The engine coughed, then started with a rough, uneven idle.

We drove slowly through the back streets, avoiding the main avenues where the SUV might be waiting.

Nora took us to an old warehouse she owned near the river, a place she used for storing old case files.

Inside, the air was cold and smelled of damp cardboard and dry rot.

We sat at a metal folding table under a single overhead bulb.

I pulled out the encrypted backup drive we had taken from the Thorne estate’s offsite server.

Nora plugged it into her laptop, her fingers flying across the keyboard.

“Julian thinks he has us cornered,” I said, staring at the screen as directory folders began to populate.

“He doesn’t know what we actually have on this drive,” Nora said.

She opened a folder labeled *Alabaster Holdings – Direct Disbursements*.

Columns of dates, bank routing numbers, and wire transfer amounts filled the monitor.

My eyes scanned the lines of data, my training as a forensic auditor kicking in despite the exhaustion.

I began to notice a pattern in the monthly payments.