Chapter 8: The Twelve Hours
We went back to the estate.
Emma sat at the desk in my study — my desk, the one nobody else sat at — and spread out what she had.
The photograph from Reyes's briefcase.
A handwritten list of dates she'd compiled from her mother's bank statements.
A copy of the forged co-signer document with her father's name on it.
Luke laid out what we had on our side.
Hale's financial records going back three years.
Testimony from two of the other nine families, gathered quietly over the past eighteen months.
A chain of wire transfers connecting Hale's holding company to accounts that had been drained in the same pattern as Margaret Carter's.
Together, it was almost enough.
"Almost," Luke said.
"The photograph connects Reyes to Aldridge," I said.
"The wire transfers connect Hale to the extracted funds.
What we're missing is a direct link between Hale and the forged documents themselves."
"Reyes is the link," Emma said.
"He referred the accounts to Aldridge.
That's what the margin note says.
If Reyes was referring accounts, Hale was directing him.
Hale ran Reyes."
"We can argue that.
A good prosecutor can argue that.
But Hale's lawyers will argue the opposite, and without Aldridge's records—"
"What about Reyes himself?" Emma said.
Luke and I both looked at her.
"You showed him the photograph," I said.
"He knows he's exposed."
"He walked away fast," she said.
"Not toward a car.
Toward the train station two blocks east.
I watched which direction he went." She paused.
"He's not going to Hale.
He's running."
Luke was already on his phone.
"A man running from Hale," Emma continued, "is a man who might want to talk to someone who can protect him."
"We're not law enforcement," I said.
"No.
But you know people who are."
I looked at her.
"You've been building this case for two years," she said.
"You have contacts.
People who would want what you have, combined with a cooperating witness."
"Reyes would have to agree to cooperate."
"He's running from a man who just ordered a fire to destroy evidence.
He knows what Hale does to people who become liabilities." She held my gaze.
"Give him a reason to talk before Hale gives him a reason not to."
Luke looked up from his phone.
"I have his location.
He's at the Blue Line station on Damen.
He hasn't boarded yet."
I made a decision.
"Go," I said to Luke.
"Don't bring him here.
Somewhere neutral.
And Luke—" He paused at the door.
"Don't frighten him.
We need him willing."
Luke left.
The study went quiet.
Emma began organizing the documents into a single pile, edges aligned, the way she straightened things without thinking about it.
"You should sleep," I said.
"I slept last night." A pause.
"Apparently."
"Emma."
She looked up.
"What Hale offered me," I said.
"The name of who ordered the hit.
I want you to know I didn't consider it."
She was quiet for a moment.
"You could have.
It would have been reasonable."
"It wasn't a difficult decision."
"Why not?"
I looked at the documents on the desk.
Thomas Carter's forged name.
Margaret Carter's stolen money.
Nine families who hadn't done anything except trust the wrong institution with the wrong account.
"Because some things you don't trade," I said.
"Even for something you want."
She looked at me for a long moment.
Then she looked back at the documents and continued straightening them.
"My mother used to say that," she said quietly.
"Some things you don't trade."
Neither of us said anything after that.
The clock on the wall moved.
Somewhere in the city, Luke was talking to a frightened man at a train station.
At 4:17 in the morning, Luke called.
"Reyes will talk," he said.
"He wants immunity."
"That's not ours to give."
"He knows.
He's asking us to make the introduction.
Tonight."
I looked at Emma.
She was watching me.
"Tell him he has an hour to decide," I said.
"After that, the offer is gone and he takes his chances with Hale alone."
May you like
Fourteen minutes later, Reyes called Luke back.
He was ready to talk.
