Chapter 7: Federal Question
The federal contact's name was Raymond Cho.
He met them in a conference room on the fourteenth floor of a building near the river — glass walls on two sides, the city spread out below.
He was in his early fifties, careful eyes, a legal pad already open on the table.
He shook Sophie's hand and said, "I understand you have the Carter documentation."
"I have the original notebook and photographs of every page," Sophie said.
"Copies have been sent to two separate secure locations."
Cho nodded.
That seemed to be exactly what he'd expected her to say.
He spent the next forty minutes going through the notebook page by page, stopping to cross-reference entries against the Harwick Transit materials Nico provided.
He asked precise questions.
He did not react dramatically to anything.
When he reached the routing numbers on page nine, he wrote something on his legal pad and underlined it twice.
"These match," he said.
Not to anyone in particular.
Just a fact landing in the room.
"They match," Nico confirmed.
Cho set his pen down.
He looked at Sophie.
"Miss Carter, I want to explain where we are.
The Harwick Transit investigation has been active for eight months.
We have financial records, corporate registrations, and evidence of ongoing irregular wire transfers.
What we didn't have was a direct connection to the 2009 warehouse operation — a dated, documented record created at the time." He touched the notebook.
"This is that connection."
"What does that mean for Mercer?" Sophie asked.
"It means the federal warrant we've been preparing becomes substantially stronger," Cho said.
"Conspiracy, wire fraud, and the 2009 incident opens a potential secondary charge depending on what the reopened investigation finds." He paused.
"It also means Mercer will know the warrant is coming within twenty-four to forty-eight hours, once we begin executing preliminary steps.
He has sources.
He always has."
"He already knows something is happening," Sophie said.
"He called me this afternoon."
Cho looked up sharply.
"What did he say?"
"He told me to think very carefully about what happens to old ones.
After saying he knew I'd been making new friends."
Cho looked at Adrien.
"Then we move the timeline up." He reached for his phone.
"I'm going to need Miss Carter's formal statement before she leaves this building."
"Of course," Sophie said.
The statement took an hour.
Cho's assistant recorded it while Cho asked questions in the same careful, unhurried way he did everything else.
Sophie answered each one completely.
She described every moment from the night she was fired to the conversation with Mercer that afternoon.
She described the photograph.
She described the notebook.
She described the deleted comment and the unknown calls.
When it was over, Cho walked them to the elevator.
"The two people outside your mother's building," he said to Sophie — he'd been told about them — "keep them there through tonight.
Tomorrow should look different."
"How different?"
He pressed the elevator button and stepped back.
"We'll be in contact."
The doors opened.
Sophie stepped in.
Adrien followed.
Nico stayed behind for a moment to exchange a last word with Cho, then joined them as the doors closed.
The elevator dropped.
The city appeared in the glass as they descended — lights beginning to come on across the skyline as the afternoon turned toward evening.
"He's moving tonight," Adrien said.
"Not us.
Cho is.
Mercer won't see who's at the door until it's too late to do anything about it."
Sophie looked at her reflection in the elevator glass.
She looked exhausted.
She looked like someone who had been awake for too long on not enough certainty.
She also looked, she thought, like someone her father would recognize.
"My mother is going to need to give a statement too," she said.
"About the key.
About what he told her."
"Cho's assistant will schedule it for tomorrow morning," Nico said.
"Somewhere comfortable.
They can come to her."
Sophie nodded.
The elevator reached the lobby.
They walked out into the evening air.
Across the river, the lights of Chicago were fully on now — the bridges, the office towers, the long line of the waterfront her father had walked every day for eight years.
Her phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
She showed it to Adrien.
He took the phone from her, answered it, and said nothing.
A long silence on the other end.
Then Mercer's voice — and for the first time, it carried something underneath the precision.
Something that was not quite fear but was the shape fear made before it arrived.
"You're making a mistake," Mercer said.
"This is Adrien Voss," Adrien said.
"The mistake was mine.
I made it fifteen years ago when I gave you access to this company." He paused.
"I won't make it again."
He ended the call.
He handed Sophie her phone.
May you like
They walked toward the car.
Behind them, the building's glass doors reflected the river, and the river reflected nothing but light.
