Chapter 1

At my company's new product launch, I was on stage, mid-speech and in full flow.

Then a squad of police officers stormed in, forced me down to the floor, cuffed me, and marched me off to the station.

The whole hall erupted, camera flashes going off nonstop.

At the station, my neighbor Frieda Walker rushed over and slapped me across the face.

"Louise Gilbert! You ran my father down with your car—why didn't you stop? Why didn't you save him?"

She was clutching her father's memorial portrait, sobbing so hard her whole body shook.

An officer set a stretch of surveillance footage in front of me.

A silver-gray sports car sent an old man flying more than a dozen yards, then sped away.

That one-of-a-kind body. That Galaxy Silver color.

It was the exact car parked in my garage.

But that car—there was no way it could have hit anyone.

1

Frieda dropped to her knees on the floor, screaming until her voice cracked.

"All my dad wanted was to get back that eighty thousand dollars!"

"And because you wouldn't give him the money, you just ran him down and killed him!"

Everyone in the room glared at me.

I stared at the footage for a long time.

There really was an identical car in my garage.

But it was only a model.

The last thing my younger brother left behind before he died.

I spoke slowly.

"The one in my garage is only a car model. There's no way it could hit anyone."

Frieda burst into tears.

"Every neighbor knows you've got a one-of-a-kind sports car in that garage!"

"My dad's body isn't even cold yet, and you're already treating everyone like fools?"

She shot to her feet, hand raised to hit me again.

An officer stepped between us just in time.

"This is a police station! Everyone calm down!"

Frieda only cried harder.

"How am I supposed to calm down? My father is dead!"

"She killed him and fled, and now she won't even admit it!"

Beside her, Frieda's mother, Agatha Lawrence, lunged forward too.

Holding her husband's black-and-white portrait, she rammed her head straight into my chest.

"Rich people kill someone and think they can just make up any lie they want?"

The wooden frame of the portrait struck my chin.

A sharp corner cut the skin, and pain flared.

I stepped back on instinct.

Agatha's mother instantly pointed at me and shrieked:

"Look, she's dodging! She kills someone and I'm not even allowed to touch her? Everyone, look at her attitude!"

The officer handling the case turned to look at me, his eyes noticeably colder than before.

"Ms. Gilbert, please explain yourself clearly."

"Why do you say your sports car couldn't have hit anyone?"

I forced down the emotions churning in my chest.

"Because it isn't a sports car at all. It's just a one-to-one model."

"No engine, no fuel tank, no drivetrain. It couldn't possibly be driven anywhere!"

The officer's gaze grew more and more skeptical.

"As far as I know, aren't models all scaled down? Where do you find a full-size car model?"

"What is it you do for work?"

I took out a business card.

"I'm the founder of an electric vehicle company."

Frieda seized on the words at once.

"Officers, did you hear that? She builds cars herself!"

"So she obviously built the car herself, and now that something's gone wrong, she's turned it back into a model!"

Agatha slapped her own thigh and wailed.

"I told you she had it all planned out! My poor husband, what an awful way to die!"

"He lived an honest life his whole life, and in the end he's run down and killed by someone with money and power!"

I looked at Frieda.

"Have you ever seen it driven out with your own eyes?"

Her sobbing hitched, then she raised her voice again.

"The whole neighborhood knows you have a silver-gray sports car!"

"Everyone can testify for me!"

The police pulled up the accident footage.

On the screen, the silver-gray car tore across the crosswalk at high speed.

The old man was thrown into the air.

His body rolled a few times across the ground, then went still.

When the car flashed past the camera, the picture was very clear.

Every detail really did match the car in my garage exactly.

The police pulled up footage from near the neighborhood too.

Eleven forty-nine.

A silver-gray sports car drove into the garage area.

Twelve oh-three.

The door to my private garage closed.

The officer paused the frame.

"How do you explain that?"

Before I could answer.

An officer pushed the door open.

He was holding a test report, still fresh off the printer.

"We found silver-gray paint chips at the accident scene."

"Preliminary comparison shows the main components match the Galaxy Silver coating registered to Ms. Gilbert's studio."

Hearing that, Frieda went limp in her chair.

She hugged her father's portrait, crying so hard she could barely breathe.

"Dad… they've found all the proof."

"You died with such an injustice!"