Chapter 6: What Sandra Moved
Marcus called the number back immediately.
Kenda picked up on the second ring.
"Where are you?" he asked.
"Outside.
Down the block from the house.
I didn't want to be inside when she — she's been on the phone since six this morning.
I heard her say the word 'transfer' four times."
"Kenda, listen to me.
Don't go back in."
"I have to get my things."
"Not today.
Tell me what you saw."
A pause.
Wind on the line.
"She went into the study around seven.
She had a box — like a document box, the kind with the lid.
She carried it out to her car.
Then she came back in and I heard the printer going for a long time.
Then she took a second folder out."
"Did you see what was in it?"
"No.
But I know which drawer she went into." Kenda's voice dropped.
"It's the one she locks.
I've never seen her open it in front of anyone."
Marcus was already walking back toward the statement room.
He pushed the door open without knocking.
Baines looked up.
"She's moving documents," Marcus said.
"This morning.
My stepdaughter watched her load files into her car."
Baines put down her pen.
She didn't ask a second question.
She picked up her desk phone.
Within forty minutes, a patrol unit was dispatched to the house.
Marcus's attorney — a composed woman named Ruth Ellison who wore reading glasses on a chain and spoke in complete, unrushed sentences — met them at the kerb.
Sandra was in the kitchen when they arrived.
She had changed into a linen blazer.
Her hair was done.
There was coffee on the counter and she had, by all appearances, been expecting something like this, though perhaps not quite so soon.
"Ruth," she said pleasantly.
"I didn't realise we'd be doing this today."
"Good morning, Sandra." Ruth set her bag on the kitchen table.
"I need to ask you directly whether you've removed any documents from the shared property this morning."
"I've been organising my personal files.
That's not a crime."
"It may constitute destruction or concealment of evidence if those files are material to the financial fraud investigation opened last night."
Sandra smiled.
It was a careful smile, trimmed at the edges.
"There's no fraud investigation.
There's a disgruntled teenager and a husband who overreacted at a party."
"There's a documented wire transfer series from a protected estate trust," Ruth said.
"There's a forensic IP match on a scholarship rejection submission.
And there's a financial crimes referral already logged with the county." She paused.
"The documents you removed this morning — I'd like them returned voluntarily.
It will be noted."
"You can't compel that without a warrant."
"The warrant application was filed at nine forty-seven this morning.
Given the documented evidence already in hand, we expect it by end of day."
Sandra's smile did not change.
But her right hand, resting on the kitchen counter, moved to the edge and gripped it.
"I want my attorney," she said.
"That is absolutely your right." Ruth turned to the officer in the doorway.
"Please ensure nothing further leaves the property until the warrant is executed."
The officer nodded.
Sandra looked at the officer.
Then at Ruth.
Then, for just a moment, at the closed study door down the hall.
"This is because of Lily," she said.
Her voice had dropped the pleasantness entirely.
"That girl has resented Kenda since the day I married her father.
Everything she's told him is coloured by that resentment.
Marcus doesn't see it because he feels guilty for working.
He always has.
Lily knows exactly which strings to pull."
Ruth wrote something in her notepad.
"You should know," Sandra continued, steadier now, building something, "that I have documentation showing Lily was informed of the scholarship deferral option directly by the university.
I have an email.
In her name.
Confirming she understood the terms."
Ruth looked up.
"An email in her name?"
"Sent from her personal account.
Accepting the deferral, not a rejection.
The scholarship wasn't stolen.
It was deferred at her request.
Everything else is a misunderstanding that Marcus escalated because he's been looking for an exit from this marriage for three years."
The kitchen was silent.
Ruth capped her pen.
"I'll need to see that email."
"My attorney will provide it." Sandra picked up her coffee cup.
"When he arrives."
Ruth gathered her bag from the table.
She looked at Marcus, who had been standing in the doorway since they arrived.
She gave him one small, steady look — not reassuring exactly, but grounding.
Outside on the driveway, while the officer stood at the front door, Ruth spoke quietly.
"She's prepared," she said.
"She has a counter-document.
It may be fabricated — almost certainly is, given the timeline — but we'll need to prove that."
"She forged another email?" Marcus said.
"It's possible.
She's been doing this for two years.
She's had time to build a paper trail in both directions." Ruth looked at him calmly.
"This just got more complicated.
But complicated is not the same as lost."
May you like
Marcus looked back at the house.
In the upstairs window, the study curtain moved.
