Five years after I buri:ed my husband, I visited a colleague and stepped into a bright nursery—only to see Daniel Mercer standing there alive. The man I had mourned was holding a baby bottle, while my mother-in-law fussed over another woman and her newborn like this was a normal family scene. Daniel looked at me, turned white, and dropped the bottle onto the floor. That was when I understood the coffin had been empty. Before nightfall, the lie that protected his entire family would destroy them all.

The threat on my phone screen chilled me to the bone.

I dropped the device onto the passenger seat and drove away from Sophie's neighborhood.

My mind frantically pieced together the puzzle.

Daniel was alive, working for Marcus Vance, and raising a child with another woman.

But why had Sophie hired me at Voss Financial three weeks ago?

It could not be a coincidence.

I pulled into my apartment complex, scanning the shadows for anything out of place.

Once inside, I locked the deadbolt and pulled my old investigative files from the closet safe.

I had kept everything from my time at the attorney general office.

I spread the documents across my kitchen table.

Voss Financial was a subsidiary of a massive real estate conglomerate.

I traced the parent company board of directors.

There it was.

Celeste Mercer was listed as a silent partner.

My mother-in-law owned the very company that had just hired me.

They had brought me in intentionally.

I was being set up as the fall guy for something massive.

My laptop chimed with a notification from my work email.

It was an urgent message from the Voss compliance department.

My employee identification had just authorized a wire transfer of fifty million dollars to an offshore account.

I stared at the screen in horror.

They were laundering cartel money, and my digital signature was on the theft.

“Which daughter is yours?” should have been a harmless question

The first wineglass shattered at 8:07 p.m

The moment the mafia boss’s wife called me “an illiterate servant,”

Someone knocked loudly on my front door.

"Police, open up!" a stern voice shouted from the hallway.

Chapter 3 - The Inside Job