Chapter 8 - The Net Closes
The garage was silent except for the harsh sound of our breathing and the steady drumming of rain against the broken windowpane.
I slid down the wall to the floor, coughing violently, my hand pressed against my bruised throat. Emily dropped the brick, fell to her knees beside me, and wrapped her arms around my neck.
“Mom,” she wept, her body shaking with tremors that rattled her teeth. “Mom... you’re alive. You’re alive.”
“I’m here, baby,” I croaked, my voice little more than a ragged hiss. “I’m here. We’re both here.”
I didn't let us rest for more than thirty seconds. An archivist knows that the crime scene is only secure when the perpetrators are in custody.
“Get his keys,” I whispered, nodding toward Daniel’s sweatpants.
Emily reached into his pocket and pulled out his key ring and his personal phone. I took the phone, used Daniel’s limp thumb to unlock the biometric screen, and immediately opened his messaging app.
The outgoing text to Deputy Miller had been scheduled via an automation app—it was an automated routine set to fire from a secondary burner number Daniel had registered under Emily’s maiden name.
He had created a digital ghost.
And then, his phone vibrated in my palm.
An incoming call from: **MOM**.
I tapped the speaker button, keeping my mouth shut.
Patricia’s voice came through the small speaker, sharp, brisk, and triumphant.
“Daniel? The notary stamped the irrevocable trust transfer. The funds are moving to the account in George Town right now. It will clear by nine-fifteen. Is the girl loaded in the trunk? We need to be on the interstate before Margaret calls that idiot deputy again.”
I cleared the blood from my throat and spoke into the microphone, my voice steady, ice-cold, and entirely devoid of fear.
“Patricia,” I said.
The line went dead silent. I could hear the faint hum of Patricia’s car engine, the click of her turn signal.
“Margaret?” Her voice was suddenly stripped of all its condescending polish, thin and trembling like wet tissue paper.
“Daniel is currently unconscious on the garage floor with a broken nose, a crushed orbit, and a severe concussion,” I said evenly. “The county sheriff, the state troopers, and the FBI’s financial crimes division have already received the audit logs for Emily’s trust fund. If you don't turn your car around and drive directly to the county courthouse to surrender, I will make sure the prosecutor charges you as a primary co-conspirator in an attempted capital murder.”
“You... you can’t prove—”
“I have your voice on a recorded line, Patricia. I spent twelve years filing evidence that put smarter people than you on death row. Turn the car around.”
I ended the call, stood up using the workbench for support, and dialed the direct line to the sheriff’s personal cell phone—not dispatch, but Sheriff Thomas Vance, my late husband’s cousin.
May you like
“Tom,” I said when he answered on the second ring. “I need three cruisers, an ambulance, and the district attorney at 414 Old Mill Road. Now. Bring zip-ties. Daniel is down, but he’s still breathing.”
***
