Chapter 7 - The Initials in the Ledger
I called Michael before the ambulance arrived.
He answered immediately.
“Adrian?”
“Put Lily on.”
A pause.
“What's wrong?”
“Put Lily on.”
Claire stood beside me listening.
“Adrian, tell me—”
“Michael.”
Something in my voice ended the argument.
A moment later Lily came onto the phone.
“Mr. Adrian?”
I closed my eyes briefly.
“You okay, bug?”
Claire looked at me when she heard the nickname.
Apparently I had given the child one without noticing.
“Yes.”
“Where are you?”
“In the kitchen.”
“Who is with you?”
“Mr. Michael and the big men.”
Gabriel's security officers.
“Is Mommy there?”
“She’s right here.”
Claire took the phone.
“Hi, baby.”
“Mommy, Clover misses me.”
“I know.”
“Did Mr. Adrian fix his ear?”
“Not yet.”
I mouthed her.
Claire almost smiled.
“We'll be home soon.”
“Are you at home?”
“At the other house.”
“That's not home.”
The sentence landed strangely.
Claire promised they would return.
When the call ended, I looked at Gabriel.
“Get a second team to the lake house. Michael does not leave.”
“You think Elias meant Dr. Grant?”
“Who else?”
Claire shook her head.
“Michael saved me.”
“Maybe.”
“He found the sedative.”
“Maybe because he knew what to find.”
“You can't suspect everyone.”
“That is exactly what tonight has taught me to do.”
Elias survived.
The bullet had passed through his shoulder.
We moved him to a private medical facility Gabriel trusted rather than a major hospital.
Before sedation, Elias regained consciousness.
I stood beside his bed.
“When you said Michael, did you mean Dr. Michael Grant?”
He frowned.
“No.”
My entire body loosened by half an inch.
“Then who?”
“Michael Rowe.”
I looked at Gabriel.
He knew the name.
I didn't.
“Who is that?”
“Former Moretti systems engineer,” Gabriel said.
“When?”
“Eight years ago.”
Elias nodded weakly.
“Designed portions of the access network.”
“What happened to him?”
“You fired him.”
I remembered.
Michael Rowe had been caught selling proprietary security architecture to a competitor.
He'd threatened litigation.
Then disappeared from Chicago.
“Victor hired him?”
“Two years later.”
That explained the breach.
The cameras.
Badges.
Backup systems.
Everything.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Didn't know until last month.”
“And you stayed silent.”
Elias closed his eyes.
“Sophie.”
I wanted to be furious.
Instead I felt tired.
“Rest.”
His eyes opened.
“Adrian.”
“What?”
“I'm not asking you to forgive me.”
“Good.”
“But Claire and Lily are alive because Victor still needs the evidence.”
“I know.”
“Once he gets it…”
“You think I don't know that?”
Elias looked at me.
“I think you're angry enough to forget.”
I left before I said something I regretted.
Back at the lake house, Lily ran toward Claire.
Claire dropped to her knees.
For a long time, mother and daughter simply held each other.
I stood near the doorway.
Lily eventually looked over Claire's shoulder.
“You came too.”
“I said I would.”
“Did you fix Clover?”
I pulled the rabbit from my coat.
Gabriel had found a sewing kit at a gas station.
My repair looked terrible.
One ear leaned slightly farther than the other.
Lily stared.
I prepared myself for criticism.
“He's beautiful.”
She hugged the rabbit.
Something inside my chest shifted dangerously.
Later, after Lily slept, we opened Daniel’s laptop.
It required a password.
Claire tried birthdays.
Wedding date.
Lily's name.
Nothing.
“What did Daniel care about most besides family?” Gabriel asked.
“Baseball.”
“Team?”
“Cubs.”
“That's unfortunate.”
Claire glared at him.
He lifted both hands.
“I'm a Sox fan.”
She tried famous players.
No success.
Then I remembered Daniel’s recording.
Anything I ever did right.
“Try ‘Lily.’”
“She did.”
“Not her name.”
“What then?”
I looked toward the rabbit.
“Clover.”
Password accepted.
Claire stared at me.
“You're getting disturbingly good at thinking like my dead husband.”
“I'll put it on my résumé.”
Files filled the screen.
Spreadsheets.
Scanned documents.
Emails.
Photographs.
Daniel had organized everything meticulously.
One folder was labeled M17.
The same identifier as Elias’s old vehicle.
We opened it.
Inside was a scan of a handwritten ledger.
Payments.
Dates.
Initials.
VR.
MV.
MR.
EM.
Gabriel pointed.
“Victor. Marcus Vale. Michael Rowe. Elias Mercer.”
Elias's initials appeared only twice.
Small payments.
Around the time of Daniel's death.
Bribes?
Or something else?
Then we found a second page.
Next to EM was a notation.
“Family leverage.”
Not payment.
Blackmail.
Claire whispered, “He really was threatened.”
“Yes.”
Another set of initials appeared repeatedly.
JH.
Amounts far larger.
“What does that stand for?”
Gabriel searched known Victor associates.
Nothing immediate.
Claire kept reading.
“Look at the dates.”
The payments aligned with municipal decisions involving waterfront permits.
“Judge?” I said.
“Politician?”
“Inspector?”
Gabriel zoomed in.
One entry included a phrase.
Court cooperation secured.
“Judge,” Claire said.
Chicago had several judges with those initials.
One stood out.
Jonathan Hale.
He had presided over two commercial disputes involving Kane Maritime.
Both had ended favorably for Victor.
Gabriel called an investigator.
I kept scrolling.
A scanned email opened.
From Daniel to Ava Reynolds.
If anything happens, Moretti is the pressure point. Kane is irrational where Adrian is concerned.
Why?
I still didn't understand.
Another file answered part of it.
A photograph from fifteen years earlier.
Victor Kane stood beside my father, Alessandro Moretti.
Both much younger.
Behind them was South River Terminal.
Claire looked at me.
“Your father knew him.”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
“I don't know.”
That was a lie.
I remembered Victor.
Not clearly.
A man at my father's office.
Arguments behind closed doors.
One night when I was twenty-four, my father returned home with blood on his collar and refused to explain.
Six months later, Victor Kane left Chicago for New York.
He returned only after my father died.
Claire studied me.
“You remembered something.”
“My father had business with Victor.”
“What kind?”
“The kind he didn't discuss with his children.”
“Can we find out?”
“Maybe.”
Gabriel opened archived company records.
Most were unavailable digitally.
My father trusted paper.
The physical archives remained at Moretti headquarters.
Then another file appeared on Daniel’s laptop.
Audio.
Date: six days before his death.
We played it.
Victor’s voice filled the room.
“You think Moretti will protect you?”
Daniel answered.
“I think he hates you enough to try.”
Victor laughed.
“You have no idea why Adrian hates me.”
“Should I?”
“He doesn't even know.”
A pause.
Then Victor said:
“Ask him what happened to his father.”
The recording ended.
Claire looked at me.
“How did your father die?”
“Heart attack.”
“When?”
“Seven years ago.”
“You believe that?”
I had.
Until that moment.
My phone vibrated.
A message from Gabriel’s investigator.
Judge Jonathan Hale had just scheduled an emergency hearing for the following morning.
Subject:
A sealed warrant authorizing the seizure of all Moretti corporate archives related to South River Terminal.
Someone knew we were looking into my father's past.
May you like
And Victor Kane had just moved the entire legal system between us and the truth.
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