Chương 10
She monitored which former coworkers Claire contacted.
She reviewed posts.
She paid for database searches.
Unethical, perhaps.
Not automatically murderous.
Then Grant’s fear grew.
Claire had discovered that several inflated vendor payments ultimately benefited a private investment vehicle controlled by Grant and Jason Bell. Some money had financed a marina acquisition Grant wanted to complete without Thomas’s approval.
Grant believed the deal would make enough money to repay the company before anyone noticed.
The familiar logic of people who called theft temporary because they expected success.
Celeste knew about it.
Her fifty-thousand-dollar payment was partly for the investigation of Claire and partly, according to her, for arranging a “pressure event.”
That phrase made Claire physically ill.
“What does that mean?” she asked Keene.
Keene’s mouth tightened.
“According to Celeste, Grant wanted you frightened enough to stop asking questions and take Emma to your sister’s home in California for several weeks.”
Claire stared at her.
“How?”
“Celeste claims the plan was to create the impression that someone had entered your hotel room on Block Island while you were at dinner.”
“What?”
“Nothing stolen. Drawers disturbed. A note about minding your own business.”
Claire almost laughed from disbelief.
“That is insane.”
“It is.”
“Did it happen?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“According to Celeste, Grant changed the plan.”
Claire stopped breathing for a second.
Keene continued.
“She says he told her he would handle it himself.”
“When?”
“The afternoon of your accident.”
“And she believed that meant what?”
“She says she didn’t know.”
“Do you believe her?”
“My belief is not the evidence.”
Claire rubbed her palms against her jeans.
“What evidence supports her?”
“Messages establish there was disagreement that afternoon. We recovered fragments from cloud backups and business accounts. Nothing says, ‘I am going to sabotage a gate.’”
“Of course not.”
“There is also a payment from Grant’s personal account to Jason Bell the next morning.”
“How much?”
“Twenty thousand.”
“For what?”
“Grant described it in a memo line as emergency consulting.”
Claire leaned back.
She had started hating the word consulting.
“What does Bell say?”
Keene watched her.
“He says Grant asked him to alter maintenance records after the accident.”
Claire closed her eyes.
There it was.
Not proof of attempted murder.
Proof of cover-up, if Bell was telling the truth and the records supported him.
“What about the latch?”
“Bell says he did not touch it.”
“Celeste?”
“She denies touching it.”
“Grant?”
“No admission.”
“So nobody touched the thing that somehow opened.”
“That is where we are.”
Claire hated the incompleteness more than she hated a lie.
A lie at least had edges.
This did not.
She asked, “Then how do you prove what happened?”
Keene folded her hands.
“Maybe we don’t prove every part.”
Claire stared.
“You can’t say that.”
“I can.”
“He may have tried to kill me.”
“Yes.”
“And you may never know exactly what he did to the gate?”
“Yes.”
Claire stood and walked to the window.
A delivery truck backed into an alley below, beeping rhythmically.
She wanted the world to stop making ordinary noises.
“What am I supposed to do with that?”
Keene did not answer immediately.
Finally she said, “Live with evidence, not certainty somebody else invents for you.”
Claire turned.
“That sounds like something you’ve practiced saying.”
“No.”
Keene rubbed her forehead.
“My brother died in a hit-and-run twenty years ago. They never found the driver.”
Claire said nothing.
Keene looked annoyed with herself for saying it.
“Forget that.”
“I won’t.”
“Fine.”
Claire sat down.
Keene continued, “The point is, incomplete truth is still truth. We build what can be built.”
Thomas’s position became worse when investigators learned his lawyers had possessed the photographs of the latch for eight months.
He was not charged with sabotaging anything.
He was questioned about evidence retention, disclosure, and company practices.
The board asked him to step aside temporarily.
He did.
For the first time in forty years, Thomas Mercer had no office to arrive at before seven in the morning.
He called Claire on a Tuesday and asked if she wanted lunch.
She almost said no.
Then she said yes because anger had started becoming too comfortable.
They met at a diner twenty minutes from the marina.
Thomas arrived in a navy sweater instead of a jacket.
Claire had never seen him in a navy sweater.
It irritated her.
“Stop looking at me like that,” he said.
“Like what?”
“Like I’m wearing a costume.”
“You own sweaters?”
“Several.”
“I assumed they came attached to boats.”
Thomas smiled.
Claire did not.
They ordered.
Thomas got soup.
Claire got grilled cheese.
For a while they discussed nothing important.
The waitress called Thomas “hon.”
He seemed unsure how to respond.
Claire enjoyed that more than she should have.
Eventually Thomas said, “I’m going to resign.”
“From the board?”
“Yes.”
“Because they asked?”
“They asked me to take leave.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Thomas stirred his soup.
“I should have disclosed the photographs. Whether I broke a law is for lawyers to argue. I broke something else.”
“Trust?”
He nodded.
Claire tore her sandwich in half.
“Do you want me to tell you not to resign?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Thomas looked out the window.
“Grant called me.”
Claire waited.
“He asked if I believed he tried to kill you.”
“What did you say?”
“I said I believe he was willing to frighten you, control you, investigate you, steal from the company, and cover up evidence after you nearly died.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“No.”
Claire looked at him.
Thomas met her eyes.
“I don’t know.”
The admission softened something she had wanted to keep hard.
Not forgiveness.
Something smaller.
“What did Grant say?”
“He said I was choosing you over him.”
Claire picked at a burnt edge of bread.
“And are you?”
Thomas looked tired.
“I spent most of his life choosing him over consequences.”
The waitress arrived with more coffee.
Neither spoke until she left.
Thomas continued.
May you like
“I confused loyalty with rescue. Maybe fathers do that. Maybe bad fathers do.”
“Don’t make it poetic.”
