Chapter 12 - The Shadows of Federal Prison
The morning air was thick with fog as my black government sedan pulled up to the gates of the Federal Correctional Institution in Alderson,
West Virginia.
The high concrete walls,
topped with coiled razor wire,
rose ominously against the gray autumn sky.
Two days after receiving Julian Croft's threat,
I had received an urgent message from the federal warden.
Patricia Vance—my mother—had filed three separate emergency requests to speak with me.
She claimed she possessed critical information regarding Julian Croft and the syndicate,
information she would only reveal to me in person.
I passed through security screening,
surrendering my mobile phone,
my federal badge,
and my sidearm to the guards at the main gate.
A heavy steel door buzzed loudly,
unlocking with a sharp metallic clack,
and a female guard escorted me into a small,
private visitor room.
The room was cold,
sterile,
and smelled of pine floor cleaner and damp concrete.
In the center stood a simple metal table bolted to the floor,
with two plastic chairs placed on opposite sides.
A minute later,
the far door opened.
My mother walked in,
escorted by a guard.
She wore a baggy orange jumpsuit that swallowed her thin frame.
Her hair,
which had always been impeccably styled in luxury salons,
was pulled back into a messy ponytail,
streaked with gray roots.
Her face was hollow,
wrinkled,
and completely stripped of the arrogant beauty she had weaponized for decades.
She sat down across from me,
her wrists shackled to a heavy chain wrapped around her waist.
When she looked up and saw me sitting there in my crisp dark suit,
looking composed,
powerful,
and free,
her lips twitched with a mixture of shame,
resentment,
and terror.
"Sarah,"
my mother whispered,
her voice raspy and thin.
"You actually came."
"You have five minutes,
Patricia,"
I said coldly,
placing my hands flat on the cold metal table.
"Tell me why I shouldn't walk out of this room right now."
My mother leaned forward,
her heavy chains clinking loudly against the table.
"They're going to kill you,
Sarah!"
she hissed frantically,
her eyes wide with genuine panic.
"Julian Croft...
he's not like your father!
Michael was stupid!
Michael was driven by pride!
But Julian is a psycho!
He controls bankers,
judges,
and hitmen all across Europe!"
"I am well aware of who Julian Croft is,"
I replied calmly,
my voice devoid of emotion.
"I know he is Michael’s biological brother.
And I know you knew about him long before the trial."
My mother flinched,
pulling her head back as if she had been slapped.
"How...
how do you know that?"
she stammered.
"Because I am a forensic investigator,"
I said,
leaning closer to her.
"I audited the bank records,
Patricia.
Ten years ago,
you discovered Michael was sending money to a private foundation in Geneva.
You found out he had a secret biological family.
Instead of going to the police,
or telling Grandma Evelyn,
you used that secret to blackmail Michael."
My mother swallowed hard,
looking down at her chained hands,
unable to deny the truth.
"You forced him to pay for your luxury clothes,"
I continued,
itemizing her greed with surgical precision,
"your European vacations,
your country club memberships,
and your diamond collections.
You didn't care that the money came from an international crime syndicate,
as long as you got your cut."
"I was protecting myself!"
my mother sobbed,
tears smearing across her pale,
makeup-free face.
"Michael would have left me with nothing!
He was planning to divorce me and transfer all our assets to Julian's offshore accounts!
I had to secure my future!"
"And look where your future is now,"
I said,
gesturing to the small cinderblock room and the steel bars on the window.
"You sold your soul for clothes and jewelry,
and now you are sitting in a federal prison wearing orange polyester."
"Sarah,
please!"
my mother cried,
reaching out her chained hands toward me,
her voice breaking into desperate shrieks.
"Julian contacted me through my lawyer last week!
He offered to pay off my legal appeals and get me transferred to a minimum-security facility if I told him where your grandmother hid the offshore codes!"
I froze,
my eyes narrowing into sharp slits of icy focus.
"And what did you tell him?"
I asked softly.
"I didn't tell him anything!"
my mother claimed desperately.
"I swear to God,
Sarah,
I didn't know where the codes were!
I told him only Evelyn and you knew!"
I stood up slowly from my chair,
buttoning my jacket.
"You just gave him the confirmation he needed,"
I said,
looking down at her with complete contempt.
"You proved to him that I was the only person standing between him and the fortune.
You sold me out again,
just like you always have."
"Sarah!
No!
I was trying to warn you!"
my mother screamed as the guard stepped forward,
grabbing her arm to pull her back toward the cell block door.
"He knows about the trip to Zurich!
He knows you're going to Switzerland!
Don't go to Zurich,
Sarah!
It's a trap!"
I turned my back on my mother's hysterics,
May you like
walking out of the visitor room as the heavy iron doors slammed shut behind me,
locking her back inside her self-made hell.
