Chapter 8 - In the Lion's Maw
For a fraction of a second, panic surged through my veins.
Then my finger pressed down on the phone screen.
*Sent.*
The files were gone. Out into the digital ether, pinging off servers across the state and the country.
I looked up at Miller. I didn't reach for the door handle. I unlocked the central locking system with a quiet click, but kept my hands resting flat on the steering wheel.
"Open the door, Audrey," Miller repeated, his eyes dark, flicking nervously up and down the empty street. "Don't make this messy. Your husband is waiting for you."
"Caleb isn't waiting for anyone, Detective," I replied, rolling the window down two inches. "He’s either dead or in pieces on our living room rug. Vance Kane made sure of that."
A faint flicker of irritation crossed Miller's face. "Vance is a businessman. He doesn't kill assets until the accounts are cleared. And right now, the trust fund password requires your signature at the private banking terminal in White Plains. You're going to get into the back of my cruiser, we’re going to take a short drive, and you're going to authorize that transfer."
"And if I refuse?"
Miller smiled—a cold, empty baring of teeth. "Then we find your body in the lake beside your brother-in-law's burning boathouse. The story is already written, Audrey: *Grief-stricken mother kills her daughter’s accomplice in an act of revenge, then turns the gun on herself.* A tragic domestic murder-suicide. The public will weep for you. Caleb will inherit the estate as the sole surviving next of kin, pay off his debts, and disappear to Panama."
He reached through the gap in the window, unlocked the door from the inside, and yanked it open.
His massive hand clamped around my upper arm like an iron vice, pulling me out into the freezing rain. He shoved me hard against the side of the car, confiscating Julian’s phone from my coat pocket.
"Clever girl," he muttered, glancing at the screen. But before he could check the outgoing mail logs, his radio crackled to life on his shoulder.
*"Unit 4, all units, we have an emergency broadcast from dispatch. Federal alert level red. Internal Affairs has issued an immediate containment order for Detective Thomas Miller. Do not engage alone. Repeat, do not engage—"*
Miller froze.
The color drained from his face in an instant. He stared at his radio, then slowly turned his head toward me.
"What did you do?" he whispered.
May you like
"I pressed send," I said softly.
Down the avenue, three blocks away, the wail of high-speed sirens tore through the quiet morning fog. Red and blue strobe lights painted the wet asphalt in furious, flashing colors.
