Chương 13
"What did he send?"
Claire inhaled.
"A whistleblower complaint."
Lucie froze beside me.
I put the phone on speaker.
"What did it say?"
Claire continued.
"He admitted participating in invoice manipulation."
"Did he name Margaux?"
"Yes."
My mouth went dry.
"And Lucie?"
"He said she discovered it."
Lucie sat down.
I could see the blood drain from her face.
"Where was this complaint?"
"In an archived mailbox rule."
"What rule?"
Claire's voice hardened.
"A rule that automatically redirected anything from Paul Mercier to a private folder."
"I didn't create that."
"I know."
"How?"
"Because it was created from workstation E-14."
Margaux's computer.
The same machine that had used Lucie's credentials.
Lucie covered her mouth with one hand.
Claire kept speaking.
"Alexandre, the rule was created eleven minutes after Paul's email arrived."
I said nothing.
"The email was never deleted."
"Why not?"
"Whoever did this probably thought redirecting it was safer."
"Can you prove who was at the computer?"
"Not yet."
"Find out."
"I am."
Then Claire added, "There's an attachment."
"What kind?"
"Audio."
Lucie's eyes lifted sharply.
"What is it?"
"I haven't listened to all of it."
"Play it."
"Not over the phone."
"Claire."
"Come back."
"No."
I looked at Lucie.
She understood before I asked.
"Send it."
Claire hesitated.
"All right."
The file arrived.
Twenty-three minutes long.
I pressed play.
For several seconds, there was restaurant noise.
Cutlery.
Low voices.
A chair scraping.
Then Paul's voice.
"I can't keep doing this."
A woman answered.
My sister.
"You already did it."
My skin went cold.
Paul spoke again.
"Lucie found the duplicate orders."
Margaux sighed.
"Then she'll become the explanation."
Beside me, Lucie stopped breathing.
Paul's voice dropped.
"That's not what we agreed."
"What we agreed doesn't matter anymore."
"She's your brother's wife."
"And he'll believe me."
There was a pause.
Then Margaux laughed softly.
"He always does."
Lucie reached for the phone, but her fingers stopped an inch above the screen.
"Keep playing."
I pressed play.
Paul's chair scraped again.
"You don't know that."
Margaux answered immediately.
"I know my brother."
"That's not the same thing."
"It's close enough."
Lucie's face had become unreadable.
Paul lowered his voice.
"If this gets bigger, I'm not taking the fall alone."
"You won't."
"You already changed the vendor account without telling me."
"Because you panicked."
"Because your numbers stopped making sense."
"I fixed them."
"You moved money through Sorelle."
"We needed somewhere to park it."
"We?"
"You were paid."
"I was paid for helping with invoices."
"You were paid for silence."
There was a clink of glass.
Then nothing for several seconds.
When Margaux spoke again, the casualness had disappeared.
"Lucie has copies?"
"Some."
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"Did you give them to her?"
"I showed her enough."
Lucie's hand closed around the edge of the chair.
Paul continued.
"She thinks someone inside Vance is changing the payment routes."
"She knows it's me?"
"No."
"Good."
"Margaux."
"What?"
"Stop saying good."
Another pause.
The restaurant noise swelled around them.
Somewhere nearby, a waiter asked someone whether they wanted dessert.
The ordinariness of it made the conversation worse.
Margaux spoke more quietly.
"You think I wanted this?"
Paul laughed once.
"Yes."
"You think I wanted to spend my life asking Alexandre for permission to exist?"
Lucie looked at me.
I said nothing.
Paul answered.
"He gave you a job."
"He gave Lucie a future."
"That's not the same thing."
"He put her in meetings."
"She was his wife."
"He listened to her."
The bitterness in Margaux's voice was unmistakable now.
"He gave her equity."
My stomach tightened.
Paul said, "That doesn't justify stealing from him."
"I didn't steal from him."
Lucie closed her eyes.
Paul sounded genuinely confused.
"What do you call it?"
"I borrowed from a company that would still be worth millions if I disappeared tomorrow."
"That's stealing."
"It was temporary."
"You've been saying temporary for a year."
"I was going to replace it."
"With what?"
Silence.
Then Paul said, "The loan?"
Margaux did not answer.
He laughed under his breath.
"Oh my God."
"Keep your voice down."
"You used your father's house."
"He signed."
"Did he know what he signed?"
"He knew enough."
My father's face flashed through my mind.
His hand shaking over the notebook.
His shame.
Paul continued.
"This is insane."
"No."
"This is criminal."
"Then stop helping."
"I am trying to."
"Too late."
Something struck the table.
Maybe Paul's hand.
"That's exactly the problem."
His voice sharpened.
"You always think too late means forever."
Margaux answered with a softness I remembered from childhood.
The voice she used when she wanted someone to come closer.
"If you leave now, Paul, you go down first."
Lucie looked at me.
Paul said nothing.
Margaux continued.
"The invoices are yours."
"The shell company was your idea."
"On paper, you arranged the vendor route."
"You approved it."
"Can you prove that?"
There was a long silence.
Paul's breathing became audible.
Then he said, "You really did plan this."
Margaux did not deny it.
I paused the file.
Lucie turned toward me.
"Why did you stop?"
"I need a second."
"You don't get one."
Her voice cracked on the last word.
I looked at her.
She stood so abruptly that the paper cup fell and rolled beneath the chair.
"Three years."
"Lucie."
"Three years."
People across the corridor looked over.
She lowered her voice but not the anger.
"You had this."
"I didn't."
"Your company had it."
"I never heard it."
"You never looked."
That was true.
There was no defense.
"I know."
"No."
She shook her head.
"Stop saying that like it fixes anything."
"It doesn't."
"You destroyed my name."
Her breathing had become uneven.
"You told your employees I stole from you."
"I know."
"You told your friends."
"I know."
"My landlord called me after someone sent him the newspaper article."
I stared at her.
"What article?"
She laughed in disbelief.
"You don't even remember."
May you like
I did.
A business blog had published a piece about the alleged fraud after the divorce became public.
