Chapter 5 - The Missing Money
The next morning, Sarah placed a laptop on the tray above my hospital bed.
"Before I show you this, I need you to stay calm."
"People keep saying that right before destroying my life."
She gave me a tired smile.
"Fair."
Hazel slept beside me.
Julian had been removed from the hospital the previous night.
Eleanor and Victoria had left separately.
Security had documented everything.
The papers had been secured.
My phone recording had been copied.
I should have felt safer.
Instead, Sarah looked worried.
She opened a spreadsheet.
"Three months ago, Julian authorized a series of payments through subsidiaries."
"That's normal."
"These aren't."
She showed me the destinations.
Consulting firms.
Management companies.
A property holding corporation.
Names I didn't recognize.
"How much?"
"Just over two million dollars."
My mouth went dry.
"Two million?"
"Possibly more."
"Where did it go?"
"We're tracing it."
I stared at the screen.
Sarah clicked another file.
"There's something else."
A company called Hale Strategic Partners.
Hale.
Victoria Hale.
I felt sick.
"She owns it?"
"Her brother does."
Payments from Vance Development had flowed into Hale Strategic Partners for nearly eight months.
"What services did they provide?"
"We haven't found any."
I closed my eyes.
The affair wasn't separate from the business scheme.
Victoria wasn't simply Julian's mistress.
She was part of it.
"How long has Sarah known?" I asked myself silently.
Then another thought struck me.
"My father."
Sarah looked at me.
"What about him?"
"Julian started asking about the trust after Dad died."
"Yes."
"He didn't fall in love with my money after eleven years."
Sarah said nothing.
"He married me because of it?"
"We don't know that."
But the possibility had already entered my mind.
And once it was there, I couldn't remove it.
Later that afternoon, a nurse helped me begin physical therapy.
I couldn't stand.
I couldn't move my toes.
But when the therapist touched my left foot, I felt something.
Barely.
A spark.
"Did you feel that?"
"Yes."
She smiled.
"That's good."
I cried harder over that tiny sensation than I had over anything else.
Because for the first time since Hazel's birth, my body had given me something Julian couldn't take.
Hope.
Then Sarah's phone rang.
She answered.
Her expression changed.
"What?"
She listened.
"Don't touch anything. Photograph it first."
She ended the call.
"What happened?" I asked.
She looked at me.
"Someone broke into your office last night."
My heartbeat accelerated.
"What did they take?"
"That's the strange part."
"What?"
"Nothing."
Sarah closed the laptop.
"They weren't trying to steal something."
She looked directly at me.
"They were trying to find something."
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And I knew exactly what it was.
My father's original trust documents.
