Chapter 2

"Ms. Vance, we have a warrant to seize your plant's complete employee roster and tax withholding records."

The next morning, three people were waiting at the front gate. Two were the deputies from yesterday. The third was a sharp, short-haired woman. Her badge read: *State Police Crime Unit.*

"Didn't you guys look at everything yesterday?" I asked.

"Yesterday was an informal inquiry. Today is an official seizure," the detective said, pushing a warrant toward me. "The body we pulled from the canal didn't drown."

"Then how did he die?"

"High levels of industrial phenol were found in his system. He was poisoned first, then dumped into the river."

Phenol.

Food-grade production lines aren't allowed to have phenol. But I had heard the senior mechanics mention that during the night-shift packaging prep, they used release agents containing phenol—especially for those unregulated, off-the-books night batches.

"Does your plant use any chemical materials containing phenol on the production lines?"

"I only handle payroll. I don't know anything about production."

"Right. The files, please?"

The warrant was stamped with a judge's signature. I didn't dare stall. Within twenty minutes, I exported three years of rosters, timecard logs, and health insurance records. David Miller’s name was highlighted right there.

The detective zipped the flash drive into an evidence bag.

"One more thing." She gave me a hard look before leaving. "This David Miller... his name appeared on a workers' comp claim last June. A chemical burn on his right hand. The insurance company paid out thirty-eight thousand dollars. Did you know about that?"

My brain went completely numb.

Last June. Workers' comp. Thirty-eight thousand dollars.

I had never filed a workers' comp claim under David's name.

"No. I don't handle insurance claims. That's admin."

"Who in admin?"

"The front office. Richard's personal assistant."

"Got it. We'll look into it."

After the police left, I didn't go to Richard right away.

I had administrator access to the payroll system. I pulled up David’s insurance logs and looked back to March of last year.

Sure enough.

David’s reported hourly wage had been bumped from fifteen dollars to thirty dollars. The login ID that authorized the change was "admin_sun."

Richard Sterling’s personal administrator account.

In other words, without my knowledge, Richard had used my ghost employee to inflate tax withholdings and cash in on a massive insurance payout that I never touched.

I had built a ghost. But Richard was using that ghost to steal much bigger money.

My phone rang.

"Did you hand over more files to the cops?" Richard’s voice sounded like a rusty saw scraping against metal.

"They had a warrant. I had no choice—"

"You couldn't say the server crashed? That the computer was broken?"

"What if they came back with handcuffs next time?"

There was a long silence on the other end.

"Those timecards for David... do you have any personal copies saved?"

"...No."

"You better not. I’ll clean up the system files from my end. Make sure you don't keep a single piece of paper related to him, you hear me?"

He slammed the phone down.

I put my phone aside and stared at David’s schedule on the screen.

I had set his shifts exclusively for the day shift. But starting from March of last year, seven or eight night shifts had been added to his schedule every month.

I didn't schedule those night shifts.

I remembered those dates—every morning after those night shifts, the packaging floor smelled like heavy chemicals. The workers thought it was just industrial disinfectant.

Suddenly, a shadow fell over my monitor.

"What are you looking at so closely?"

Brenda had snuck up behind me. She took her lollipop out and waved it in the air, leaving a sweet, sticky scent.

I quickly locked my screen.

"Just auditing timecards."

"Oh? How convenient." She bent down and shoved her phone screen right in front of my face. It was a screenshot of David’s timecards from the past three years. Every single punch-in was a manual override. Not a single biometric fingerprint scan.

"Over a thousand days, and not a single fingerprint scan. I checked the database last night."

She straightened up and gave me a wicked grin.

"I’m only telling you this because I care about you, Chloe. If you don't figure out a way to explain this to the cops, I certainly won't do it for you."