have similar digits on the transfer receipt, but the account number would be different.” She gasps in a sharp breath when I place down the two sheets of paper side by side. “They’re almost identical.” Her eyes lift to mine. “Is that the number Alex pried out of Albert Thursday afternoon?” Her eyes widen when my chin balances on my chest. “But there are decades between transfers. The date on Albert’s transfer reveals it only occurred this week. It was a down payment for something no amount of grappling had him disclosing, but the code on the Greggs’ file is from twenty-two years ago.”
The shock on her face slips away for annoyance when I mutter, “It isn’t just legitimate businesses that have return customers, Phillipa.”
Her face screws up. She appears utterly confused. “What do you mean? You need to spell it out for me, Brandon. I’m hormonal and five seconds from chewing off my arm in hunger, so my brain is beyond fried right now.”
Trust isn’t something I give easily, and tonight isn’t any different. My next set of words don’t just come out garbled, they’re also brimming with distrust. “Did you make copies of the files I requested?” When Phillipa jerks up her chin, I ask, “Even Ophelia Petretti’s?”
Her chest rises and falls four times before she pulls a third file out of her leather briefcase. This one is thicker than the Greggs’ file. It’s even bulgier than Isabelle’s.
“Did you comb through it?” The instant I voice my question, I realize how stupid it was for me to ask. Phillipa’s rant only minutes ago exposes she read Ophelia’s file, otherwise, how would she know about Ophelia’s bogus claims I used my position to instigate a sexual favor. “Did you find a wire transfer receipt inside?”
Phillipa’s brows furrow before she shakes her head. “But that doesn’t surprise you, does it? She wasn’t sold, more removed from her situation, so her file wouldn’t have a receipt for us to source similarities from.”
With her honesty feeding my trust, I pace to an oil painting hanging above my fireplace. Phillipa groans when the removal of the painting from the wall reveals a hidden safe. “That’s the first place thieves look.”
My laugh comes out super breathy since I tried to hold it in. “That’s the point. As soon as light is captured by the digital retina in the touchpad, an inbuilt camera commences recording. The footage is uploaded to both the security company’s servers and is streamed live to my phone.”
Phillipa joins me at the wall that divides my dining room from my living space. “There’s a camera in there?” When I nod, she asks, “Where? That’s got to be the world’s smallest lens.” After stepping back, she waves her hand across her body then strays her eyes to my phone that commenced streaming a live feed the instant the painting was inched away from the wall. “It’s tiny but effective. I can see my crow’s feet from here.” She’s clearly joking. Although she is a handful of years older than me, she doesn’t look a day over twenty-five.
While Phillipa lady-boners over my state-of-the-art security system, I punch a six-digit code into the digital touchpad, push aside my personal weapon, bundles of emergency cash, and a shoebox full of photos and memorabilia I can’t give up no matter how hard I try so I can grab a bright pink envelope from the very back. The greeting on the front of the envelope reveals it doesn’t belong to me, much less the tiny slip of paper inside it.
I didn’t buy Isabelle, but Tobias most certainly did, and he kept a record of his purchase.
I’m reasonably sure I won’t eat for a week when I dig out the slip of paper from the envelope. The number sequence scrawled across it is a sixty percent match to the one Alex handed me. The only difference is the numbers that most likely correspond with the account the money was being withdrawn from. It abundantly proves Isaac is purchasing something significant from the Popovs. I just need to determine whether it’s upstanding like the purchase Tobias made or something much more sinister.
Many hours later, I fan a bedspread over Phillipa before heading to my room. We worked through both lunch and dinner, yet we’ve barely made a dent in the stack of wire transfer receipts Phillipa returned from Tiburon with. The angle Tobias was working is clear, each transfer appears to be an exchange of money between the Popovs,