“And he wrote ‘Settlement for accidental fall’ right on the memo line in his own blue handwriting.”

“He did,” I said.

“This isn’t a settlement check,” Sarah said, laying the bag in her open case file.

“This is physical evidence of attempted witness tampering and felony bribery in an active police investigation.”

She picked up the USB flash drive and plugged it into the blue port on her computer.

She put on a pair of black padded headphones and clicked the media player icon on her screen.

For thirty seconds, Sarah sat completely still, watching the audio waveform move across her screen.