Chapter 5 - The Arrest
At five-fifteen that evening, the sun was setting behind the glass sky-scrapers of downtown Phoenix, painting the desert horizon in long, bloody streaks of crimson and orange.
I sat in the front passenger seat of Detective Miller’s unmarked police sedan, parked across the street from the towering glass headquarters of the Finch Legacy Foundation. Beside me, David Chen sat with a high-powered camera equipped with a telephoto lens resting on his knee.
Two marked Phoenix Police Department cruisers pulled up into the circular brick driveway of the building, their red and blue lights flashing silently against the mirrored glass windows.
A crowd of foundation employees, news reporters who had been tipped off by David’s newsroom, and passersby were already gathering along the sidewalk.
The heavy glass double doors of the building swung open.
Two uniformed police officers emerged first, holding the doors open.
Behind them came Bennett Finch.
He was wearing the same navy suit he had worn at the hospital that morning, but his jacket was rumpled, his silk tie pulled loose at the collar, his hair disheveled. His hands were secured behind his back in shining steel handcuffs. A young patrol officer held him firmly by the upper arm, guiding him down the wide granite steps.
Directly behind Bennett came Margot Vance.
Her tailored ivory suit was wrinkled, and one of her designer heels had snapped off at the base, forcing her to walk with an embarrassing, awkward limp. Her wrists were also bound in steel. She was screaming at the officers, her face red and distorted with pure, unbridled rage, while tears of humiliation streaked through her heavy makeup.
"Get your hands off me!" Margot shrieked, her voice echoing across the courtyard as flashbulbs began to pop wildly from the gathered reporters. "Do you know who my father is?! My father will have all your badges by morning! Bennett, do something!"
Bennett didn't do anything. He couldn't even look up. He kept his head bowed low, his chin pressed against his chest, trying frantically to hide his face from the dozen news cameras that were pressing toward the security barricades.
“Mr. Finch! Over here! Is it true you siphoned foundation funds to pay off your mistress's firm?!” a reporter shouted through a megaphone.
“Bennett! Did you assault your pregnant wife at St. Jude's Medical Center this morning?!” another voice yelled out.
“Margot! Look over here! Are you facing felony assault charges?!”
David Chen’s camera shutter clicked rapidly beside me, capturing thirty high-definition frames per second of the pristine power couple being shoved into the back seats of the police cruisers.
Bennett reached the rear door of the lead cruiser. As the officer placed a hand on his head to guide him into the back seat, Bennett’s eyes swept across the crowd, scanning the street with a frantic, desperate searching look.
His gaze landed on Detective Miller’s unmarked sedan.
Through the tinted glass of the front windshield, our eyes met.
I didn't turn away. I rolled down the passenger window three inches, letting the cool evening air flow into the car.
I looked at him—at the ruined prince of Phoenix philanthropy, at the man who had stood over me on a cold floor four hours ago and told me not to make a scene because people were staring.
I lifted my right hand, resting it gently against the side of my window frame, letting the fading sunlight catch the bare skin of my ring finger where his ring used to sit.
Bennett stared at me through the back glass of the police cruiser, his mouth slightly open, a look of profound, terrifying realization settling into his eyes as the heavy metal door slammed shut, locking him inside the dark interior.
The cruisers pulled out of the driveway, their sirens blaring loudly into the desert twilight, carrying Bennett Finch and Margot Vance away toward the Maricopa County Central Booking Facility.
I rolled the window back up, pulling my hands back into my lap, feeling Clara take a slow, powerful turn inside my stomach.
"Are you okay, Tessa?" David asked softly from the back seat, setting his camera down.
May you like
I took a long, deep breath, feeling the air fill my lungs completely for the first time in four months. The physical pain in my flank was still there, a dull ache that would take weeks to heal, but the suffocating weight that had been crushing my chest was gone.
"I'm better than okay, David," I said, turning my face toward the sunset. "I'm free."
