“Are you prepared to face him like that?”

“I am,” I said.

I stood up and took my coat from the back of the chair.

“I am going to the bank now to retrieve the blue binder.”

“I will see you both tomorrow morning.”

I walked out of the conference room and down the quiet carpeted hallway.

The elevator ride down to the lobby was silent.

When the doors opened, the lobby was bustling with commuters heading home in the rain.

I stepped out onto the wet sidewalk and pulled my collar up against the wind.

My phone buzzed in my pocket.

It was an unknown number.

I paused under the awning of the building, looking at the screen.

I swiped to answer.

“Claire,” a woman’s voice said.

It was not a voice I expected to hear.

It was Brooke.

“We need to talk,” she said, her voice trembling.

“He left something in my safe, and I don’t know what to do with it.”

The rain dripped from the edge of the canvas awning, splashing onto my leather shoes.