Chapter 3

The community center smelled of stale coffee and manufactured pity. Colin stood at the podium in the center of the stage, playing his absolute favorite role: the exhausted, long-suffering savior of a broken family.

"It breaks my heart to share this with you all," Colin said, his voice echoing smoothly through the microphone to the fifty-odd neighbors and local trustees seated in the folding metal chairs. "But as a father, I have to protect my son."

He clicked a remote in his hand. The projector screen behind him suddenly lit up, casting a harsh, glaring white light across the room. It was a video of me.

In the grainy, distorted footage, I was screaming at the top of my lungs, smashing expensive porcelain plates against the kitchen wall, my hair wild and my eyes wide.

Gasps instantly rippled through the packed audience. Several women sitting in the front rows covered their mouths in open shock.

"Keep her away from that poor boy," an elderly neighbor whispered loudly, shaking her head in disgust. "She's completely unhinged. A total danger to him."

What the edited video conveniently didn't show was Colin slipping a heavy, disorienting dose of hallucinogens into my morning coffee right before he turned on his phone to record.

I sat alone in the very back row of the auditorium. My face was a mask of cold, unbothered marble. I didn't jump up to scream at them, and I didn't burst into tears to defend myself. I just sat there in the shadows, my thumb slowly tracing the smooth curve of the wooden therapy bead hidden safely in my coat pocket.

Let them look. Let them whisper. Let them judge the hollow shell they thought they were burying today.

A few rows ahead, Luz was standing near the exit doors, pretending to help manage the seating. Her phone vibrated aggressively in her hand. I watched her face drain of color in real-time. She looked physically sick to her stomach, her shifty eyes darting frantically toward the exits like a hunted animal cornered in a trap. Another urgent threat from her ruthless creditors.

I pulled my phone out from my purse, shielding the screen with my palm. I didn't need to be a corporate hacker or a certified bank auditor to start dismantling their fragile little world. I just needed to pull the pin and let them destroy each other.

I opened a new draft to the insurance company's senior fraud investigator.

I attached two high-resolution photos. One was an intimate picture of Luz and Colin kissing right in my kitchen. The second was a clear, zoomed-in shot I had just taken of Luz's glowing phone screen, displaying her massive, unpaid gambling balance and final warning notices.

Subject line: Fraud Tip - Is the Father's Mistress Living Off Insurance Money?

I tapped send. A formal investigation would freeze the payout account by tomorrow morning. Colin thought he was only a week away from cashing out his five-million-dollar jackpot. In reality, he was standing directly on a landmine.

I stood up slowly from my seat, the wooden bead heavy and comforting in my palm. I turned my back on the projector screen, ignored the whispered judgments around me, and walked quietly out of the double doors.