Part 6
“For what part?”
His eyes lowered.
“That is fair.”
“No, it isn’t. I don’t want fairness. I want to know what you gave Arthur.”
“Preliminary financial statements. Asset summaries. Forecasts.”
“Why?”
“Vale Meridian proposed acquiring a minority position in the glassworks expansion subsidiary. They would contribute hospitality contracts and real estate access. We would supply architectural glass.”
“You said Daniel’s furnace line was being financed through ordinary debt.”
“It was one option.”
Daniel turned toward him. “You told me the board had approved the bank package.”
“The board approved continued negotiations.”
“That isn’t what you told me.”
Richard looked tired rather than guilty, which made Mara angrier. Guilt would have admitted a boundary. Tiredness suggested he considered their reactions additional work.
“Arthur approached me eight months ago,” he said. “The proposal had merit. I did not know Vale Meridian’s liquidity position had deteriorated.”
“Did Graham know you were talking?” Mara asked.
“I assumed so.”
“Did you assume I knew?”
Richard sat in the chair across from her.
“I planned to bring you in after the wedding.”
“Why after?”
“Because you and Graham had become defensive whenever business overlapped with the relationship.”
Mara stared at him.
“You kept a business negotiation from me because I might become defensive about my fiancé negotiating access to my company through my father.”
“When you say it that way—”
“How else is there to say it?”
Daniel paced toward the window.
Richard’s voice sharpened. “I made an error. I did not authorize fraud. I did not authorize him to use your name. I certainly did not authorize what happened tonight.”
“But you helped create the room where he thought it might work.”
The sentence left Mara before she had arranged it. Her father recoiled as though she had struck him.
She regretted the precision and did not take it back.
A knock sounded.
Rachel entered carrying a leather case and two coffees. She was sixty-one, silver-haired, compact, and dressed in dark slacks with a raincoat she did not need in the desert. She looked at Mara for a long moment before setting the coffees down.
“Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
“Good. That answer may change several times in the next week. Tell me when it does.”
Rachel did not hug her. Mara had known her since childhood and loved her for understanding that care did not always require contact.
They spent the next two hours reconstructing access.
The forged lender packet had been sent at 8:42 p.m. from a domain registered three days earlier. The registration information was private. The message used language copied from Mara’s earlier business correspondence and included an internal access code from the company’s secure document portal.
The code had been generated from Mara’s account six weeks earlier.
“I was in Los Angeles six weeks ago,” Mara said.
“With Graham?” Rachel asked.
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“Five days.”
“Did you access company files?”
“Probably. We were finalizing the furnace proposal.”
“From what device?”
“My tablet.”
“Did anyone else use it?”
Mara looked at Richard.
Her father looked away.
Rachel noticed but did not ask yet.
The board chair had frozen all pending discussions involving Vale Meridian. The lender had been notified that the guarantee was disputed and unauthorized. That would likely stop an immediate closing, though Rachel warned them that copied information might already be circulating among investors.
“We need a forensic review,” Rachel said. “Not because every digital trace proves what it appears to prove, but because we need to know what left the company, when, and through whose credentials.”
Daniel leaned against the desk. “We know through whose credentials.”
“We know Mara’s account was used. We do not know by whom.”
“He admitted looking at her files.”
“Did he admit downloading them?”
Mara thought back.
“He said he looked at what he needed.”
“That is not the same sentence.”
“It is to me.”
“It can be to you. It cannot be to an investigator.”
Daniel opened his mouth.
Rachel raised one finger.
“Anger is useful for approximately seven minutes. After that, it begins destroying evidence and relationships indiscriminately. We are past seven.”
Daniel sat.
Mara almost smiled again. Rachel had spoken to him that way since he was sixteen.
At six thirty, Claire knocked and entered with a paper bag containing plain clothes purchased from the resort boutique. Cream linen pants, a white shirt, sandals. Not what Mara would have chosen, but nothing she had chosen recently felt trustworthy.
Claire placed the bag on the bed.
“The deputies released the room,” she said. “The resort moved your belongings to storage except the items collected as evidence.”
“Where are Graham’s things?”
“Separate storage.”
“Who authorized that?”
“I did.”
“Can you do that?”
“Probably not for much longer.”
Mara looked at her.
Claire’s face remained composed, but exhaustion showed around her eyes.
“The resort’s managing director asked me to take administrative leave,” she said. “I declined until you had another point of contact.”
“Because you called security?”
“Because I entered a guest villa without bringing another employee and because I recorded part of a private incident.”
“You came because I asked.”
“That is what I said.”
“What did he say?”
“He said the Vale family accounts represent a significant portion of our event business.”
Richard shifted in his chair.
Claire continued, “He also said the resort has a duty to remain neutral.”
Rachel gave a dry laugh.
“Neutrality is often the preferred word when money dislikes chronology.”
Claire looked at her with immediate respect.
“Are you a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Mara stood and opened the clothing bag. Beneath the shirt lay a small sewing kit.
She touched it.
Claire said, “The boutique clerk thought you might want to repair the dress.”
Mara looked toward the gown hanging from the wardrobe door. The torn shoulder sagged beneath the weight of lace.
“Not today.”
Claire nodded.
May you like
Rachel asked to speak with Claire privately about what she had seen and heard. They moved to the sitting area near the window. Daniel followed their father into the hall, where their low argument resumed almost at once.
