Buying a Drink

I didn't order a drink. I ordered two.

"You're paying," Sarah said, eyeing the second glass of cheap whiskey I slid toward her.

"I'm buying you a new life," I corrected. "Two drinks is just the down payment."

She picked up the glass, her fingernails bitten to the quick. "You talk big for someone who looks like they just crawled out of a sewer."

"I crawled out of a lot worse than that."

She downed the shot. She winced, then set the glass down with a definitive clink.

"So," she said. "The hard drive. It proves the money trail?"

"Every cent," I said. "The payments to the shell company. The kickbacks to Dr. Thorne. The transfers from the construction accounts. It's all there."

"And the bodies?"

"The waste management fees," I said. "They spike every time Arthur breaks ground on a new project. I cross-referenced the dates. It's a perfect match."

Sarah stared at the silver rectangle on the bar. "You realize what this means, right? If this gets out... the whole company goes down. The stock. The jobs. Your husband's inheritance."

"My husband signed a DNR for his own mother," I said. "I don't care about his inheritance."

She looked at me. Really looked at me. "You still love him, don't you?"

The question hit me like a physical blow. I thought about Julian in the kitchen, his arms around me, his heart beating against mine. I thought about the fear in his eyes when Arthur raised the gun.

"I love the man he used to be," I said. "Before his father broke him."

"He's not broken, honey," Sarah said. "He's bought. There's a difference."

She signaled the bartender for another round.

"So," she said. "Friday. The disposal."

"Tell me about it."

"It's usually a transfer," she said. "They move the 'package'—that's what they call them, packages—to a secondary location. Usually a funeral home in Jersey. From there... well, you saw the receipt."

"Eternal Rest," I said. "Cremation."

"Exactly. No body, no crime."

"But Margaret is alive," I said. "They can't just cremate a living woman."

Sarah's face went hard. "They can if the paperwork says she died of natural causes in the facility. Dr. Thorne isn't the only doctor on Arthur's payroll. The new Medical Director signs whatever Arthur puts in front of him."

I felt the rage burn in my chest again. "So they're going to kill her on Friday?"

"No," Sarah said. "They're going to overdose her. Make it look like heart failure. Then ship the body."

She leaned in close.

"But here's the thing," she whispered. "The transfer happens at the loading dock. At 2:00 AM. That's when the shift change happens. Security is lightest then."

"Like last night," I said.

"Exactly. But on Friday, there will be two guards, not one. And the driver."

"I can handle the guards," I said. "I have... resources."

I didn't, really. I had a crowbar and a teenager who worked at a car lot. But Sarah didn't need to know that.

"What about the driver?" she asked.

"Who is he?"

"New guy," she said. "Works for the disposal company. Doesn't ask questions. Just drives the truck."

"I need to know the route," I said. "I need to know where they take the bodies before they get to Jersey."

Sarah shook her head. "I don't know the route. I just know they leave by the north gate."

"The north gate?"

"It's the service exit. Old logging road. Leads straight to the highway."

I nodded. I knew that road. I had parked on it.

"Okay," I said. "So we intercept the truck."

"We?" Sarah raised an eyebrow.

"You're driving," I said.

She laughed. "I'm a nurse, not a stunt driver."

"You're the one with the badge," I said. "You can get us past the gate."

She looked at the hard drive again. She looked at me.

"You really think you can take down Arthur Hawthorne?"

"I don't have to take him down," I said. "I just have to expose him. And once the world sees Margaret alive... he's finished."

Sarah took a deep breath. She picked up the hard drive and slipped it into her pocket.

"Friday," she said. "2:00 AM. Meet me at the turnoff."

"I'll be there."

She stood up. She looked at me one last time.

"You know," she said. "You don't look like a Hawthorne."

"I'm not," I said. "Not anymore."

She walked away.

I watched her go. I felt a strange sense of relief. I had an ally. I had a plan.

But I still had one problem.

The Ghost Signer.

Sarah had called me that. *You're the one who pays the bills.*

She meant the invoices. The checks I had signed for ten years.

But there was something else. Something I had seen in the safe. Something I hadn't let myself think about until now.

The medical power of attorney.

It wasn't just signed by Arthur.

There was a witness signature on the bottom line. A scrawl I recognized instantly, even though I hadn't seen it in years.

It was my own.

I hadn't signed it. I wasn't even there that day.

But it was my signature.

Which meant Arthur hadn't just used me to pay the bills.

He had used me to authorize the imprisonment.

If Margaret died, I wouldn't just be the grieving daughter-in-law.

I would be the murderer of record.