It had been two days since I'd been arrested. I was running off of two hours of sleep, refused to eat the slop of food they'd tried to give to me, and Michelle had not answered any of my calls.
The attorney they'd given me was trash. The man didn't seem to even be in his right mind, let alone capable of defending me. However, none of that mattered because the company was coming to speak to me today. I could finally clear this mess up. They'd just made a mistake, this was an easy fix.
I was taken to a dimly lit room with a metal table and folding chairs. My attorney sat to the right of me, looking as clueless as ever. Together we waited for what felt like forever. After some time, the bank's legal team entered along with a few people from the management.
Sarah, the regional manager, looked at me with disgust. I'd only seen her around the bank a handful of times; she probably didn't even know my name before this. Now her first impression of me was that I was a criminal. A wave of embarrassment filled my body.
My direct manager, Keith, spoke up first. "Mr. Voss, how are you holding up?"
"Not too good," I responded in a lighthearted tone, sighing.
He let out an uncomfortable grunt, folding his arms. "It seems the company has been conducting an investigation. Something about counterfeit money being swapped in to replace real money from the safe."
"I don't even have access to the safe," I immediately chimed in, feeling my temperature rising. "What does this have to do with me?"
"We'll take it from here," a woman said pulling a chair up. She looked over at me before opening a manila folder. "After running through hours of footage and checking the safe for a breach, we found a passageway from the supply closet to the safe. Can you tell us a little about that?"
I could feel my eyebrows knitting together in confusion. "A passageway? You're joking right?"
"I wish they were," Sarah said pursing her lips.
The woman at the table tossed a few photos in front of me. They were blurry, but if I squinted I could just barely make out what it was. Surely enough there was a hole in the wall just behind the shelves in my supply closet. That was the moment my stomach dropped. The second photo was some paneling that looked like somebody moved it, and then poorly put it back in place.
"A direct path from your closet to the safe," the woman said in an accusatory tone.
I let out a sigh, looking up at her. I looked over at my attorney and he gestured for me to speak. Something didn't feel right about that. For some reason, I still opened my big mouth to say, "Anybody could've put that there."
Sarah let out a loud howl, laughing in disbelief. "Listen if you just admit you did it, we won't have to drag this out in court. I don't think you can afford all those fees."
"But I'm telling you it wasn't me! Don't you have cameras? You said you looked through footage, so you telling me I'm the only person who's been in there?" I questioned.
Sarah rolled her eyes, folding her arms. "There's a blind spot right where your closet is, but you already knew that. Employees have mentioned you hanging around the security office."
"The security office?" I asked confused. At first, I was going to deny it, but then I remembered. I'd gone up there to talk to Sy'eer about the date with Celine a few times. "I just go up there to talk to my coworker," I defended.
Sarah went to speak, but the woman at the table held her hand up to stop her. "All of this sounds like it's just a coincidence. Is that what I'm getting here?" She asked sounding sincere. Sadly, my gut could tell there was a hint of sarcasm. This wasn't good.
"That's what it is, honestly. I have nothing to do with any money missing or anything like that. I swear I don't have any money!"
"-and that's believable. There's just one thing I still need you to explain to me," she started as she shuffled a few files around in the folder. "Tell me why they found 5,000 of the missing $120,000 tucked behind cleaning supplies in your cart."
I couldn't keep myself from hopping to my feet. "What!?"
She tossed a few more photos down. That was my cart and there was money stashed in it. My first thought was what I'd done if I knew that money was there. My second thought was how the hell did it get in my cart?
"Just another coincidence?"
"I don't think so," I responded pointing at the photos. "That looks more like I'm being framed."
"Framed?" Sarah asked, scoffing. "No, I just think you aren't as bright as you think you are."
"That's enough," Keith cut in. "Listen, Danny, just give them the money back."
"But I don't have any money!"
"If you plead guilty and return the money, you'll get a much shorter sentence. We'll even get you into a nice federal prison," the woman explained.
"But I didn't do this!"
My attorney finally spoke up, just to say "I think you should take the deal."
"I'm not pleading guilty to something I didn't do!"
"Then we'll see you in court," the woman shrugged. She then stood, leading everybody out behind her. Keith looked back giving a disappointed side-eye, and then it was just me and my attorney again.
"Why would you not take that deal?"
"Because I don't know what the hell they're talking about! Aren't you supposed to be defending me?"
"How do I defend you when they have all that evidence," he asked, annoyed. "I'm gonna go beg them to keep that offer on the table and you need to seriously think about the time you're gonna face if this goes to trial."
Then he was gone too.
My entire body went numb as they led me back to my holding cell. It felt like the room was spinning. They offered me another phone call, but again Michelle didn't answer. I tried Sy'eer, but he didn't answer either. There was nobody left for me to call.
I lay on the cold concrete and stared up at the ceiling. All the hope that this was a misunderstanding was gone. All of the evidence pointed to me and I didn't even know who to blame for it. I had an attorney that had no intention of helping, I didn't have any of the money to give back and there was no way for me to prove my innocence. In a matter of days, I'd gone from normal life to facing prison time.
"Daniel Voss," a man called out into my cell.
I sat up wiping tears from my face. "That's me," I choked out.
"Let's go. You made bail."
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