his workstation, his body draped over the keyboard in a crimson lake that stretched from desk to carpet. Jack touched his shoulder, whispering his name, trying to wake him from what couldn't possibly be real. When she forced his weight back in the chair, his head lolled at an unnatural angle that spoke of absolute finality. The gentle man who could fix anything, who made even the worst days bearable with his encompassing hugs, was gone. His windpipe had been ripped through the front of his neck with savage brutality—not the clean slice she might have imagined, but something that looked like animal violence. She curled up on their sofa, rocking and keening his name, her system refusing to process this sequence of events. Error: an unhandled exception has occurred. Time became meaningless in that room where her future had died along with her husband. The computer lights flickered in their reflection of blood, casting dancing shadows across walls that had once meant safety. When Jack finally called 999, her voice was surprisingly steady, though inside she felt like drowning. "My husband—he's been murdered." The words sounded impossible coming from her own mouth, but the evidence was undeniable. Someone had entered their home and butchered the gentlest man she knew, leaving her alone in a world that no longer made sense. The police arrived with sirens and flashing lights, transforming her quiet street into a crime scene. White-overalled forensics officers laid down mats and set up harsh lights that illuminated every detail of the carnage. As they led her away, Jack caught one last glimpse of the living room where she and Gabe had spent countless evenings, now violated by violence and reduced to evidence in a case she couldn't yet comprehend.

Chapter 2: Framed by Blood: When Evidence Becomes a Weapon

The interview room felt like a trap closing around Jack with each repeated question. Detective Sergeant Habiba Malik pressed her again and again about the timeline—why had it taken so long to drive home, why was her phone switched off, why had she waited nearly an hour before calling for help? Their skepticism was palpable, transforming her from grieving widow to prime suspect with surgical precision. "We're struggling to make these timings add up," Malik said, her voice deceptively gentle. The subtext was clear: Jack's story didn't hold water, and they knew it. When they showed her the photograph of the kitchen knife—Gabe's expensive Japanese blade, now stained with his blood—Jack felt the walls closing in completely. It was their knife, from their wedding registry, covered in what looked like her husband's life. The email arrived like a death sentence. Sunsmile Insurance Ltd was delighted to confirm her joint life insurance policy with Gabriel Medway—one million pounds, activated just days before his death. Jack stared at the screen in disbelief. They had never discussed life insurance, never needed it for their mortgage-free house or freelance lifestyle. The policy was either an elaborate frame-up or Gabe's final, inadvertent betrayal—his attempt to protect her becoming the very evidence that would destroy her. The realization hit like ice water: someone was setting her up. The broken bathroom fan, the missing hard drive, the convenient insurance policy—it all pointed to a professional hit designed to frame the victim's wife. But who would orchestrate such an elaborate deception, and why target Gabe? As she sat in that sterile interview room, Jack understood that the police had already made up their minds. When Malik's voice drifted through the corridor—"I say we nick her now"—Jack knew she was out of time. The police weren't interested in finding Gabe's real killer; they had their convenient suspect and a motive worth a million pounds. Justice for Gabe would have to come from somewhere else, and Jack was the only one left to find it.

Chapter 3: Flight into Shadows: From Widow to Fugitive

Jack's decision to run came in a heartbeat of desperation. As DS Malik discussed her arrest with colleagues in the corridor, Jack realized that waiting for justice meant accepting injustice. The police had their narrative—jealous wife kills husband for insurance money—and no amount of protestation would change their minds. If she stayed, Gabe's real killer would disappear into the shadows while she rotted in prison. The escape required every skill she'd honed as a penetration tester. Using a Sharpie to jam the security door, she slipped through the police station like a ghost, staying in CCTV blind spots and timing her movements to avoid detection. Her heart hammered as she passed the front desk, but the officer was distracted by a complaining citizen, allowing her to walk out into the car park unnoticed. At her house, Jack found the bathroom window fan cracked and loose—the killer's entry point that the police had somehow missed. She squeezed through the same route her husband's murderer had taken, the violation of following in those footsteps making her stomach churn. Inside, she gathered her go-bag and Gabe's Bitcoin wallet key, hidden in a battered copy of Dashiell Hammett's "The Glass Key." A police officer's unexpected arrival turned retrieval into a desperate game of hide-and-seek. Jack crouched in their bedroom wardrobe, listening to heavy footsteps and wheezing breath as the officer searched the house. When he discovered the displaced ceiling tile in the bathroom, she knew her time was up. The crash through the wardrobe doors, the wild sprint across rooftops, the leap into her neighbor's garden—it all blurred into a sequence of pure survival instinct. Bleeding from a puncture wound sustained in her escape, Jack talked her way through a stranger's house and onto the street. She was now a fugitive, her face likely plastered across every police computer in London. The woman who had entered that police station as a cooperative witness had emerged as a wanted criminal, her transformation complete and irreversible. Behind her, sirens wailed through the neighborhood as reinforcements arrived. Ahead lay only uncertainty and the slim hope that she could somehow prove her innocence from the shadows.

Chapter 4: The Hunter Becomes Hunted: Chasing Digital Ghosts

London became a maze of surveillance cameras and suspicious eyes. Jack's distinctive red hair was a liability that had to go, so she found refuge in a shopping center bathroom, applying bleach with grim determination. The chemicals burned her scalp raw as she watched her identity wash away in creamy white foam. The woman who emerged had draggled platinum hair and the hollow-eyed look of someone running on adrenaline and desperation. The backpacker hostel became her first refuge, a place where transient strangers asked no questions and paid in cash. Lucius, an American backpacker, became an unlikely savior when the hostel refused to take cash. His simple kindness—paying for her room without expecting anything in return—reminded Jack that decent people still existed in her increasingly dark world. Her sister Helena became her lifeline, meeting her in secret to provide cash, clothes, and a burner phone. But even Helena couldn't hide her fear. "You look like you're running from something terrible," she whispered, pressing money into Jack's trembling hands. The terrible thing wasn't behind Jack—it was the future stretching ahead without Gabe, a landscape of suspicion and exile. In the hostel's dining room, Jack opened her laptop and found an email from Jeff Leadbetter, her abusive ex-boyfriend and serving police officer. His message dripped with mock concern and barely concealed satisfaction: "Who's been a naughty girl then." The implication was clear—Jeff knew she was on the run, and he was enjoying every moment of her downfall. Jack's reply was pure fury, years of suppressed rage pouring onto the screen. She accused Jeff of the domestic abuse he'd inflicted, the stalking campaign after their breakup, and the police cover-up that had followed her complaints. But Helena's theory haunted her: what if Gabe's murder wasn't about him at all, but about punishing Jack? Jeff had threatened her years ago—"If I can't have you, no one can"—and he had both the connections and the vindictive nature to orchestrate such an elaborate revenge.

Chapter 5: Betrayal's True Face: The Friend Who Became Enemy

Cole Garrick appeared like salvation in human form. Gabe's best friend and fellow programmer found Jack outside his office building, her body shaking with exhaustion and fever. Cole had always been the steady one, the corporate success to Gabe's anarchic brilliance, and now he offered what Jack needed most—help without questions. In an abandoned church in Limehouse, surrounded by dusty pews and filtered light, Cole held her as they both grieved the man they'd lost. "It's so fucking unfair," Cole whispered, his shoulders shaking with tears Jack still couldn't shed. Their shared love for Gabe created an instant bond of understanding—they were the two people who knew him best, now left to navigate a world without his steady presence. Cole's technical expertise proved invaluable, setting up encrypted communications and finding Jack a temporary refuge in his girlfriend's isolated cottage near Rye. The cottage was beautiful but primitive, with no electricity and only oil lamps for light. Jack huddled by the fire, finally able to contact Helena through secure messaging while Cole brought supplies and comfort. But Jack's body was betraying her. The wound in her side, earned while scaling a wall during her escape, had turned angry and infected. Cole tended to it with gentle hands, his concern genuine as he cleaned the festering cut. Yet something felt wrong in the cottage, some discordant note Jack couldn't identify through her pain and grief. Wine and shared loss created a dangerous chemistry, leading to a kiss that felt like betrayal even as Jack's body craved human contact. She pushed him away, horrified at herself, at him, at the way grief could twist into something else entirely. They were both reaching for Gabe through each other, but that path led only to more pain. The cottage that had felt like safety was becoming something else entirely, and Jack's instincts screamed warnings she couldn't yet understand.

Chapter 6: Breaking the Code: Exposing the Conspiracy

Dawn brought police sirens through the sea mist as DS Malik's team surrounded the cottage. Jack escaped through the back window, her wound tearing open as she dropped into the sand dunes. Behind her, she could hear Malik's voice through a loudspeaker: "We know you're out there, you've got nowhere to run." But Jack had been running her entire life, and she wasn't about to stop now. The chase through the dunes became a deadly game of hide-and-seek, torch beams slicing through the fog as officers closed in from multiple directions. Jack's stamina, honed by years of physical training, kept her ahead of her pursuers until she found refuge in an abandoned ice cream shack. Crouched in the darkness, she listened to Malik and Jeff Leadbetter argue about her location, their voices terrifyingly close. Her most desperate gamble led her to Milton Keynes and the Sunsmile Insurance building. Using social media and careful research, Jack had identified her target: Keeley Winston, a call center operator currently home with a sick child. Armed with a forged employee pass and years of social engineering experience, Jack prepared to infiltrate the very company that held the key to Gabe's murder. Inside the corporate maze, surrounded by the chatter of customer service representatives, she accessed the database that would change everything. The policy existed, but the voice on the recorded verification call wasn't Gabe's. Jack listened to the recording again and again, each playback driving the knife of betrayal deeper. The voice belonged to Cole. The man who had comforted her, who had helped dress her wounds and offered sanctuary, was the same man who had set the trap that made her a murder suspect. The cottage that had felt like safety became a prison in her memory, and Jack realized she had been running toward her enemy all along. Cole had been playing a longer game than she imagined, feeding information to handlers who valued digital secrets above human lives.

Chapter 7: Justice in Binary: The Final Confrontation

The confrontation came through encrypted messages and bitter revelations. Gabe had discovered a vulnerability in Cole's security software—a backdoor that allowed complete surveillance of users' phones, cameras, and locations. It was worth millions to the right buyers, and Gabe's ethical stance made him a liability that had to be eliminated. Cole's confession poured out in fragments of desperation and self-justification. He claimed he'd tried to protect Jack by framing her, reasoning that prison was safer than death. But Jack saw through his lies to the ugly truth beneath—Cole had chosen his own survival over his best friend's life. The insurance policy was meant to provide Jack with blood money while ensuring she couldn't investigate further. The warehouse apartment felt like a tomb when Jack confronted Cole in his bedroom. He woke to find her standing over him, no longer the broken woman he'd manipulated but something harder and more dangerous. The gun in his nightstand seemed pathetic against her absolute lack of fear—she had nothing left to lose. Jack's final gambit was born of rage and reckless courage. She uploaded Gabe's files to every platform he'd ever used, broadcasting the vulnerability to the global hacking community. Cole's phone lit up with notifications as the files spread like wildfire through hacker networks, each share another nail in his coffin. His handlers would see the exposure as betrayal, his corporate employers would face regulatory nightmare. The chase through London's streets felt inevitable. Cole fled with desperate efficiency while Jack pursued him down the building's stairs, her infected wound screaming with every step. Police sirens provided the soundtrack to Cole's capture as Detective Malik closed the net. Jack's livestreamed confrontation gave them everything they needed—confession, evidence, and a clear picture of the conspiracy that had cost Gabe his life.

Chapter 8: Phoenix Rising: Rebuilding from Ashes

The hospital bed felt like luxury after weeks of running. Jack's body was broken—ruptured spleen, severe infection, wounds that would leave permanent scars—but her spirit had found something unexpected. The pregnancy test results came as a shock that transformed into wonder. Gabe's child grew inside her, a piece of him that death couldn't touch. Cole's suicide in prison robbed Jack of the satisfaction of seeing him stand trial, but it couldn't diminish what she'd accomplished. The vulnerability was patched, the surveillance network dismantled, and countless potential victims saved from digital predation. Gabe's death had meaning beyond the personal tragedy—it had protected strangers he would never meet. Recovery brought new challenges and unexpected joys. Jack learned to navigate single motherhood while rebuilding her security consulting business. Her daughter Gabby inherited her father's curiosity and her mother's determination, a living reminder that love persists beyond death. The house in Salisbury Lane became a home again, filled with laughter instead of ghosts. The scars remained—physical marks from her desperate flight, emotional wounds that would never fully heal. But Jack had discovered something valuable in the darkness: the knowledge that she could survive anything, that love could endure even the most brutal betrayal.

Summary

Jack Cross had paid the ultimate price for truth and found it was worth every drop of blood, every moment of terror, every sleepless night spent running from shadows. She had won something more precious than justice—she had won the future, and the chance to raise Gabe's daughter in a world made slightly safer by their sacrifice. The conspiracy that killed her husband had been exposed, its architects brought down by the very technology they had corrupted. In the end, love proved stronger than betrayal, and justice emerged from the digital shadows where it had been hiding all along. Jack's journey from grieving widow to hunted fugitive to avenging angel had cost her everything she thought she valued, but given her something infinitely more precious: the knowledge that some things are worth fighting for, no matter the odds, no matter the cost.

About Author

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Ruth Ware

Ware interrogates the boundaries of trust and deception through her intricate thrillers, often immersing readers in a world where the line between ally and adversary is blurred. Her works, including "In a Dark, Dark Wood", "The Woman in Cabin 10", and "The Death of Mrs Westaway", explore themes of isolation and suspense while maintaining a tension that compels readers to question their perceptions. By crafting narratives that are both engaging and unsettling, Ware ensures her books resonate with a wide audience, prompting readers to unravel the complexities of her plots.\n\nHer method involves weaving suspense with deep psychological insights, thereby captivating those who appreciate layered storytelling. Each book invites readers to delve into a labyrinth of twists and turns, with characters whose motives are as unpredictable as the plot itself. Moreover, Ware’s skill in constructing atmospheric settings amplifies the suspense, making her novels an immersive experience. For fans of the thriller genre, her stories offer not only entertainment but also a chance to ponder the deeper implications of trust and human nature.\n\nWare's books have been lauded worldwide, with many reaching bestseller status and being translated into over 40 languages. This international success underscores her ability to connect with a diverse readership, proving the universal appeal of her storytelling. The cinematic potential of her work, with several titles optioned for film and TV, further highlights the compelling nature of her narratives. Therefore, those who seek a gripping, thought-provoking read will find Ware's novels to be a rewarding choice.

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