Chapter 5 - What Victoria Was Hiding
The security guard didn't draw his weapon.
He didn't need to.
His hand rested near his jacket, enough to make everyone understand the situation had changed.
Adrian stepped in front of Maya.
“Who is he?”
Daniel nodded toward the guard.
“Someone Charles pays better than the venue does.”
Charles turned.
“Get him out of here.”
The guard hesitated.
Adrian looked at him.
“You work in my building.”
That mattered.
The guard removed his hand from his jacket.
Adrian continued.
“If you touch anyone here, your name will be attached to every recording on this rooftop before you reach the elevator.”
Phones were everywhere now.
The guard backed away.
Charles looked suddenly smaller.
Daniel lifted the envelope.
“This is what Lorraine kept.”
Maya stared.
“What am I holding?”
“Copies.”
“You lied.”
“Yes.”
“Again.”
“Yes.”
She wanted to scream.
Instead she said, “Give me the original.”
Daniel looked at Charles.
“No.”
Maya nearly laughed.
“You drag me into this, use my mother, send me into a wedding carrying fake leverage, and now you're protecting him?”
“I'm protecting you.”
“I'm getting tired of hearing that.”
Daniel's expression broke.
“Lorraine said the same thing.”
Maya froze.
Adrian said, “Open it.”
Daniel looked at him.
“You won't like what's inside.”
“I'm having that kind of evening.”
Nobody laughed.
Daniel opened the envelope.
He removed three documents.
The first was a trust agreement.
The second, a private settlement.
The third, a notarized letter.
Daniel handed the trust agreement to Maya.
She read the first page.
Her name appeared.
Maya Lorraine Bennett Trust.
Established September 2008.
Settlor:
Richard Alexander Cole.
Her knees weakened.
Adrian read over her shoulder.
“No.”
Maya looked at him.
“You knew?”
“No.”
“Don't lie to me.”
“I didn't.”
His face had gone gray.
Victoria started crying.
Not loudly.
Quiet tears.
Maya looked at her.
“Why are you crying?”
Victoria shook her head.
“Because I knew.”
Adrian stared at her.
“What?”
“I found the records after my mother died.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
The same month Lorraine died.
Maya felt sick.
Victoria wiped her face.
“My mother kept copies.”
Charles said, “Victoria.”
“Stop protecting me.”
She faced Adrian.
“There was an affair.”
Maya stopped breathing.
“Between Richard and Lorraine.”
“No.”
Victoria's voice cracked.
“That's what I believed.”
Maya looked at Daniel.
“Is that true?”
Daniel hesitated.
“Partly.”
“What does partly mean?”
“Richard loved Lorraine.”
Maya's stomach dropped.
“Were they together?”
“Yes.”
Adrian stepped back as though hit.
His father.
Maya's mother.
The rooftop seemed to tilt again.
Maya looked at the trust agreement.
“Am I his daughter?”
“No.”
Daniel answered immediately.
She stared at him.
“No?”
“No.”
Adrian exhaled.
Maya didn't know whether relief was allowed.
“Then why the trust?”
Daniel handed her the notarized letter.
“Because your father died.”
Maya's eyes narrowed.
“My father left when I was three.”
“No.”
“My mother told me—”
“Lorraine lied.”
Everything inside Maya went quiet.
Daniel continued.
“Your father was named Marcus Bennett.”
Maya knew that name.
It was on her birth certificate.
“He didn't leave.”
“What happened?”
Charles looked away.
Daniel said, “He was killed on an Ashcroft construction site.”
Maya stared.
“Accident?”
“No.”
One word.
That was all it took.
The world changed.
Daniel explained slowly.
Marcus Bennett had worked as a union safety inspector on a riverfront development controlled by one of Charles's companies.
He discovered that structural test reports were being falsified to avoid costly delays.
He threatened to shut the project down.
Three days later, he fell from an unfinished floor.
Officially, a workplace accident.
Unofficially, several safety barriers had been removed.
Lorraine never believed it was accidental.
Richard Cole didn't either.
At the time, Richard had financed the project.
When he started investigating, he found the shell companies.
The bribes.
The forged inspections.
The money.
Lorraine, working for the outside accounting firm, found the financial trail independently.
They joined forces.
And somewhere in the months that followed, they became close.
Too close.
Adrian stared at the city.
“My father cheated on my mother.”
Daniel said nothing.
Adrian laughed bitterly.
“Great.”
Maya looked at him.
There were two tragedies standing beside each other, neither canceling the other.
“My father died,” she whispered.
Daniel nodded.
“And my mother let me think he abandoned us.”
“She thought it was safer.”
“She let me hate him.”
Her voice broke.
“For twenty-seven years.”
Daniel's eyes filled.
“She was terrified you'd start asking questions.”
Maya turned to Charles.
“Did you kill him?”
Victoria gasped.
Charles looked directly at Maya.
“No.”
“Did you know somebody would?”
“No.”
“Did your company cover it up?”
Silence.
That was enough.
Maya stepped toward him.
“You knew.”
“I knew afterward.”
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
Her hand shook.
Charles's voice dropped.
“I was thirty-seven years old. My company was collapsing. Investors would have walked. Hundreds of employees—”
“Don't.”
He stopped.
“Don't give me a business lecture about my father's death.”
Charles looked down.
“I signed the settlement.”
“What settlement?”
Daniel handed Maya the second document.
A confidential payment agreement.
Money had gone to Lorraine.
Maya stared at the number.
Two million dollars.
“My mother took this?”
“She never spent it,” Daniel said.
“That's not the point.”
“She put it into a protected account for you.”
“I never got two million dollars.”
“No.”
“Where is it?”
Daniel looked at Victoria.
Maya followed his gaze.
Victoria closed her eyes.
Adrian said quietly, “Victoria.”
She opened them.
“My mother moved it.”
“What?”
“She found the account years later.”
Maya stepped toward her.
“You stole money from me?”
“No.”
Victoria's voice shook.
“My mother did.”
“Where?”
“She rolled it through a family investment vehicle because she was afraid the settlement could connect my father to the old project.”
“And you knew.”
“Not until six months ago.”
Maya laughed without humor.
“And instead of telling me, you tried to humiliate me out of the building.”
“I panicked.”
“You shoved me into a pool.”
“I know.”
“Why?”
Victoria looked at Adrian.
Because there was something else.
Maya saw it.
“What?”
Victoria whispered, “The money became part of the capital my father used to save Ashcroft Development.”
Charles closed his eyes.
Adrian stared.
“How much is it worth now?”
Nobody answered.
Adrian's voice hardened.
“How much?”
Charles said, “Approximately forty-eight million.”
Maya couldn't process the number.
Tasha made a choking sound somewhere behind them.
Maya looked at Charles.
“You built part of your company with money meant for me.”
“It wasn't that simple.”
“It sounds incredibly simple.”
“Maya—”
“No.”
She backed away.
All her life, rent had been late.
Her mother rationed prescriptions.
Maya worked double shifts through college.
She dropped out for a year because tuition increased.
Forty-eight million dollars.
Sitting inside the empire of people who treated her like furniture.
Victoria started toward her.
Maya raised a hand.
“Don't.”
Victoria stopped.
Then her phone rang.
She looked at the screen.
Fear returned.
Daniel saw it.
“Who is that?”
“No one.”
“Victoria.”
She declined the call.
It rang again.
Adrian said, “Answer it.”
She didn't.
Daniel took a step forward.
“It's him.”
Victoria's face changed.
Charles whispered, “Who?”
Daniel looked at Maya.
“The person Lorraine was actually afraid of.”
Before anyone could speak, the rooftop lights went out.
Darkness.
Someone screamed.
Glass shattered.
Maya felt a hand grab her wrist.
Then the envelope was ripped from her fingers.
When emergency lights came on fifteen seconds later, Daniel Mercer was gone.
May you like
So were the original documents.
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