Chapter 5 - Red and Blue Lights on Elm Street
The red and blue flashers of two Ford Explorers painted the pale yellow siding of our house in rolling stripes of neon color. By the time the cars pulled up into our driveway, half the neighborhood was out on their front lawns. Mr. Henderson had abandoned his broom entirely and was leaning against his white picket fence with a look of undisguised, neighborhood-watch satisfaction.
Two uniformed officers stepped out of the first vehicle, while a taller man in a dark gray suit—presumably Mr. Vance or one of his senior investigators—stepped out of the second.
Michael didn't run. He couldn't. His legs seemed to have turned to lead. He just stood frozen beside the porch pillar, staring at the flashing lights as they reflected off the chrome of his own second-hand sedan parked in the driveway.
Ashley, however, tried to make a break for it. She turned sharply toward her car, grabbing her designer handbag, and marched down the steps.
“Where do you think you're going, ma'am?” the first officer asked, stepping into her path with a calm, immovable authority.
“I have rights!” Ashley shrieked, her voice pitching up into a hysterical octave. “We haven't done anything wrong! The ticket was just sitting on a table! We didn't steal it out of her hand!”
“Possession of stolen property and attempted fraudulent validation of a state lottery ticket valued in excess of fifty thousand dollars is a felony in this state, ma'am,” the officer replied smoothly, resting his hand casually near his utility belt. “I’m going to have to ask you to step away from the vehicle and place your hands where I can see them.”
Carmen let out a short, sharp whistle from the porch. “Well, look at that. Karma comes packaged in a cruiser.”
I didn't smile. Winning ninety million dollars didn't feel like a celebration standing out here in the morning chill with my suitcase by my knees. It felt like an ending—a heavy, definitive period at the end of a very long, exhausting chapter of my life.
The man in the gray suit walked up the wooden steps, bypassing Michael entirely, and stopped in front of me. He pulled out a leather badge case and flashed it briefly.
“Mrs. Margaret Ortega?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“I’m Special Agent Miller with the State Lottery Commission Enforcement Division. We received your digital records and the store logs. We also have security footage of your son attempting to validate the ticket roughly twenty minutes ago downtown before our automated systems flagged the discrepancy.” Agent Miller glanced over at Michael, who was now being gently guided toward the back of the first police cruiser by the uniformed officers.
“Is that your ticket, ma’am?” Agent Miller asked, pulling a clear plastic evidence bag from his briefcase. Inside was the familiar scrap of purple-and-white paper, folded neatly in half.
Through the clear plastic, I could see my own shaky handwriting written across the back in blue ballpoint ink: Margaret Ortega. March 6.
“Yes,” I said softly. “That’s my ticket. I bought it at the corner store using cash from my pension check, exactly like I do every Thursday in memory of my late husband.”
Agent Miller nodded slowly. “Then I believe, Mrs. Ortega, you are going to need to come down to the commission headquarters with us this afternoon to fill out some paperwork. Because as of right now... you are officially the sole legal winner of ninety million dollars.”
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Across the driveway, as the rear door of the police cruiser clicked shut behind Michael, Ashley began shouting curses that made Mr. Henderson gasp and cover his ears from across the street.
I didn't look back at them. I turned around, picked up my brown suitcase, and walked back through the green front door into my house.
