Her brother, Maddox, had her mother's ring and she wanted it back. The will left it to her. It was all she had left now. Megan Murdock brushed her dark brown hair behind her ears and straightened her shoulders that slumped from the weight of her large, heavy pocketbook. She closed her eyes, swayed on her feet as the palm trees swayed in the wind behind her. Lawyers hadn't helped her get the one thing she wanted to keep, forever.

Once she felt stable, she was ready.

She knocked on the door and crossed her arms. A few seconds later, her brother's voice pierced the air. "Megan, go away."

Normal people didn't talk to siblings through the intercom. She glanced at the door and wondered where the camera was while she crossed her arms. "I want Mom's ring, Maddox."

"I'll send it in the mail."

No. She refused to lose another day. Her mother had left everything to her brother, except the ring. On her hospital bed, their mother had said Megan was capable of taking care of herself. She had always wished her mother saw more than raw strength, but the promised ring meant she at least left her something personal that she had worn every day of her life. It had to mean she saw more in her. Megan knocked on his door again. "You haven't in the past month. I'm here to collect it."

"Go."

Her face felt hot as the hottest day in South Florida where the air itself felt like hot soup that covered the skin. Soon, she'd lose her cool. She pressed her feet into the cement ground through her high heels. "Open the door and give it to me. I'm tired of waiting."

"Are you alone?"

"Clearly." She turned so he could see beyond her and onto the street. This was insane, but again it seemed so was her brother, after the war. She pressed her hand to her temple. Somehow she had to get through to him. He needed help. She softened her voice. "Maddox, let me in."

"Okay fine." The jingle and click of metal knobs told her that her brother was working on his half a dozen locks. The door opened to darkness, but then she saw the brown eyes that almost glowed from the sun beaming in the door. He wiggled his finger and indicated that she should come in.

To get the ring, she followed. The second she was inside, he locked all six of his door locks. Once done, he pointed her toward the living room and a gray couch that had seen better decades. "Wait here and I'll find the ring."

"Thanks." She brushed the goosebumps off her bare arms and stared at the mess in the room. Maddox had papers everywhere and the dust that came from her just walking in told her that he hadn't cleaned in years.

He stormed down the hall and left her there. She refused to even touch that couch and moved toward the closest pile of papers.

The same man's face was on the first half a dozen articles. She peered closer and read Gable Hawke. Her mind clicked that the Hawke name had something to do with computers, but she wasn't a techie like her last boyfriend. Neither was her brother, for that matter. She walked toward a different pile but stopped when she coughed on dust.

At least her brother had made an appearance at the funeral, though he had only stayed for a half an hour and had jittered the entire time. Before he served overseas, Maddox never sent chills throughout her body.

She called out, "Mom would have been happy you came."

"I was always a disappointment."

Bored, she glanced at the papers on the coffee table. Again Gable Hawke's name was highlighted, as was information about his family. He had two sisters and it seemed his parents were close to dying from an assassination attempt. Her brother doodled stars all over the news clipping. The back of her neck grew cold. "Did you find the ring?"

"Almost."

Good. She needed to go. Then she opened the red folder next to the news articles. The folder was like one of the ones they had used in school years ago, but inside she saw his handwriting and a print-out of an almost dead couple. Her stomach churned as she picked it up and read closer. She stared so hard at the papers until the words blurred into black pools. This letter with her brother’s name on it couldn’t say that her brother had murdered the couple on their way to help at a soup kitchen.

No. This wasn’t possible. Maddox wasn’t that bad. He could have written a confession note for a number of reasons, right?

Beads of sweat grew on her forehead.

In her hands she held her brother's assassination plans. The drawings showed where he intended to stand, where the old couple went to buy Christmas presents and their route to deliver them to needy children at a shelter. Everything clicked in her head at once. The news article had said Mr. and Mrs. Hawke were hospitalized and in comas from gunshots near a homeless shelter and soup kitchen. Her heart raced.

Her brother had tried to murder innocent people. Her hands curled on the folder. All those years as a sniper in the Marines could mean he was interested in the murder that his expertise written all over it. She stuffed it in her pocketbook and then wiped her sweaty palms on her yellow sundress. Perhaps outside, she'd read this differently, but right now her breaths became shorter. She edged to the door.

Something fell in the other room and it felt like her heart might stop. She called out, "She'd want you to see a doctor regularly, Maddox."

"Doctors can't help me."

Despite how she shivered inside, she remembered how she’d promised their mother she'd do what she could for Maddox. She licked her cold lips. "Is there anyone that can?"

"I think I put the ring in here. Give me a moment."

Right. The ring. Her hands shook and she clutched her bag. Perhaps the schematics were of a football game or anything else and that her mind made up all those conclusions as she glanced to her right and saw another picture of the Hawke family. "Who’s Gable Hawke? That's an unusual name."

"He ruined my life."

The statement hung in the air. All she could think was that her brother had intended to harm them. The papers against her chest might as well be bricks. They weighted her to the floor and she couldn’t move. She pushed her hair back again. Perhaps she should ask her brother, "How?"

"He and his crowd left me for dead."

"In the desert?" Footsteps echoed while he came closer to her. Bile filled her throat. Once she was home, she could look up what happened and perhaps, hopefully, her instincts were way off. As children, she'd never suspect her brother of murder, but the hollow ghost of a man that haunted this old house never felt like he was her brother. Course she hadn't seen much of him in years, but her instincts screamed it was possible that he was an assassin.

"Yeah," he called down the hall.

She stumbled backward closer to the door and knocked over a pile of papers. She knelt and picked them up to put them back. Even more pictures of Gable Hawke and his family. Her heart sped faster again. "A doctor would be..."

Her teeth chattered so much that she stopped talking and stared at her brother's outlines.

"I found the..."

"I knocked it over with my bag and I was putting your pile back together. She stood and willed her hands to not shake and she put them out palm up. "Do you have it?"

"Are you sure..." He scratched his head.

"You have the ring?" No. Every cell in her body screamed to run. If she did, he'd know for sure what she thought. Okay probably not, but he'd figure her out too fast. Her fingers began to curl as she waited. To pretend she wasn't affected, she tapped her shoe and glanced at him and her empty hand.

He dropped the diamond ring in, and she clutched it like it was a life preserver. Her breaths were still coming too short but she turned toward the door.

"Were you going through my papers?"

The image of being locked in a basement like those people in the last movie she’d seen ran through her mind. She shook her head and twisted the first lock. "I was looking for the ring. I want to go."

He put his hand on the lock and stared at her. "Megan, you're lying to me."

Coldness ate at her from her gut. The man staring at her wasn't her brother. Not anymore. She pushed her lips out. She had to get out of here. Now. In pretense, she shrugged. "I don't care what you think. I have the ring and now I have to go to work."

"Go." He unlocked the other five locks.

Her legs practically ran by themselves to her Mercedes. As she walked away, one by one she heard the multiple locks slip into place like they were bullets aimed at her chest. The sound made her jumpy, but she steeled herself. Her brother had locked himself and now the sunlight beamed over her head.

Inside her car, her fingers wrapped around the steering wheel and she held tight. Breathing was a challenge, but in the rearview mirror she glanced at her brother's house surrounded by the weeping trees. Her heart was practically frozen, but she turned the key and listened for the sound of the engine that sparked her car to life. Her foot pressed the pedal harder than normal and she drove fast to get away.

On her way to work at Morgan Enterprises, she picked up the phone. She needed to talk to someone, but there was no one to confide in about her brother. She told the phone, "I can't call Tess or any of my friends."

Then her phone said, "How may I help you?"

She laughed to herself and knew she looked foolish if anyone passed her, but she didn’t care. Se parked in her spot in the employee parking lot. She stared at the faceless phone and realized it was the artificial intelligence, so she asked, "Who is Gable Hawke?"

"Here is what I found about Gable Hawke."

Information about the CEO of a computer tech firm filled her phone. She glanced at her pocketbook to check on her brother’s confession letter. Her face felt cold, but she used her phone to research his parents’ recent attempted murder and how the police had no suspects.

If she went upstairs, she'd sit at her desk and stare at her pocketbook.

Tires squealed past her and adrenaline rushed through her body. She grabbed her bag and dug in for the folder while she tried to shift into her seat like it might mask her. She looked around the lot and saw no one, so she read.

These were the schematics of an attempted hit and she reread the details about how the parents of Gable Hawke were practically executed. This wasn't an unknown assailant to her like the news report read. The boy who’d rescued frogs from the road after it rained so they wouldn’t get run over by cars? Had he been so screwed up by what he’d seen in the war to commit such an atrocity? This was her brother's work. Why else would he have written such a letter and signed it? She swallowed.

If she didn't turn this in, she was now an accessory. Her heart slammed in her chest. She'd not go to prison, not for something her brother might have done. Her mother's words echoed in her brain to protect Maddox. In Florida, they had the death penalty. If she turned her brother in, she'd have to make a deal. She swallowed and tried to get a grip. She only had one hope and it was probably stupid. Her mind eased and started her car again until her courage grew and she told her phone. "I'll need driving directions to the Hawke Inc."