CHAPTER FOURTEEN B: THE VISIT ACROSS THE STREET

Helen came to Mark’s house after the new glass was ordered but before it arrived.
She stood outside the plywood and waited until he opened the front door.
Her hands were empty.
“I wanted to apologize without my lawyer,” she said.
Mark stayed on the porch.
“Then you can say what you came to say.”
Helen looked toward the street where they had once helped each other shovel snow.
“I broke into your home because I was afraid of what that recording would show.”
“You knew Martin got into the van.”
“I did.”
“You watched us search for him anyway.”
“I did.”
Mark waited.
Helen swallowed.
“I thought if the recording disappeared, the investigators would have to listen to my explanation instead.”
“You were trying to control what everyone knew.”
“Yes.”
“And you thought you could do that by threatening me.”
Helen looked at the boarded door.
“I wasn’t thinking about you.”
Mark felt the sentence land harder than the apology.
“That’s the problem,” he said.
Helen nodded.
She offered to pay the contractor directly.
Mark told her the repair bill would be handled through the legal process.
“I don’t want money to become another reason you come to my house,” he said.
Helen stepped back.
“I understand.”
Mark did not tell her he forgave her.
He watched her walk across the street and waited until she entered her own home before going inside.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN C: THE SECOND ACCOUNT

Investigators found that the diverted checks did not all travel to one address.
Some were sent to temporary mailboxes, while others were deposited through accounts opened with false business descriptions.
The scheme depended on ordinary delays between patients, clinics, insurers, and transport providers.
When one office asked a question, another office could claim it was waiting for a correction.
Ruiz explained the pattern to Denise using a diagram on a whiteboard.
Denise recognized several account names from monthly reconciliation reports.
She had assumed they belonged to subcontractors.
One account paid for fuel at the station where Cole Mercer had been told to abandon his van.
Another paid storage fees at Simon’s furniture warehouse.
A third transferred money to a vehicle auction company linked to Randall Sykes.
“They weren’t just taking reimbursements,” Denise said.
“They were using the money to keep the whole operation moving.”
Ruiz asked whether Denise could identify who authorized the transfers.
Denise pointed to Graham Pike’s initials on a reconciliation sheet.
“He signed the monthly summaries,” she said.
“But the payments were entered under a shared office login.”
The inspectors knew that the login alone could not identify a person.
They sought records showing who had access to the terminal at each relevant time.
Denise described the office layout and the security badge system.
Her account helped investigators narrow the dates they needed to examine.
She left the interview relieved that she had been useful, but worried about how much she had failed to notice while working there.