Chapter 5 - The Midnight Transfer

Mason was already moving before the call ended.

“Can the bank freeze it?” he asked.

“It is frozen,” Hsu said. “But the attacker knows that now.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means they’ll start destroying evidence.”

I grabbed my coat.

“Mom’s house.”

Hsu answered immediately. “Do not go there.”

“She has Dad’s old office.”

“And if the attempt came from that network, we need a warrant, not a family argument.”

I hated waiting more than almost anything.

But discipline is doing the correct thing while every nerve in your body demands something else.

So I waited.

At 1:12 a.m., Hsu called back.

“We have emergency authorization to preserve digital records. Local officers are on their way to secure the residence pending warrant execution.”

“Is Mom there?”

“Her vehicle is.”

“Sienna?”

“Unknown.”

I looked at Mason.

He already had his keys.

We drove to my mother’s neighborhood but stopped two blocks away, where Hsu had asked us to wait.

Rain had started falling, thin and cold.

Blue lights reflected across wet pavement.

I could see the top of Mom’s house through the trees.

The house where I had grown up.

The house my father painted every summer because he refused to pay someone for a job he could do himself.

The house he had nearly lost once because my mother secretly guaranteed one of Sienna’s loans.

Mason parked.

“You okay?”

“No.”

“Good answer.”

I laughed once, without humor.

Ten minutes later, Hsu approached our car under an umbrella.

“Your mother is inside,” he said. “She claims she’s been asleep since eleven.”

“She left the party after ten-thirty.”

“We know.”

“Where’s Sienna?”

“She says she doesn’t know.”

I looked toward the house.

One upstairs light switched off.

Then another.

A vehicle engine roared somewhere behind the property.

Hsu turned.

A black SUV shot out of the rear alley with its lights off.

“Move!” someone shouted.

Two police units pulled away.

The SUV accelerated.

For a second, its rear tires lost grip on the wet pavement.

Then it disappeared around the corner.

Hsu was already speaking into his radio.

I reached for my door.

Mason locked it.

“Liv.”

“That could be Sienna.”

“And the cops are handling it.”

I slammed my palm against the dashboard.

“Damn it.”

Five minutes later, the radio crackled.

Vehicle stopped.

Driver detained.

Not Sienna.

Wesley Kane.

When police brought him back toward the house, his expensive suit was soaked from the rain.

He saw me through the windshield.

His face collapsed.

Not with guilt.

With panic.

He twisted away from the officer holding him.

“Olivia!”

I got out before Mason could stop me.

Hsu stepped between us.

Kane shouted over his shoulder.

“You don’t understand!”

“Then explain it,” I said.

His eyes flicked toward my mother’s house.

“She made me do it.”

My stomach tightened.

“Who?”

Kane swallowed.

Then the front door opened.

My mother stood under the porch light in a robe, arms folded.

Kane stared at her.

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And whispered one name.

“Sienna.”