Chapter 2 - A Web of Lies UnravelsBy midnight, the police were back in our living room. Detective Miller, a weathered man with sharp gray eyes and a perpetual scowl, watched the video three times in complete silence.
When the screen went dark, he turned to us. "Where is your sister right now, Mrs. Davis?"
"I... I don't know," I stammered, staring blindly at the coffee table. "She said she was out of town for a few days. She told me to check the mail because she wouldn't be back until Friday."
Detective Miller let out a dry, humorless laugh. "Out of town. Right. Let's look at her digital footprint."
Within the hour, the cybercrime unit pulled up Kara’s recent activity. What they found shattered whatever illusions I had left about my family.
Kara hadn't gone out of town. In fact, her phone pinged off a cell tower just three blocks away from my parents' house on the night of the incident. Worse still, her financial records revealed a desperate trail of mounting debt.
Maxed-out credit cards, payday loans with predatory interest rates, and a series of threatening notices from a high-stakes online gambling syndicate.
Detective Miller tapped a finger on the desk. "Your parents owned their house outright, didn't they? And your father’s pension, plus their life insurance policy..."
"Stop it," I whispered, tears streaming down my face. "Are you saying she did this for money?"
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"People have killed for a lot less," Miller said bluntly. "And based on the hospital toxicology report, what was in that soup wasn't a quick-acting poison. It was a slow-acting neurotoxin mixed with heavy sedatives designed to mimic a massive stroke or accidental overdose. If you hadn't gone over there when you did, the coroner would have ruled it natural causes. The insurance payout would have cleared her debts within thirty days."
A cold sweat broke out across my skin. Kara hadn't just wanted to steal from them; she had planned to get away with murder disguised as tragedy. And she had used me—her own sister—as the unsuspecting pawn to discover the bodies so no one would ever look her way.
