Chapter 6 - The Rat in the Corner
At 11:30 p.m., rain began to fall again over the northern suburbs of Chicago.
Inside the sprawling, twelve-thousand-square-foot Mercer estate in Naperville, absolute chaos reigned.
Every light in the house was blazing. Downstairs in the master bedroom suite, wardrobe doors hung wide open, expensive silk dresses were ripped from hangers and thrown across the king-sized bed, and leather suitcases sat bursting with jewelry boxes, stacks of bearer bonds, and foreign currency.
Victoria stood in front of the walk-in safe hidden behind a mahogany wall panel, her hair disheveled, her expensive mascara smudged beneath her wide, terrified eyes.
"Where is the offshore key?!" she screamed into her phone, her fingers clawing frantically through a pile of passports. "Raymond, answer me! Where did you put the Zurich transaction codes?!"
On the speakerphone, Raymond Cross’s voice was hysterical, punctuated by the sound of rapid windshield wipers and a roaring V8 engine.
"The bank in Zurich froze the accounts thirty minutes ago, Victoria!" Raymond yelled. "Vance filed an emergency international Mareva injunction under the Federal Whistleblower and Crime Victims Protection Act! The money is gone! It’s all locked!"
Victoria dropped a handful of diamond necklaces onto the carpet, her breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. "What do you mean, locked?! We have twenty million dollars in the shell company account!"
"Vance traced the shell company back to my trading LLC in Delaware!" Raymond panicked. "The FBI just raided my apartment in Gold Coast! I’m driving north on Interstate 94 toward the Canadian border right now! You need to leave the house immediately! The state police are—"
Suddenly, Raymond’s voice cut out.
CLICK. BEEP... BEEP... BEEP...
"Raymond? RAYMOND!" Victoria screamed, pulling the phone from her ear.
The screen flashed red: NETWORK SIGNAL TERMINATED.
Victoria threw the phone against the full-length mirror, shattering the glass into a thousand gleaming shards.
"Damn you, Jonathan!" she shrieked at the empty room, her chest heaving. "Damn you to hell!"
She grabbed two velvet jewelry bags, stuffed them into a leather tote bag, snatched her car keys from the nightstand, and ran down the grand marble staircase toward the four-car garage.
She hit the wall button to open the heavy bay doors. Cold rain misted into the garage as the automatic door slid upward.
Victoria sprinted toward her white Porsche Cayenne, disarming the alarm with her key fob. She yanked the driver's side door open, threw her tote bag onto the passenger seat, and leaped inside.
She slammed her foot on the brake, pressed the engine start button, and shifted the transmission into reverse.
Before her foot could hit the accelerator, a massive black Ford Expedition turned hard into the driveway, cutting off the garage exit at a sharp forty-five-degree angle.
Blinding red and blue emergency lights flashed through the darkness, illuminating the rain-slicked pavement.
Two more police cruisers roared up the circular driveway, their sirens wailing, blocking every escape route from the estate.
Victoria hit the steering wheel with her fists, screaming in pure, unbridled rage.
Through the rain-streaked windshield, she saw Detective Thomas Brandt step out of the lead vehicle, holding a heavy black flashlight and wearing a blue Kevlar jacket stamped with CHICAGO POLICE HOMICIDE.
Behind him, stepping out of a black sedan, was Marcus Vance, holding his silver cane, standing quietly in the rain.
"Victoria Mercer!" Detective Brandt’s voice boomed over his cruiser's bullhorn. "Step out of the vehicle with your hands visible! You are under arrest for the first-degree murder of Jonathan Mercer!"
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Victoria sat frozen in the driver's seat. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird. She looked at her leather bag filled with stolen diamonds, then up at the flashing blue lights reflecting off the ceiling of her multi-million-dollar garage.
Slowly, her hands trembling so violently she could barely open the door, Victoria stepped out into the freezing cold rain.
