Page 79 of All Wrong
When he looked through the open door, however, Corinne wasn’t there. Just half a dozen girls stretching and asking the same questions rolling around in his mind.
“Anyone know if Corinne’s coming tonight?” one of them asked.
“No idea,” answered another.
“Wanna work on the stuff we did last week?”
“Yeah, okay.”
Nick moved on, his brief hope replaced by the return of that bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.The same one that had been growing since he’d left Corinne’s rental. He might be high on Corinne’speople to avoidlist—and for good reason—but she wouldn’t ditch her dance class because of it. She loved those kids.
And he loved watching her with them even if she never knew it. She was kind and patient. As willing to learn as teach. He remembered the one time he’d been walking by and seen the girls trying to show her a series of moves popular on TikTok or something. Corinne had been smiling, her face lit up with joy as she tried and failed over and over again.
Maybe she was just running late. The Airbnb was farther out than her apartment had been. Perhaps she hadn’t adjusted for the extra distance or had run into traffic. Lots of road repairs were in progress, too, as crews were trying to fix as much as possible before the weather began to turn colder.
He looped around the facility. No sign of her. A subsequent check of the parking lot confirmed her SUV wasn’t there.
He went back to the room to find the girls working on moves. Corinne still hadn’t showed. Another check of his phone. Seven fifteen.
He set a course for the office. He was going tobreak down and ask Nicki if Corinne had called in. He’d deal with the fallout later.
He found his sister scowling at something on the desktop screen, a phone cradled between her head and shoulder. She put up her index finger to stop him.
“When?” she said into the receiver. “All of them? Robin is a goddess.” She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I know you helped, Ian. Yeah, I’ll tell her. Thanks.”
“What’s up?” Nick asked, sliding into a seat as his sister put the phone down.
“Robin was able to use the worm Corinne had uploaded to uncover an entire network of shell corporations and fake accounts. At first glance, they appeared to be dead ends, but they were just cloaked. Robin traced them to other accounts, other banks, offshore holdings. She’s attached a hidden virus to all of them, so every transaction sends notifications anonymously to FinCEN, the DOJ, the FBI, and the DEA.”
Nick tried to summon some enthusiasm. Itwasgreat news, but it wasn’t his priority.
“And get this,” Nicki continued. “Several of those bogus accounts trace back to one calledPhil Golden Enterprises.”
Nick blinked at her.
“Phil, as in Phi. Golden, as in golden ratio?” she prompted.
Nick frowned. “Kind of a stretch, don’t you think?”
“If that’s all there was, yes. Two of those accounts she was able to nail down? One was a private lab in the Midwest that does deals primarily with government contracts. Very little information on that, but Ian’s working his magic to get the details. Another was a private trucking company.”
Nick rubbed his thumb along the center of his forehead. The pieces were there, but they were scattered and weren’t fitting together. His mind was having trouble focusing on anything other than Corinne and the pain in his gut that was growing more intense by the minute.
“Nick? Did you hear me? This could be the key to shutting downphi.”
“Yeah. That’s great. Have you heard from Corinne lately?”
Her expression didn’t change, except for the slight widening of her eyes. “No, but I only got here an hour ago. Why?”
“She didn’t show for her dance class.”
“That’s not like her.” Nicki’s gaze went back to the screen as she moved the mouse and tappedsome keys. “No one put any notes on the schedule.” She reached for her phone and tapped the screen. “Lace, Nicki. Have you heard from Corinne today? She didn’t show for her dance class. Uh-huh. Yeah, okay. I’m sure she just forgot to call. Thanks.”
Nicki put her phone down. “Corinne texted Lacie on Tuesday morning. Said she needed some time away and would be out of town for a few days. Lacie texted back, but said the message was still unread. She thinks Corinne must have turned her phone off.”
Shit.Maybe things were even worse than he’d thought. “Did she say where Corinne was going?”
“Corinne didn’t say,” Nicki said carefully.
