Chapter 5 - The Trap is Sprung
I broke every speed limit getting back to my apartment. The hallway was swarming with uniforms. My heavy wooden door was dented, the deadbolt warped from someone trying to kick it in.
I shoved past the officers and ran inside. "Claire!"
She was sitting on the floor of the kitchen, gripping my backup revolver with white knuckles. She was hyperventilating, but she was unharmed.
I dropped to my knees and hugged her tightly. She buried her face in my shoulder, shaking violently.
"He was here, Mara," she sobbed. "I heard him. He was whispering through the door. He said he just wanted to talk. He said if I didn't open the door, he would hurt you."
"I'm right here. I'm safe. You're safe," I murmured, gently taking the gun from her hands.
The responding officers found no one, of course. The building's security cameras had mysteriously glitched for twenty minutes. It was a professional job. Ethan was escalating. The trial was only three weeks away, and he realized Claire wasn't backing down.
That night, as Claire slept fitfully, I sat in the dark living room, staring at the city lights.
Playing by the rules wasn't working. The law was a shield for the innocent, but for the rich and guilty, it was a weapon. I needed to trap him. I needed him to confess on tape, or I needed him to violate his restraining order in a way that couldn't be denied.
I called an old friend, a tech wizard who had left the force for private security. By morning, my apartment was wired with hidden microphones and micro-cameras that streamed directly to a secure cloud server.
Then, I did something incredibly reckless.
I called Ethan's phone.
He answered on the second ring. "Well. Detective Bennett. What a surprise."
"I want to make a deal," I said, keeping my voice steady, feigning exhaustion. "Claire is falling apart. She can't handle a trial."
There was a long silence. Then, a soft, victorious chuckle. "I told you she was fragile. What do you want?"
"Fifty thousand dollars, and I convince her to drop the charges and move out of state. But I want it in cash. And I want to hear you admit that you hit her. Just between us. So I know you won't come after her once she's gone."
"You must think I'm an idiot, Mara. I'm not confessing to anything."
"Then she testifies. And I burn you to the ground."
"Meet me tomorrow night," he countered smoothly. "The old shipyard on Pier 4. Come alone. We'll discuss... terms."
"Fine." I hung up.
I knew he wouldn't bring money. He was going to bring a problem solver. He was planning to eliminate the threat—me.
What he didn't know was that I wasn't going to the pier. I was going to leak the meeting location to an ambitious, un-bribable federal prosecutor I knew, claiming an anonymous tip about a drug drop.
But Ethan was a step ahead of me.
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The next evening, I left the apartment, locking Claire safely inside. As I started my car in the garage, a dark SUV slammed into the side of my vehicle, pinning my door shut.
My head smashed against the window. Dazed, I reached for my gun, but the car door was ripped open from the other side. A massive man in a ski mask dragged me out, hit me across the jaw with something heavy, and everything went black.
