The story moves forward in the next chapter.

-8-

The federal interrogation room was a stark, windowless box made of brushed steel and soundproof acoustic panels. The single overhead fluorescent light cast a harsh, glaring circle down onto a bolted metal table where Dr. Marcus Vance sat hunched over in a standard-issue orange jumpsuit, his hands cuffed to a metal loop in the center of the tabletop.

When I pushed the heavy door open and stepped inside, Marcus didn't look up immediately. His hair was disheveled, his expensive silk tie replaced by the collarless cotton of a detention uniform, and his shoulders slumped under the crushing weight of a ruined career.

I pulled out the metal chair opposite him, sat down with deliberate slowness, and placed a thick manila folder squarely in the center of the table.

The scrape of metal against steel made Marcus finally raise his head. When his bloodshot eyes locked onto mine, a violent shudder ran through his frame.

“Elena...” he choked out, his voice cracking. “Please... I was just following orders. Richard said—he told me you were trying to ruin the family, that you were mentally unstable and stealing from the estate. He said we had to protect the company—”

“Save the family loyalty speech, Marcus,” I interrupted, my voice flat, cold, and utterly devoid of emotion. “You didn't commit murder to protect a company. You did it for a fifty-thousand-dollar wire transfer deposited into an offshore account in the Cayman Islands twelve hours after my grandmother drew her last breath.”

Marcus flinched as if he had been physically struck. He dropped his gaze back to the tabletop, his mouth working silently as he searched for words that no longer existed.

“Let’s review the timeline together, shall we?” I opened the manila folder and pulled out a hospital admittance sheet, sliding it across the table toward him. “Three weeks ago, Grandma called me to tell me she discovered Richard siphoning money from the employee pension fund. She told me she was rewriting her trust to disinherit my parents entirely and hand operational control of Sterling Logistics over to me.”

Marcus swallowed hard, sweat beading along his hairline.

“She died of a sudden, unexpected stroke while recovering in a secure room at St. Jude’s Memorial Hospital,” I continued, leaning forward until I was inches away from him. “A room where you were the attending cardiologist. A room where your personal digital signature authorized a lethal combination of potassium chloride and fast-acting beta-blockers.”

“It wasn't supposed to kill her instantly!” Marcus suddenly blurted out, his voice cracking with panicked desperation as his composure completely shattered. “Richard swore it was just supposed to keep her weak! He said she needed to be incapacitated so we could get her signature on the new probate documents before she could call her outside lawyers! I didn't mean to kill her, Elena! I swear to God I didn't!”

The audio recording device hidden inside the acoustic panels of the interrogation room spun silently, capturing every single syllable of his unprompted confession.

Behind the two-way mirror in the observation gallery, federal prosecutors and forensic investigators were logging the audio stream in real-time, locking in a watertight case for capital murder and conspiracy.

I didn't yell. I didn't slam my fist on the table. I simply watched him unravel, piece by calculated piece, realizing the monsters he had served had thrown him under the bus the very second the federal net closed around them.

“You didn't mean to kill her,” I repeated quietly. “You just wanted fifty thousand dollars and a secure position as chief medical consultant for a company run by a man who views human lives as disposable line items on a balance sheet.”

“Richard promised he would protect me!” Marcus wept, his head dropping into his cuffed hands as tears spilled down his cheeks. “He said if the faxes were ever audited, his legal team would take the fall! He lied to me! He lied to all of us!”

“That’s the thing about men like Richard Sterling, Marcus,” I said, standing up smoothly and closing the manila folder. “They don't have friends. They don't have family. They only have accomplices until the police arrive.”

I turned toward the heavy steel door, signaling the guard outside to unlock it. As I stepped out into the observation gallery, leaving Marcus sobbing alone in the harsh fluorescent light, my phone buzzed in my pocket.