And all you did was send a miserable few thousand every four weeks like you were throwing crumbs to servants!”
“Crumbs?”
I repeated.
I pulled my phone from my pocket.
The screen was still broadcasting.
In the upper-left corner of the display, a tiny, pulsing red indicator showed that the camera tucked into the mesh breast-pocket of my travel shirt had been live-streaming directly to an encrypted cloud partition for fourteen minutes:
`SERVER RELAY: US CYBER COMMAND // FORT MEADE`
`STREAM ID: CIPHER-ALFA-770`
`BANDWIDTH: UNRESTRICTED`
`RECIPIENTS: 4 ACTIVE NODES // CLARA BENITEZ, ESQ.`
“Over the last thirty-four months, Brenda,” I stated, every syllable falling like cold brass shell-casings against tile:
“I wired precisely one hundred and eighty-six thousand dollars into the joint account at SunTrust.”
“I have every wire confirmation number.”
“I have every international SWIFT clearance record.”
“You bought a four-thousand-dollar OLED television.”
“You bought an Italian leather sectional.”
“Heather purchased a brand-new Lexus crossover that is currently parked in the driveway downstairs.”
I pointed my finger down at my mother’s cracked lips, down at the yellowed cotton rags binding her fragile wrists to the rusted angle-iron of the bedframe, down at the cockroaches crawling across the cold, congealed grits on her plastic plate:
