Chương 4 - The Man Who Finally Saw HerWe didn’t sleep.
Larkin moved me into one of his secure apartments in Tribeca before midnight.
Calling it an apartment was insulting.
It occupied half a floor.
Floor-to-ceiling windows.
Private elevator.
Marble kitchen.
Two guest rooms bigger than my entire apartment.
Security stationed downstairs.
I stood barefoot in the living room, still wearing the black dress, while Larkin studied the scanned ledger on a laptop.
My shoes lay near the sofa.
One heel was broken.
Somehow that detail bothered me more than my destroyed home.
Maybe because the shoes represented the person I had chosen to become for one night.
And now even they were damaged.
Larkin looked up.
“You should change.”
“I don’t have clothes.”
He walked to a closet and pulled out a white shirt.
“Use this.”
I stared at it.
“You keep women’s clothes here?”
“It’s mine.”
“Oh.”
The absurdity of that conversation almost made me laugh.
Ten minutes later, I returned wearing his white shirt and borrowed sweatpants someone from security had delivered.
My makeup was gone.
My sharp bob remained.
Larkin looked at me.
Not like he had at the gala.
Different.
Quieter.
Like he was trying to reconcile two versions of me.
“I liked the dress,” he said.
I folded my arms.
“That sounded dangerously close to a compliment.”
“It was.”
“Are you feeling well?”
He almost smiled.
Then the moment disappeared.
He turned the laptop.
“The ledger page is from eleven years ago.”
“My father died twelve years ago.”
“Yes.”
“So someone kept using his signature afterward.”
“Possibly.”
“Or forged it.”
“Yes.”
I sat across from him.
“What was Meridian Allied?”
“A holding structure.”
“For what?”
“Shipping revenue. Real estate. Cash-heavy businesses.”
“And my father?”
“He supervised reconciliations.”
Exactly what I did now.
The realization made my skin cold.
“You hired me because of him.”
“No.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I hired you because you corrected a seventeen-million-dollar discrepancy during your interview.”
I remembered.
The hiring manager had placed a test spreadsheet in front of me.
I found the error in twelve minutes.
Larkin had entered the room fifteen minutes later.
He hired me personally.
“You researched me.”
“After hiring you.”
“And never found my father?”
“You listed your mother’s maiden name on older records. Penelope Carter.”
I nodded.
After my father died, my mother changed my name temporarily for legal reasons.
Later, I went back to Woods.
Maybe that had hidden me.
Maybe someone had wanted me hidden.
Larkin tapped the ledger.
“My father’s signature appears here too.”
“Does that mean he approved it?”
“No.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because this transaction moved money from one of his private accounts.”
“So?”
“So he would never authorize theft from himself.”
I stared at him.
“You think Thomas’s father did it.”
Larkin looked away.
Thomas’s father, Gregory Steves, had died five years earlier.
Heart attack.
At least officially.
“Gregory controlled Meridian’s operations,” Larkin said.
“And your father?”
“Controlled the organization.”
“So Gregory stole from him.”
“Maybe.”
“And my father found it.”
“Maybe.”
“And then my father died.”
Larkin’s jaw tightened.
I stood.
“You’ve known this possibility for years.”
“I knew money was missing. I didn’t know your father was involved.”
“Don’t split words with me.”
“I’m not.”
“You people destroy lives and call it accounting.”
His eyes flashed.
“You work for us.”
“Because I needed money.”
“You stayed three years.”
“Because leaving a crime syndicate after learning its books seemed unhealthy.”
Silence.
He stood.
For the first time, we were nearly face-to-face.
“You think I would have hurt you for resigning?”
“I didn’t know.”
“You should have.”
“Why?”
His answer came too quickly.
“Because I’m not my father.”
I stared at him.
Something personal had slipped through.
Before I could respond, his phone rang.
Security.
He answered.
“What?”
He listened.
Then hung up.
“Thomas is downstairs.”
I laughed once.
“Of course he is.”
“He says he wants to explain.”
“Do you believe him?”
“No.”
“Then don’t let him up.”
Larkin looked at me.
“He knows we suspect him.”
“Good.”
“He may know where your notebooks are.”
My expression changed.
Larkin pressed the intercom.
“Send him up.”
Thomas arrived five minutes later.
He looked furious.
His eyes landed on me wearing Larkin’s shirt.
Then on Larkin.
A slow smile formed.
“Well.”
I said, “If you make the obvious joke, I’m going to be disappointed.”
He ignored me.
“Larkin, you’ve lost your mind.”
“Your driver was at Penelope’s building.”
Thomas froze for half a second.
Then shrugged.
“I sent him.”
I hadn’t expected the admission.
“Why?” Larkin asked.
“To retrieve something.”
“My notebooks,” I said.
Thomas looked at me.
“Yes.”
The room went silent.
Larkin stepped forward.
“You broke into her apartment?”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I sent Marco to collect a folder Penelope took from the office three weeks ago.”
I frowned.
“I didn’t take anything.”
Thomas laughed.
“You really don’t remember?”
“No.”
He reached into his jacket.
Security moved instantly.
Thomas slowly removed a photograph.
He placed it on the table.
The image showed me leaving the office carrying a brown archive box.
Date stamp.
Three weeks earlier.
I stared at it.
“That box contained tax records.”
“No,” Thomas said.
“It contained a ledger.”
“What ledger?”
“The same one your father died trying to protect.”
My chest tightened.
“Where is it?”
Thomas smiled.
“That’s the problem.”
“You have it.”
“No.”
“Then who does?”
His smile disappeared.
“Someone who just made a move against all of us.”
Larkin said, “Name.”
Thomas looked at him.
Then at me.
“Adrian Vale.”
I remembered the man from the gala.
The man who had questioned how I knew his corporate structure.
May you like
Thomas continued.
“And if he has that ledger, Penelope isn’t the only person whose life is about to fall apart.”
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