Chapter 3 - The man who knew the jackpot
Rodrigo recovered quickly.
“It’s all over social media.”
“No,” Samuel said through the phone. “The winning retailer is public. The winner is not.”
Rodrigo’s jaw tightened.
Mariana stared at him.
“You told me you didn’t know anything about Ethan’s ticket.”
“I heard people downstairs.”
“People downstairs know the jackpot was eighty million,” he said. “Everyone does.”
Possible.
But he had reacted before I named it.
That bothered me.
Still, suspicion was not proof.
I turned toward Mariana.
“What was supposed to happen today?”
“What?”
“Rodrigo said after today you wouldn’t need me anymore.”
She looked toward him.
He shook his head once.
Tiny.
Warning.
I saw that too.
Mariana took a breath.
“I was going to leave you.”
Direct.
Unexpected.
My stomach dropped even though I had already watched her kiss another man.
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“Why?”
She swallowed.
“I filed preliminary divorce papers last week.”
There it was.
Not because of the lottery.
Unless she had somehow known before I did.
Impossible.
The winning numbers were drawn the night before.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I was afraid you’d make a scene.”
I almost laughed.
“I’m the one holding flowers.”
She looked at them.
Then away.
Rodrigo interrupted.
“This is private.”
“No,” I said. “It became relevant when someone tried claiming my ticket.”
Samuel asked me to leave the building immediately and come to his office.
I agreed.
Before leaving, I walked outside.
Employees filmed from the glass.
The pink SUV sat under late-afternoon light like a joke somebody had designed specifically for me.
Then the dealership representative approached.
“Mr. Hale?”
“Yes?”
“There’s a problem with the registration.”
“What kind?”
He showed me paperwork.
The vehicle had been purchased in my name.
But thirty minutes earlier, someone called the dealership attempting to change title instructions.
To Mariana.
“How did they know about the car?”
The representative frowned.
“Mrs. Hale gave the VIN.”
That required access to purchase details.
Mariana was still upstairs.
Or had been.
I looked back at the building.
Then my phone buzzed.
A message from Samuel:
Do not go home.
Someone accessed your home safe at 3:52 p.m.
My breath stopped.
Our smart home sent safe-access logs to a cloud account I had forgotten Samuel’s tech consultant could review after I authorized financial security.
The ticket had been in my jacket.
But other documents were in that safe.
Passports.
Property deeds.
Tax returns.
Old financial files.
I called our home-security service.
The access code used belonged to Mariana.
At 3:52, she had been at Vithera.
Unless someone else had her code.
Then the camera feed loaded.
A man entered our house.
Baseball cap.
Sunglasses.
Gloves.
He went directly to the safe.
He knew the code.
And when he turned toward the hallway camera, I recognized him.
May you like
Old Man Ruben.
The gas-station clerk who sold me the winning ticket.
