Chương 8
“Did you sign in ink?”
“Yes.”
“Blue or black?”
Claire blinked.
“What?”
“The ink.”
“Blue.”
Maya made a note.
“Did anyone witness it?”
Claire frowned.
“Dad, maybe.”
I felt something shift in my chest.
“Was it notarized?”
She looked at me.
“I don’t know.”
“Think.”
Maya did not interrupt.
Claire closed her eyes.
“There was a woman there.”
“What woman?” I asked.
Maya gave me a look.
I stopped.
Claire opened her eyes.
“I thought she worked for Mark.”
“Name?” Maya asked.
“I don’t remember.”
“What did she do?”
“She stamped something.”
Maya’s pen stopped.
“Did she ask for your identification?”
Claire stared at her.
“No.”
“Did she watch you sign?”
“I think so.”
“Think carefully.”
Claire’s face drained of color.
“She wasn’t in the room when I signed.”
Nobody spoke.
Maya wrote one more line.
Then she looked at me.
“Did you see this woman?”
“Yes.”
“Can you describe her?”
“Mid-forties, maybe.”
“Anything distinctive?”
I pictured the dinner.
A navy coat over the back of a chair.
A leather tote near the entry.
A woman standing in my parents’ kitchen while Mom searched for a serving spoon.
“She had a name badge clipped inside her bag.”
Maya leaned forward.
“Did you read it?”
“Not all of it.”
“What did you see?”
I closed my eyes.
The memory resisted because I had not cared at the time.
Three letters came back first.
Then a surname.
“Lena.”
Claire inhaled sharply.
I opened my eyes.
“Or Lina.”
Maya waited.
I saw the badge again, partly covered by the tote strap.
“Harper.”
Claire’s face changed.
“You know her?” I asked.
She nodded.
“She was Mark’s office manager.”
Maya’s expression became very still.
“Was?”
Claire looked at her.
“He fired her three weeks ago.”
“Why?”
“He said she stole from him.”
No one moved.
Then Maya asked the question that none of us had considered until that moment.
“Did Mark report the alleged theft to police?”
Claire shook her head.
“He said he didn’t want to ruin her life.”
Maya and I looked at each other.
For the first time since I arrived at the vineyard, I saw a new possibility take shape.
Not an answer.
A person.
A person who had been close enough to Mark’s records to witness signatures, handle documents, and possibly know why a five-million-dollar transfer had triggered federal agents on the morning of his wedding.
Maya did not reach for her phone.
Instead, she looked at Claire and said, “You are not contacting her.”
Claire’s mouth opened.
“I wasn’t—”
“You were about to ask whether we should.”
Claire glanced at me.
“She’s right.”
Maya capped her pen.
“If Ms. Harper has information relevant to a federal investigation, she may already have counsel, she may already be cooperating, or she may want nothing to do with anyone connected to Mark.”
“So we just ignore her?” Claire asked.
“We let your attorney handle contact.”
“You are my attorney.”
“If you retain me.”
Claire stared at her.
“I thought that’s what this was.”
“This is a consultation.”
The distinction seemed to irritate Claire simply because it existed.
“How much?”
Maya told her.
Claire blinked.
“Oh.”
Maya’s expression softened by perhaps five percent.
“White-collar defense is an expensive way to learn that paperwork matters.”
I almost laughed again.
Claire did not.
“I have money.”
“Your money?”
That stopped her.
Claire looked down.
“I think so.”
Maya waited.
“I have my own checking account.”
“Funded from what?”
“My salary.”
“You still work?”
“Yes.”
“What do you do?”
“Marketing for a medical device company.”
“Is your paycheck deposited there?”
“Yes.”
“Does Mark have access?”
Claire rubbed her palms against her dress.
“I gave him login information once when we were applying for the mortgage.”
“What mortgage?”
“Our house.”
I sat up straighter.
“You bought a house?”
Claire looked at me.
“We closed two months ago.”
I had not known.
The fact should not have mattered in the middle of a federal fraud case.
It did.
Another milestone.
Another omission.
Another thing everyone else had apparently known.
Claire saw the change in my face.
“I didn’t tell you because we weren’t talking.”
“That part is obvious.”
“I was going to.”
I said nothing.
Maya let the silence sit for exactly long enough to become uncomfortable.
Then she asked, “Whose names are on the deed?”
“Mine and Mark’s.”
“The mortgage?”
“Both.”
“Down payment?”
Claire hesitated.
“Mark.”
“How much?”
“Four hundred thousand.”
Maya wrote it down.
“From which account?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you ask?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Claire’s jaw tightened.
“Because I thought my fiancé having money was normal.”
Maya nodded.
“Fair.”
Claire seemed almost offended by the lack of judgment.
Maya continued.
“Any joint investment accounts?”
“One.”
“With Bellamy Capital?”
“Yes.”
“How much did you contribute?”
“About eighty thousand.”
“Your own funds?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Claire’s voice became quieter.
“He had me roll over an old 401(k).”
“How much?”
“Maybe one thirty.”
Maya made another note.
I watched the numbers accumulate in blue ink.
Not abstract fraud.
Claire’s salary.
Claire’s retirement.
Claire’s house.
Pieces of a life she had assumed belonged to her.
“Did Mark pressure you?” Maya asked.
“No.”
“Did he promise specific returns?”
“He said I’d do better with him.”
“How much better?”
“He didn’t say.”
“Did you receive statements?”
“Yes.”
“Paper or electronic?”
“Electronic.”
“From Bellamy Capital’s client portal?”
“Yes.”
“Do not log in.”
“I know.”
Maya glanced toward me.
“Good.”
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
I ignored it.
Maya asked Claire for permission to formally represent her.
Claire signed the engagement agreement with a hand that shook only once.
Maya gave her a copy and placed the original into a folder.
Then she said, “Now I can tell your family to stop giving you advice.”
Claire looked at me.
“I like her.”
“Most people don’t,” Maya said.
“I’m sitting right here,” I said.
“That includes you.”
It was the first normal exchange Claire and I had shared all day.
It lasted perhaps three seconds.
May you like
Then Maya’s desk phone rang.
She looked at the display and frowned.
