Chương 3
“The ring?” Claire asked.
Vanessa pulled her hand farther beneath the table. “Daniel bought the ring.”
“With what?”
“I don’t audit my fiancé.”
“No,” Richard said. “You only audit your family.”
Claire turned toward him. “I audit companies before buying them. That is the reason you are about to receive an offer instead of a liquidation notice.”
His face reddened.
Ellen took one step toward Claire. “Please don’t leave.”
Claire had not realized she was backing toward the doorway until her suitcase wheel touched her heel. The cream tote still hung from her shoulder. Rain had pooled around her practical black shoes.
“I need every estate statement,” she said. “Every transfer, every account, every document sent to the firm that drafted this waiver.”
Richard’s voice went cold. “You are not entitled to my personal records.”
“I’m entitled to the records of the trust you administered.”
“The trust terminated years ago.”
“Then the accounting should be easy.”
“You don’t understand what it took to keep people employed.”
Claire looked at the man who had once walked her through the factory on Sunday mornings, lifting her over sawdust piles and letting her press the green button that started the dust collection system. She remembered believing the building woke because he told it to.
“By Monday at nine,” she said, “Cypress Ridge is supposed to begin confirmatory diligence. I will disclose the waiver and the missing estate funds before that happens.”
Richard’s face lost color.
“The estate has nothing to do with the acquisition.”
“It does if you moved the money through the company.”
“I did no such thing.”
“Then give me the records.”
He looked toward the folder. For the first time that evening, his anger made room for something else.
Claire recognized fear because she had spent most of her life arranging herself around it.
She picked up the phone.
“Do not forward that recording,” he said.
“I already sent it to myself.”
That was a lie. She had not thought that far ahead.
Richard believed her.
Claire pulled the suitcase through the doorway. Ellen followed her into the hall.
The front of the house smelled of lemon polish and rain-damp wool. Nothing had changed in the entry except the rug. The old one had been navy. This one was pale enough to show every footprint Claire had left.
“Where will you go?” Ellen asked.
“A hotel.”
“You have a room here.”
“I had a room here.”
“Claire, please.”
Her mother touched the sleeve of her soaked coat. Claire stopped because Ellen’s hand was shaking.
Behind them, Richard told Vanessa to bring him the folder.
Claire turned. “Don’t touch it.”
Vanessa froze halfway out of her chair.
“It belongs to me,” Claire said.
Vanessa’s mouth tightened. “Everything belongs to you tonight, apparently.”
“Vanessa.”
“What? She walks in with thirty million dollars and suddenly she gets to talk to us like we’re employees?”
Claire nearly answered. Then she saw the fear beneath Vanessa’s irritation, the same fear Richard used to turn into loyalty. Vanessa had always defended the person most likely to leave her.
Claire pulled her coat sleeve gently from Ellen’s hand.
“At nine tomorrow morning,” she said, “I’m speaking with counsel.”
Richard appeared at the study doorway. “If you do that before you understand the company’s position, you will destroy the deal.”
“You built a company that can survive the truth, or you didn’t.”
“You think men in New York will protect those workers because you wrote a paragraph into a contract?”
“The buyer is based in Nashville.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I always know what you mean. That’s been the problem.”
She left before he could restore the room to its usual shape.
The rain had flooded the brick path, and by the time Claire reached the rental car, water had run inside both shoes. She put the suitcase in the trunk, then sat behind the wheel without starting the engine. The house glowed through the storm, every window warm, the study curtains open.
Her phone showed six missed calls from her father before she reached Poplar Avenue.
She sent the recording to her work email, her personal email, and a secure storage folder Cypress Ridge used for transaction documents. Then she pulled into the parking lot of a closed pharmacy and vomited beside a hedge.
A car passed without slowing. Its tires hissed against standing water.
Claire stayed bent over until the rain cooled the back of her neck. When she straightened, she wiped her mouth with a napkin from the glove compartment and discovered the napkin had a cartoon armadillo printed on it. The rental company’s idea of regional charm.
She laughed once, an ugly sound that frightened her more than crying would have.
The Peabody was full because of a medical conference, and the desk clerk at the second hotel apologized before telling her the only available room faced the parking garage. Claire said that was fine. She did not want a view.
She hung her coat in the bathroom and spread the acquisition agreement across the desk beneath the air-conditioning vent. The wet leather folder had left a brown stain on the top page. She took photographs of every document, including the waiver, then placed them between hotel towels and two magazines from the nightstand.
At 10:42, Vanessa texted.
You really recorded us?
Claire read the message twice.
Yes.
Three dots appeared and disappeared.
Dad says the deal is fake.
It is not fake.
He says your company cannot buy from family.
I disclosed the relationship months ago.
Another pause.
Why didn’t you tell us?
Claire stared at the question. She had asked herself the same thing during the flight.
May you like
She had wanted one evening in which her father could not interfere before the facts were complete. She had wanted to see whether he could be proud of her before learning how much he stood to gain. She had wanted to place something undeniable on the table and watch the old imbalance disappear.
She typed, Because I wanted it approved first.
