Chương 5
Marcus was not merely denying what happened.
He was building his defense around the thing he did not know Chloe had copied.
Park watched me carefully.
“Mrs. Bennett, I need you to tell me exactly what your daughter said about those records.”
I looked through the glass panel in the door at Chloe lying beneath hospital blankets.
Then I looked back at the detective.
“She said Marcus thinks he took the only copy.”
Park’s eyes sharpened.
“And is he wrong?”
“Yes.”
“Where is the copy?”
I thought of Chloe gripping my sleeve inside the ambulance.
Not on the laptop.
That was all she had told me.
“I don’t know.”
Park studied me for a moment, deciding whether I was protecting evidence or simply telling the truth.
Then my phone vibrated.
Marcus.
One text.
I showed it to Park without opening the conversation further.
Tell Chloe she has thirty minutes to return what she stole, or I call the FBI.
Park read it twice.
Then she looked up at me.
“That’s convenient.”
“No,” I said.
“It’s a mistake.”
Because Marcus had finally done something frightened people often did when they believed they were still in control.
He had put his threat in writing.
Detective Park photographed the text on my screen before asking me to place the phone on the counter beside the nurses’ station.
“Do not answer him.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“You looked like you were planning to.”
“That is an occupational hazard.”
“Retired.”
“So everyone keeps reminding me.”
Her mouth moved slightly, but she did not smile.
“Thirty minutes is specific.”
“Yes.”
“Specific deadlines usually mean somebody believes something will happen when they expire.”
“Or wants the recipient to believe it.”
“Exactly.”
She looked through the glass toward Chloe.
“Does your daughter know why the company records matter?”
“She knows enough to have copied them.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No.”
Park waited.
I sighed.
“She told me she saw vendor payments that appeared improper.”
“To whom?”
“I don’t know.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
“How long?”
“I don’t know.”
“You really don’t know much.”
“I learned restraint in government service.”
“That would make you the first.”
I almost liked her.
Then my phone vibrated again.
Park glanced at the screen.
Another message from Marcus.
Twenty-nine minutes.
“Subtle,” she said.
“He likes clocks.”
“He likes control.”
“That too.”
She photographed the second message.
Behind us, an orderly pushed a wheelchair past with an elderly man arguing about whether he was allowed to eat bacon.
His wife told him that surviving a heart attack did not entitle him to become stupid.
He told her stupidity had been covered by their marriage vows.
For half a minute, the hallway belonged to someone else’s life.
Then Dr. Patel emerged.
“Mrs. Bennett?”
I stood.
“Imaging shows two cracked ribs, no pneumothorax, and no intracranial bleed.”
My knees weakened anyway.
He noticed.
“There is no brain bleed.”
“I heard you.”
“She does have a concussion.”
“How severe?”
“Mild by the usual clinical classification, which does not mean pleasant or insignificant.”
“What about the wrist?”
“Sprain, no fracture.”
“And the cold exposure?”
“Her temperature is coming up normally.”
He tucked his hands into his coat pockets.
“She’s lucky.”
I hated that word.
Lucky was what people said when something awful stopped just short of becoming irreversible.
“Can I see her?”
“In a minute.”
Park stepped closer.
“Doctor, will she be admitted?”
“Probably observation for several hours, then discharge if nothing changes.”
“Can she speak with me?”
“That depends entirely on whether she wants to.”
“Understood.”
He left.
Park looked at me.
“You know what happens next.”
“Some of it.”
“I need her statement.”
“Yes.”
“And if she tells me what she told the doctor, we have probable cause to move beyond a conversation at the house.”
“For Marcus?”
“Potentially Sylvia too.”
“Potentially.”
“You don’t like qualifiers.”
“I made a career out of them.”
“No, you made a career out of making other people live with them.”
That one landed.
I folded my arms.
Park did not apologize.
“She is the victim here,” she said.
“Not you.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
I looked through the glass again.
Chloe was drinking water through a straw while the nurse adjusted the blankets around her.
“I’m trying.”
“That’s better than pretending.”
She started to walk away.
“Detective.”
Park turned.
“If Marcus called the FBI himself, what would happen?”
“That depends what he reports.”
“If he claims Chloe stole confidential company records.”
“They may listen.”
“And if he claims trade secrets?”
“They may listen harder.”
“You’re being careful.”
“So are you.”
Because we both knew the uncomfortable truth.
Being injured did not immunize Chloe from scrutiny.
If she had accessed information unlawfully, copied protected data without authorization, or transmitted it somewhere she had no right to send it, Marcus could potentially create a second investigation that complicated the first.
That did not erase what he had done to her.
It did not make his threats innocent.
It simply meant the world was not obliged to arrange itself into victims and villains cleanly enough for a holiday television movie.
“Did she have authorized access to the records?” Park asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Then find out before you assume the answer helps.”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to investigate.”
“You’re not.”
Her eyes sharpened.
“You are supposed to let your daughter tell the truth, including the parts you don’t like.”
Then she walked away.
I went into Chloe’s room.
She was sitting slightly upright now.
Someone had cleaned the dried blood from her face.
Without it, she somehow looked younger.
“Two ribs,” she said.
“I heard.”
“And apparently my brain is only mildly damaged.”
“You always were an engineer.”
“Funny.”
“No charge.”
Her face changed when she saw the phone in my hand.
“He texted you.”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
I told her.
She closed her eye.
“Of course he did.”
“Chloe, I need to ask you something.”
“No prosecutor voice.”
May you like
“I don’t have a prosecutor voice.”
“You absolutely have a prosecutor voice.”
