Chương 8
None of that was proof.
Lucas said so repeatedly.
Then Samantha reached the first sentence that made her stop.
“What?”
She looked at me.
“Do you remember a company called Alder Ridge Capital?”
The name meant nothing.
“No.”
“It was involved in refinancing company debt two years ago.”
“I wasn’t involved.”
“Lucas says Charles personally guaranteed part of that financing.”
I frowned.
“Dad never personally guarantees anything.”
“That appears to have been the problem.”
Samantha turned the page.
“The guarantee was not disclosed to the full board.”
“Is that illegal?”
“Not necessarily by itself, depending on the exact arrangement.”
“But?”
“But Lucas believed Charles concealed the terms because the collateral included his Baldwin-Gallagher shares.”
I stared at her.
“My father pledged his company shares?”
“Potentially.”
“To a lender?”
“Yes.”
“How much debt?”
“The memorandum estimates eleven million.”
I laughed because the alternative was screaming.
“Where did he get eleven million dollars of debt?”
“He didn’t.”
“Then what are we talking about?”
“A personal guarantee is not the same as personally receiving the loan.”
“Samantha.”
“The money appears to have gone into company-related transactions.”
“So Dad borrowed money to help the company?”
“Maybe.”
“That does not sound like stealing.”
“No.”
For the first time all day, the version of my father I wanted to believe in had somewhere to stand.
Maybe he had hidden debt.
Maybe he had manipulated accounts to keep the company alive.
Maybe everything ugly had a reason that was not simple greed.
Then Samantha turned another page.
“Lucas checked the transactions.”
My hope lasted approximately three seconds.
“The money didn’t all reach Baldwin-Gallagher.”
“How much did?”
“About seven million.”
“And the rest?”
“He could not trace it.”
I looked away.
Outside the narrow hospital window, clouds had lowered over Syracuse until the buildings across the parking lot seemed flattened beneath them.
A man stood beside a minivan smoking a cigarette under a no-smoking sign.
He kept checking his phone.
I wondered what his emergency looked like.
The door opened again.
A nurse named Kayla came in to adjust my monitor and tell me the obstetrician was on her way.
She asked whether I wanted an epidural.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t have to decide this second.”
“How much longer do I have?”
“For the epidural or childbirth?”
“Both.”
Kayla smiled.
“Childbirth refuses scheduling requests.”
Samantha closed the memorandum until she left.
The quiet felt almost domestic.
I picked up the decaf coffee.
It was terrible.
“You brought me hospital coffee.”
“I bought it downstairs.”
“That is hospital coffee.”
“You have strangely high standards for someone currently wearing a gown that opens in the back.”
I drank another sip anyway.
“Keep going.”
She reopened the pages.
Lucas had traced one portion of the missing funds to a consultancy called Merritt Strategic Services.
I knew that one.
“They did our route optimization project.”
“That’s what the invoices say.”
“They were legitimate.”
“You met them?”
I thought about it.
“No.”
“Did Lucas?”
“No.”
“Daniel?”
“I don’t know.”
Samantha checked the memorandum.
“Lucas says the company listed a Manhattan address that turned out to be a virtual office.”
My stomach sank.
“How much did we pay them?”
“Just over two million.”
“For route optimization?”
“And advisory services.”
“My God.”
“Most of the invoices were approved by Charles’s credentials.”
“From his computer?”
“Some.”
That mattered.
I could hear Daniel warning me not to confront Charles about the machine.
“Who owned Merritt?”
“Lucas hadn’t confirmed it when he wrote this.”
“But you have?”
Samantha hesitated.
“My office started running corporate records after the fraud clause triggered.”
“And?”
“Merritt was controlled through another LLC.”
“Of course it was.”
“That LLC was managed by an attorney in Albany.”
“Who?”
“Elliot Mercer.”
I stared at her.
“Mercer?”
“No connection to Mercer Private Bank that we know of.”
“Good, because I was running out of walls for the conspiracy chart in my head.”
Samantha ignored that.
“Elliot Mercer represented your father personally for several years.”
I knew the name now.
He had attended my mother’s funeral.
Tall, silver-haired, too much cologne.
He had hugged me for exactly as long as social convention required.
“Is he still Dad’s lawyer?”
“Not officially.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means their formal engagement ended eighteen months ago, but they continued communicating.”
“How do you know?”
“Lucas attached email headers.”
She handed me another page.
I scanned dates, subject lines, names.
One subject repeated three times.
Rochester.
My skin prickled.
“The warehouse.”
“Yes.”
Another line caught my eye.
Need V removed before revised packet circulates.
I read it twice.
“What is V?”
“Lucas didn’t know.”
“You think it means Victoria.”
“I think assuming that would be premature.”
The cautious answer irritated me.
Then I noticed the date.
It was two days before the acquisition packet had been emailed to me.
“Who sent this?”
“Elliot Mercer to Charles.”
My mouth went dry.
“Need V removed before revised packet circulates.”
“Yes.”
“What was removed?”
“We don’t know.”
“You have the packet.”
“We have the version you received.”
“So compare it to the earlier one.”
“That requires finding the earlier one.”
“Daniel?”
“Lucas asked him.”
“And?”
“The archive copy had been overwritten.”
I put the page down.
There it was again.
Something important always happened just before the evidence became complete.
A missing file.
An altered record.
A credential used by someone else.
A dead man who knew enough to be afraid and not enough to explain himself.
My phone buzzed.
This time the message came from Courtney.
Charles told me not to talk to you.
A second arrived before I could react.
I think he lied to me about more than the signature.
Samantha leaned closer.
“Don’t answer yet.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
A third message appeared.
There is something in his car you need to see before he gets it back.
I showed Samantha.
She stood immediately.
“What car?”
“My father’s.”
“Where is it?”
“Probably my house.”
She called Deputy Harrison.
May you like
He answered after two rings.
Samantha identified herself and asked whether Charles’s vehicle remained on the property.
