Chương 3
Brooks paused.
“How do you know that?”
“My watch.”
She lifted her wrist.
The notifications were still there.
Ethan.
Ethan.
Ethan.
Ethan.
Ethan.
Ethan.
Brooks looked at the watch, then back at her.
“Don’t call him.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“That’s the first good decision anyone in your family has made tonight.”
She stared at him.
He stood.
At the door, Claire said, “Detective.”
Brooks stopped.
“When you came into the ballroom, Victoria looked scared.”
“She had reason to be.”
“No. Not of you.”
He waited.
“She looked at Ethan first.”
Brooks’s face did not change, but his attention did.
“What do you think that means?”
“I don’t know.”
That answer bothered her too.
Three hours later, Claire went home without Ethan.
Their townhouse on East Sixty-Ninth Street looked exactly as it had when she left for the gala: one lamp on in the front room, a stack of unopened nursery catalogs on the console, Ethan’s running shoes crooked beside the stairs.
The normality of it felt offensive.
Maya walked in behind her carrying Claire’s clutch in an evidence bag inside a larger paper bag. The recorder remained with investigators. The ultrasound photograph had been returned after being photographed where it fell.
Claire took it out.
The corner had bent.
She flattened it with her thumb.
“You can go home,” she said.
Maya took off her heels.
“No.”
“I wasn’t asking.”
“I know.”
“Maya.”
“I’m not leaving you alone tonight.”
“I have security.”
“Security does not know you cry when you reorganize kitchen drawers.”
Claire turned.
“I do not.”
“You did after your mother’s memorial.”
“That drawer was chaos.”
“It contained forks.”
“They were mixed with serving spoons.”
Maya walked toward the kitchen.
Claire stood in the foyer holding the ultrasound photograph.
“Were you there?”
Maya looked back.
“At the memorial?”
“Yes.”
“No. I started working for you eight months later.”
“Then how do you know about the drawer?”
“Ethan told me.”
The house changed.
Not visibly.
The lamp stayed on. The shoes stayed by the stairs. Somewhere in the kitchen, the refrigerator motor started.
But the house changed.
Claire looked at Ethan’s shoes.
“How many things did he tell you about me?”
Maya stopped.
“Normal things.”
“What does that mean?”
“He loved talking about you.”
Claire’s throat tightened.
“Past tense?”
Maya did not answer.
Claire walked upstairs.
She slept for forty-two minutes.
At six seventeen the next morning, her phone rang.
It was her lawyer, Daniel Cho.
At six twenty-three, her obstetrician texted to ask how she felt.
At six twenty-nine, the chair of Northstar Bancorp called.
At six thirty-four, Claire stood barefoot in the kitchen eating peanut butter directly from the jar while Daniel explained that an emergency application had been filed to prevent any change in control or disposition of the prenatal trust until the disputed documents could be reviewed.
At six forty-one, Northstar’s board chair left a voicemail requesting an urgent governance call.
At six forty-three, Claire dropped the spoon.
Not because of any of those things.
A message from Ethan appeared.
I’m out. Please let me explain.
She read it twice.
Then a second message came.
My mother lied to both of us.
Claire stared at the screen.
A third followed.
I was trying to keep her from destroying everything.
Maya entered the kitchen wearing yesterday’s pantsuit and one of Claire’s old college sweatshirts.
She saw Claire’s face.
“What?”
Claire handed her the phone.
Maya read the messages.
“Don’t answer.”
“That’s what Brooks said.”
“Brooks is occasionally intelligent.”
Claire took the phone back.
“What did Ethan think Victoria was destroying?”
Maya did not answer immediately.
“That,” Claire said, “was not rhetorical.”
“I don’t know.”
“You investigated the foundation.”
“I reviewed records you authorized me to review.”
“You found the transfers.”
“Yes.”
“You found the e-sign logs.”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
Maya looked tired for the first time.
Not professionally tired. Not the discreet kind she hid behind concealer and good posture.
Actually tired.
“There was a bridge loan.”
Claire set the peanut butter jar down.
“To the foundation?”
“From a Bennett family entity.”
“Which one?”
“Bennett Development Holdings.”
Ethan’s company.
Claire did not move.
“How much?”
“Twelve million.”
“When?”
“Four months ago.”
She thought back.
Four months ago Ethan had spent two weeks in Chicago, supposedly negotiating a mixed-use development near the river.
He had sent her photographs from hotel rooms.
One morning he complained that the coffee tasted burned.
She had been nauseated and sitting on the bathroom floor when he called.
Twelve million dollars.
“Was it repaid?”
“No.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
“I found it yesterday.”
“Before the gala?”
“Two hours before.”
Claire looked at her.
“And?”
“And I sent it to Daniel and Brooks.”
“And you let me walk into that ballroom.”
“You insisted on walking into that ballroom.”
“You knew my husband’s company had loaned twelve million dollars to his mother’s foundation.”
“I knew an entity he controls had made the loan.”
“Same thing.”
“No,” Maya said. “It is very much not the same thing when we are talking about possible financial crimes.”
Claire hated that she was right.
“What was the foundation doing with twelve million?”
“Covering redemptions.”
“From what?”
Maya reached for the coffee machine, then stopped because she seemed to remember it was not her kitchen.
Claire waved at it.
Maya started coffee.
“The foundation committed thirty-eight million to a private credit fund two years ago.”
“I remember.”
“The investment was marked down.”
“How far?”
“We don’t have full numbers.”
“Maya.”
“We don’t.”
Claire pulled out a chair.
The sound of its legs against the floor made her flinch.
Maya noticed.
Neither mentioned it.
“Best estimate?”
“Enough that Victoria started moving money.”
Claire sat.
“How much?”
“More than twelve million.”
“The trust.”
“Yes.”
May you like
Claire pressed two fingers against the bridge of her nose.
Her mother had created the trust seven years earlier as part of an estate plan built around Northstar stock. It was not, as Victoria had announced, a pile of money Ethan could simply sign over to anyone. Claire remained the grantor. An independent trust company was designated as trustee upon the birth of her first child. Ethan had been named to a family advisory role because Claire, in a fit of what now felt like expensive optimism, had wanted their daughter to have both parents represented.
