Chapter 1 - The Ink and the Alibi
The heavy hospital door clicked shut, sealing the suffocating scent of Sienna’s floral perfume inside the room. I listened to the muffled, celebratory laughter of the Vance family echoing down the maternity ward hallway. Julian had snatched the leather folder from my bedside table the second my pen lifted from the final page, clutching it like a winning lottery ticket. He didn't even look back at Leo and Oliver. He just took what he came for and walked out with his mistress on his arm.
The silence that followed was absolute.
I looked down at the $200,000 cashier’s check resting on my thin hospital blanket. Then, I looked up at the social worker standing quietly in the corner of the room.
"Did the cameras capture the audio clearly?" I asked, my voice completely stripped of the fragile, heartbroken tone I had just been faking.
The social worker reached up, pulling a microscopic lapel microphone from the collar of her badge lanyard. "Crystal clear, Mrs. Vance," she said, her professional demeanor shifting into something much sharper. "Extortion, coercion of a postpartum patient under medical duress, and an explicit attempt to purchase human beings. The United States Attorney’s Office is going to have a field day with this."
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She wasn't a hospital social worker. Her name was Agent Sarah Jenkins, and she worked for the FBI’s financial crimes division.
For six months, Julian thought I was a naive, bedridden, high-risk pregnant wife who spent her days ordering baby clothes and crying over his sudden "late nights at the office." He thought I was blind to the scent of Sienna on his tailored suits, and oblivious to the massive withdrawals from our joint accounts. He was wrong. I hadn't just discovered his affair; I had discovered the radioactive corporate fraud funding it.
