She drew a thick stack of papers from her briefcase and laid them flat on the mahogany table.

“That is a very convenient narrative, Evan,” Lydia said. “But it doesn’t hold up against the evidence.”

“What evidence?” Evan sneered. “It’s her word against mine.”

“No,” Lydia said, tapping the documents. “It is your word against Cole Brantley’s ledger.”

Evan’s eyes darted to the papers on the table.

“Cole Brantley was served with a federal subpoena three hours ago,” Lydia said.

“He panic-called you because he had no choice but to comply to save his own license,” she added.

“Brantley turned over his digital registry and his physical intake books,” Lydia said.

She flipped to a page containing high-resolution scans of several consignment receipts.

“These are the transfer sheets for the 1982 Chateau Petrus and the 1990 Romanee-Conti,” Lydia said.

I looked at the signatures at the bottom of the page.

My name was written there in neat, slanted cursive.

It looked almost like my handwriting, but the loop of the ‘C’ was too wide, and the pressure on the paper was too heavy.