Chương 8
“He asked for the copy last month.”
“And you didn’t give it to him?”
“I forgot.”
Ava almost smiled. Walter’s careful architecture might have survived if Derek had been slightly more organized.
“Did he ask for anything else?”
“The old insurance file. Some emails.”
“Did you give them to him?”
“The insurance file, yes.”
Ava’s anger rose again, then stalled. “When?”
“Last week.”
“Before this trip.”
“Yes.”
“He knew we might discover the title.”
“I didn’t connect it.”
“You didn’t want to.”
Derek sat on a cooler they had not unloaded. He looked enormous and exhausted, his forearms resting on his knees.
“When Dad fixed things,” he said, “you didn’t ask how either.”
Ava folded the document carefully. “I’m asking now.”
“And what happens to us while you prove how clean you are?”
The question followed her into the house.
By evening, Naomi’s attorney had sent a preservation notice naming eleven Mercer-related entities. Marcus created a secure copy of the accounting data and retained an outside forensic firm. Ava notified the board of a potential conflict involving Walter and requested an emergency meeting.
Walter responded with his own notice, accusing Ava of exceeding her authority and exposing confidential information to outsiders.
The next morning, three company lenders asked for calls.
By lunchtime, one froze an unused credit line.
Mercer Lodging employed eighty-six people. Ava knew most by name. Housekeepers, maintenance crews, reservation agents, property managers. They did not know Evelyn Shaw. They knew payroll arrived on Fridays and health insurance came out of their checks. The moral clarity Ava had felt in the hotel thinned when Marcus showed her the cash forecast.
“If the line stays frozen, we have seven weeks,” he said.
“Before what?”
“We start missing obligations.”
“Payroll?”
“Not first. Vendors. Then payroll.”
“Can we use operating reserves?”
“For four additional weeks, maybe.”
“And if the banks call the other loans?”
Marcus did not answer.
Ava sat in her office with the door closed. The room had once belonged to Walter. She had replaced his dark furniture with pale wood and moved his framed awards into a conference room. The only thing she kept was a dent in the floor where he used to drop a brass doorstop.
“What does Naomi want?” she asked.
“Full accounting. Return of misdirected funds. Confirmation that no Mercer entity claims the lake house.”
“How much are the misdirected funds?”
“We don’t know.”
“Estimate.”
“I won’t invent one.”
“That bad?”
“That unknown.”
Ava looked out at the parking lot. A maintenance supervisor was helping a new employee jump-start her car. They stood over the battery, laughing at something. The world remained offensive in its normality.
“We have to tell the board everything we know,” Ava said.
“Yes.”
“And employees?”
“Not yet. We need facts.”
“Walter is already calling people.”
“He’s telling a version that protects him.”
“Versions spread faster than audits.”
Marcus sat across from her. The skin beneath his eyes had darkened. His wedding ring clicked against the arm of the chair.
“Why are you still wearing it?” Ava asked.
He looked down.
The question had nothing to do with the company. That was why she asked it. Her mind needed one thing it could understand without opening another ledger.
“I don’t know,” he said.
“Does your wife ask?”
“Sometimes.”
“What do you tell her?”
“That I forget to take it off.”
“Do you?”
“No.”
Ava nodded.
Marcus turned the ring once. “People like objects that let them postpone a sentence.”
The emergency board meeting lasted three hours.
Walter joined by video from his attorney’s office. His beige shirt had been replaced by a navy suit. The image on screen flattened him into the familiar shape of authority. Two board members appeared from vacation homes. Another joined from a car and kept muting whenever traffic grew loud.
Ava presented the title record, the Shaw transfers, the preservation notice, and the potential conflict. She did not accuse Walter of theft. She used phrases the company’s counsel had approved: unexplained transactions, disputed authorization, incomplete documentation, potential exposure.
Walter listened with his hands folded.
When she finished, he said, “My daughter-in-law has allowed a personal shock to overwhelm her judgment.”
Ava did not react to the downgrade from daughter.
Walter continued. “Evelyn Shaw was a sophisticated investor and a close personal friend. She funded early Mercer projects in exchange for returns that exceeded market rates. Her daughter resented those decisions and is exploiting Evelyn’s death.”
A board member named Paul asked, “Why is the lake house still in Evelyn’s name?”
“There was a long-standing agreement to transfer it after certain obligations were satisfied.”
“Written?”
Walter paused. “Partly.”
“What does that mean?”
“Correspondence exists.”
“Where?”
“We are locating it.”
Ava asked, “Did Evelyn instruct you not to enter the property?”
Walter’s attorney leaned toward him and whispered.
Walter said, “There was a disputed communication during a period of diminished capacity.”
“Did you enter anyway?”
“My family entered.”
“You supplied the keys.”
“I provided access to a property our family maintained for years.”
“Who installed the electronic lockbox?”
“Naomi.”
“Who owned the house?”
Walter’s attorney whispered again.
One board member sighed. “This is going in circles.”
Walter looked directly into the camera. “Ava wants you to believe she is protecting the company. In reality, she is exposing it to a hostile claimant without first determining whether that claimant has merit.”
Naomi’s attorney had merit enough to freeze a credit line, but Ava resisted saying so. The bank had acted on risk, not proof.
Walter added, “She has also disabled the board chair’s access to company systems.”
“After you attempted a full archive export,” Ava said.
“For preservation.”
“To a personal drive.”
“My attorney’s secure storage.”
“Without informing counsel or the board.”
May you like
Walter’s face remained calm. “Because I no longer trust Ava to distinguish evidence from accusation.”
The board voted to place both Ava and Walter under limited access while the outside firm conducted a preliminary review. Ava retained operational control but could not move funds between entities without approval. Walter was barred from company offices and systems.
