Chapter 5 - The Inside Job
The air in the bank suddenly felt too thin to breathe.
Detective Price, the woman who had warned me about Adrian, was actually a part of the syndicate.
She was their inside person in the state fraud office, feeding them targets and covering their tracks.
I realized the encrypted messages I had sent her with the evidence were probably being used to monitor my exact moves.
I had to act immediately before the bank teller realized I was panicking.
I calmly asked the teller to freeze the account using a federal override code I knew from my forensic accounting days.
I typed the command into the keypad, effectively locking the funds in a bureaucratic nightmare that would take months to untangle.
I walked back out to the lobby where Adrian and Celeste were waiting impatiently.
I smiled and told them the transfer would take exactly twenty-four hours to clear international banking regulations.
Adrian looked suspicious, demanding to see the transaction receipt.
I handed him a forged printout the teller had generated at my request, showing a pending status.
Celeste snatched the paper, analyzing it with the sharp eyes of a seasoned criminal.
She nodded at Adrian, confirming that the document looked legitimate.
They escorted me back to the car, believing they had just secured a million-dollar payday.
As we drove back toward the isolated beach house, a black SUV suddenly cut us off on the narrow coastal road.
Two men in dark suits stepped out, and one of them pulled out a suppressed handgun.
Adrian cursed loudly and threw the car into reverse, but another SUV blocked our retreat.
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The man with the gun walked up to my window and knocked on the glass.
When he took off his sunglasses, I realized it was my father’s former business partner, a man I thought had died five years ago.
