Chapter 6 - The Raid on Finch Capital
At 2:30 PM, three black SUVs pulled up to the glass-and-steel building housing Finch Capital Management in the heart of the Minneapolis financial district.
Accompanied by Gavin, my partner David Mercer, and two state financial investigators bearing a court-ordered search warrant, I walked through the sleek glass doors of the lobby.
The receptionist—a young girl who looked terrified—stood up as we entered. "Can I help you?"
"We are executing a judicial preservation order for all digital ledgers, physical files, and server logs of Finch Capital Management," David Mercer announced, presenting the warrant.
Panic erupted across the floor. Alistair's primary business partner, a man named Marcus Vance, rushed out of his corner office, adjusting his silk tie nervously.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Marcus demanded. "Jacqueline? What are you doing here? Alistair is in the hospital!"
"I know where my husband is, Marcus," I said, walking past him into Alistair's private suite. "And I know what you two have been doing in this office for the last four years."
Marcus’s face turned gray. "Jacqueline... listen to me..."
Gavin immediately stepped past him, plugging an external forensic imaging device directly into Alistair's main desktop terminal.
"Hey! You can't touch that!" Marcus yelled, reaching for Gavin.
One of the state financial investigators stepped in front of Marcus, holding up his badge. "Back away, sir. This is an active state investigation into securities fraud and wire embezzlement."
I stood behind Alistair's grand mahogany desk, looking at the framed photographs lined up along the edge. There was a photo of Alistair and me from our anniversary trip to Tuscany three years ago. Right behind it, hidden inside a leather desk drawer, was another framed photo—Alistair, Paige, and little Matty at a beach resort in Florida.
He had kept his two lives organized right down to his office drawers.
"Jacqueline," Marcus pleaded, his voice dropping into a frantic whisper as the investigators began boxing up hard drives and financial files. "I didn't know about the offshore transfers! Alistair told me those were legitimate management fees! I had no idea he was skimming from your legal clients!"
"You signed off on the quarterly compliance reports, Marcus," I said, pulling open the bottom desk drawer and lifting out a black leather ledger book. "Which makes you either completely incompetent or criminally complicit. Either way, Finch Capital is finished."
I opened the ledger book. It was Alistair’s hand-written secondary log—the old-fashioned, arrogant habit of a narcissist who couldn't resist keeping an exact record of his own cleverness.
Every stolen transfer was noted in his precise handwriting:
- $120,000 to Cayman Trust #409 (Edina down payment)
- $48,000 to Martha Finch (Annual allowance)
- $85,000 to Cartier (Diamond necklace for Paige)
- $3,000,000 First National Commercial Credit Line (Guarantor: Jacqueline Ross-Finch - Pending)
He had logged his entire criminal enterprise like a daily work journal.
"Gavin," I called out, holding up the ledger. "Bag this. It's the master key."
Marcus sank into a leather armchair, holding his head in his hands, realizing that his career, his firm, and his freedom were disappearing into police evidence bags.
My phone rang. It was the front desk at St. Mary Care Center.
"Mrs. Ross-Finch?" the head nurse asked. "Your husband is demanding to be discharged against medical advice. He's trying to leave the hospital."
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I looked at the black leather ledger in Gavin's hands and smiled.
"Let him leave," I told the nurse. "He has a very important appointment at my law firm at 5:00 PM."
