MY HUSBAND'S MISTRESS SECRETLY DROPPED AN ILLEGAL DRUG INTO MY WINE, AND I CAUGHT HER IN THE ACT. SHE EVEN LAUGHED, "RELAX, SIS YOU CAN'T DRINK!" I GRABBED HER HAIR AND FORCED HER TO FINISH IT ALL, LEAVING MY HUSBAND FROZEN IN SHOCK.

By 2:00 PM, I was sitting in an interrogation room at the County Jail.

Vanessa Thorne was brought in wearing an orange inmate jumpsuit. Her makeup was gone, her skin was sallow, and her wrists were secured by heavy steel handcuffs. The arrogance that had fueled her the night before had completely vanished.

"What do you want?" she spat, slumping into the metal chair. "Come to laugh at me?"

"I don't laugh at amateur criminals, Vanessa," I said, resting my elbows on the steel table. "I merely review their sentencing guidelines."

She looked away, clenching her teeth. "Daniel's lawyer will have me out by tonight. He’s taking care of it."

I opened my folder and pulled out a single sheet of paper, sliding it toward her. It was a copy of the emergency motion filed two hours earlier by Daniel’s newly appointed criminal defense attorney.

Vanessa read the bold text halfway down the page:

*DEFENDANT DANIEL HOLLOWAY ASSERTS COMPLETE COERCION BY CO-CONSPIRATOR VANESSA THORNE, CITING EXTORTION, FINANCIAL MANIPULATION, AND SOLE PHYSICAL CONTROL OF THE ILLICIT SUBSTANCE.*

Vanessa's breath caught. "What is this?"

"Daniel just sold you out," I said. "He’s claiming you were blackmailing him with fabricated accounting errors. He told the prosecutor that you brought the poison to our home on your own initiative, and that he was merely a terrified bystander trying to prevent a homicide."

"That’s a lie!" she screamed, rattling the chains against the table. "He bought the poison! He bought it through a broker on the dark web! He gave it to me in the car on the way to your house!"

"A jury won't believe you," I said coldly. "Daniel has no prior record, a clean corporate history, and a legal team pointing the finger at the young mistress who stood to inherit a fortune through Aegis Consulting. You are looking at Attempted First-Degree Murder with Premeditation. In this state, that carries a minimum of twenty-five years without the possibility of parole."

Tears began to spill over Vanessa's cheeks, carving clean lines through the grime on her face. "He said he loved me. He said we were going to Switzerland."

"Daniel loves only Daniel," I replied. "Now, here is your one and only lifeline. Give me the password to the encrypted hard drive in Daniel’s private safety deposit box at First National Bank. The drive containing his backup communications and offshore routing accounts. Give me that, and I will instruct Detective Miller to offer you a plea deal for conspiracy and grand larceny. Ten years, eligible for parole in four."

Vanessa stared at me. Her hands shook violently against the steel table.

"He kept the key in his watch winder," she whispered, her voice broken. "The password is his mother’s maiden name followed by the date we first slept together. September fourteenth."

I stood up, collected my papers, and tapped on the glass for the guard.