SophiaThe wall has become my second heartbeat.It stares back at me from the corner of Jamie’s guest room, a patchwork of printouts, scribbles, and red string. Anyone else would probably call it unhinged. I call it necessary. It’s the only place where the noise in my head sorts itself into something resembling order.Claire’s voice is still in my ears when I grab my pen and scrawl a note in the margin of my latest lead. Liberty-Anne Hoffman. Wire transfer. Same Cayman routing number Marrin used.She’d called late afternoon, sounding tired but fierce in that way only Claire can manage, like she’s been arguing with firewalls and offshore servers all day and came out singed but victorious. The offshore transfers she traced confirmed what I already suspected. Liberty-Anne wasn’t just another overdosed socialite. She was part of the web, caught in the same sticky threads I keep tripping over.Now her name sits on my wall, a fresh Post-it angled upward, linked by a sharp red line to Marr
MarcusThe thing about asking Sophia out for coffee is that it felt like throwing a live grenade and then walking away, waiting for the boom.She didn’t say yes, exactly. But she didn’t say no either. Just, A distraction from what?I typed back before I could think better of it. It’s coffee, Sophia. Not a blood pact with the devil in exchange for your immortal soul.A little pause, the kind that makes your stomach fold in on itself. Then, finally, Fine. Tomorrow though, I’m busy right now.So yeah. I’ve been replaying that exchange on a loop, like a sixteen-year-old who just scored his first date. Which is ridiculous, because I’m not sixteen, and this isn’t a date. It’s reconnaissance. Or, at least, that’s what I keep telling myself.And yet, when I wake up the next morning, I feel like someone’s rewired my chest.Coffee later. For now, work.The case file isn’t ancient, just a few years old, but it already has that lived-in feel, corners softened from being handled too many times. I
SophiaThe call comes just after nine, my second cup of coffee for the day cooling beside my notebook.“Tell me you’re sitting down,” Claire says by way of hello.“I’m sitting.”“I pulled the last few tax filings for that charity you flagged. The one that went belly-up two years ago? Guess what’s buried in the final quarter before it closed?”I click my pencil. “Surprise me.”“Offshore transfers. Big ones. And before you ask, yes, they’re routed through an account owned by Marrin’s old company. I checked twice.”That snaps me fully awake. Marrin again. He’s like mildew, once you see him, you start spotting him everywhere. “Destination?”“Three different shell entities. Two in the Caymans, one in Panama. All dissolved within six months of the transfers. No surviving records I can get to without a warrant.”Which neither of us will ever have, and I’m not stupid enough to fake one.“Send me what you can,” I say.“Already in your inbox. And, Sophia? You’re getting close. Just… be careful
MarcusPemberton’s file has been combed over so many times the metadata practically squeaks it’s so clean. So imagine my shock when I actually find something.A supplemental memo, dated less than two weeks before his death. It’s short, only two paragraphs, both maddeningly vague, about “coordination with external consultants for discrete asset management.”That’s Bureau-speak for moving something without a paper trail. Could be cash. Could be favors. Could be both.There’s no invoice, no contact sheet, just a redacted name where a company should be. But the phrasing is familiar enough that my gut says Bainbridge.I pull up Liberty-Anne’s calendar for the same period. She canceled a lunch meeting the day before that memo was filed. The guest field is blank. Scrubbed clean, not left empty. Whoever she was meeting, someone didn’t want it to be recorded.The three-day gap in Pemberton’s financial records is still there, glaring like a missing tooth. If someone moved cash in that window,
MarcusGillespie calls first thing in the morning. I’m halfway through a mug of black coffee, scrolling the day’s reports, when her name flashes across my screen.“Bainbridge’s lawyers are sniffing around Marrin’s associates,” she says, no hello. “Old business partners. College friends. That guy who was on the board with him for five minutes.”“That’s not their usual play,” I say, setting the mug down. “They’re nervous.”“That’s one interpretation.”“It’s the right one,” I counter. “If they’re rattled, we press harder. Go for the weak link. There’s a reason they’re doing damage control now.”She exhales like I’m the problem, not Bainbridge’s PR machine. “Rodriguez wants us to sit tight. No sudden moves.”“That’s bullshit.”“It’s an order,” she says, and I can hear the thin thread of patience fraying in her voice. “Something you suddenly seem to have a problem with. You’ve been told to stand down before. I’m telling you again. Do not freelance this, Marcus. Do not make me write that
SophiaThe downtown records office smells like every dusty archive I’ve ever set foot in. Dry paper, stale air, and the faint tang of toner from a printer that probably pre-dates my career. It’s not a place you stumble into by accident. You have to walk through a marble-floored lobby, sign a clipboard, and hand over your ID to a clerk who regards you like you’re here to commit a crime.I’m not even here digitally. Claire’s voice is in my head, warning me again about leaving a trail. This is old-school, analog only.The reading room is chilly, even though it’s late afternoon in August. Rows of beige metal filing cabinets run along the walls, with broad wooden tables in the center under buzzing fluorescent lights.There’s a scattering of other patrons. An older man in a suit paging through property records, a grad student type surrounded by microfiche reels, a woman with a pile of bound ledgers.I head straight for the archive desk, give my request in a low voice. The name of the now-d