When we descended, Mason was no longer smiling.
Two investigators waited near the entrance with a uniformed officer.
They didn’t create a spectacle.
They simply asked Sophia whether she would speak with them.
She said yes.
Mason stepped forward.
“She’s exhausted.
She isn’t speaking to anyone tonight.”
The officer looked at Sophia, not Mason.
“Ma’am, is that what you want?”
The question was simple.
But Sophia seemed stunned by it.
Someone was asking her what she wanted and waiting for her answer.
“No,” she said.
“I want to speak.”
Mason’s jaw tightened.
The investigators escorted us into a private room off the lobby.
Sophia’s mother followed several steps behind.
For nearly an hour, Sophia explained the evidence.
She identified Mason’s voice.
She described how the messages had been preserved.
She identified the accounts referenced in the emails and explained why some transfers had frightened her even though she hadn’t understood their purpose.
One investigator made a forensic copy of the relevant files with Sophia’s permission.
The other kept returning to the financial records.
“Where did you get these?” he asked.
“Mason sent some of them to me by mistake years ago,” Sophia said.
“Then he demanded I delete them.
That’s why I saved copies.”
“Did he say why?”
“He told me they were none of my business.
Then he threatened my mother’s treatment again.”
The investigator wrote something down.
Outside the room, Mason began demanding to leave.
At first, nobody stopped him.
Then Karen called.
“The financial unit confirmed the account numbers,” she said.
“At least two appear tied to entities already under review.
We’re seeking an emergency preservation and restraint order now.”
“Does Mason know?”
“Not yet.”
I glanced through the glass panel in the door.
Mason was pacing the lobby.
He still believed he could walk out, make a few calls, and rearrange the world before anyone reached him.
Men like him depended on time.
Time to intimidate witnesses.
Time to move money.
Time to delete records.
Tonight, Sophia’s folder had taken that advantage away.
Around three in the morning, Mason tried a different strategy.
He asked to speak with Sophia alone.
She refused.
Then he asked to speak with her mother.
Her mother refused too.
That seemed to frighten him more.
He stared at the woman who had defended him for years as though she had violated some private law.
“After everything I’ve done for you?” he demanded.
