Chapter 6 - Handcuffs and Rights
“Marcus Jenkins and Diane Jenkins, stand up and place your hands behind your backs,” Deputy Vance commanded, pulling a pair of heavy steel handcuffs from his tactical belt. The sound of the ratcheting metal echoing through the immaculate living room was the sweetest sound I had heard in years.
“You can't do this!” Diane screamed, kicking her designer heels against the hardwood floor as the second deputy forced her arms backward. Her hair had come undone from its tight, perfect bun, hanging in ragged strands around her flushed, furious face. “We have money! We know the town prosecutor! Marcus, call your lawyer right now! Tell them she’s framing us!”
“The town prosecutor doesn't handle federal wire fraud or interstate financial exploitation of a vulnerable adult,” I informed her, watching without a shred of pity as the deputy tightened the cuffs around her wrists. “Because you transferred my mother’s retirement funds across state lines into an offshore account in the Caymans, this is no longer a local domestic dispute. This is a federal felony jurisdiction. I'll see you at the bail hearing on Monday morning.”
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Marcus didn't fight as they cuffed him. He stood completely limp, his shoulders slumped, his eyes staring blankly at the floorboards where his mother's antique jewelry box usually sat. As the deputies marched them out the front door and pushed them into the back of the waiting patrol cruisers, several neighbors had already gathered on their manicured lawns, watching the neighborhood's most "dedicated caregivers" being hauled away like common criminals.
I stood alone in the quiet house for a long moment. The heavy, oppressive silence that had greeted me when I arrived was gone, replaced by the hum of the refrigerator and the gentle rustle of the summer wind against the drawn window blinds. I walked over to the living room window, grabbed the cord, and pulled the heavy drapes wide open, flooding the dark room with bright, golden afternoon sunlight.
