Chapter 7 - WHAT ELENA KNEW
I read the note five times.
“I don’t know why.”
Nathaniel believed me.
The police did not.
By morning, detectives were asking questions about Richard.
Had I met him privately?
Had he ever paid me?
Had I seen him arguing with someone?
Had he given me documents?
I answered no.
Then Detective Harris asked:
“Did you ever enter Mr. Cross’s study when Richard Vale was present?”
I remembered the night Vanessa made me clean the office.
“Yes.”
“Did you touch anything?”
“No.”
“See anything?”
My mind went back.
Papers.
Laptop.
Wineglass.
Richard’s gray head bent over the desk.
Then something else.
A small silver object.
“I saw a flash drive.”
Nathaniel leaned forward.
“Where?”
“Richard had it.”
Detective Harris asked, “What happened to it?”
“I don’t know.”
Then I remembered cleaning the next morning.
A silver flash drive under the radiator.
I had placed it inside the top drawer of Nathaniel’s desk.
Nathaniel stood.
“Stay here.”
He returned twenty minutes later.
The flash drive was gone.
But security footage showed who had entered the study afterward.
Vanessa.
Richard.
Thomas.
Nathaniel.
And Lily.
I frowned.
“Lily?”
A camera showed my daughter wandering in while looking for me.
She stayed forty-three seconds.
Then left carrying her stuffed rabbit.
I called her over.
“Sweetheart, did you take something from Mr. Nathaniel’s desk?”
She looked worried.
“No.”
“Think.”
She hugged the rabbit.
“There was a shiny thing.”
“What did you do with it?”
“I made bunny a necklace.”
Every adult in the room looked at the stuffed rabbit.
I took it.
Around its neck was a faded pink ribbon.
Inside the knot was something hard.
The flash drive.
Nathaniel almost laughed.
Detective Harris didn’t.
Within an hour, cyber investigators opened it.
Richard had copied thousands of files.
Bank records.
Internal emails.
Audio recordings.
One folder was labeled INSURANCE.
Inside were recordings of conversations between Richard and Vanessa.
Vanessa knew about the debt scheme.
She knew Richard was falsifying reports.
She believed her father would use the resulting crisis to force Nathaniel into accepting Lowell capital.
But then another recording played.
Richard’s voice:
“If Cross refuses?”
A male voice answered:
“Then he won’t remain CEO.”
Vanessa said:
“My father said no violence.”
The male voice laughed.
“We’re beyond your father.”
Vanessa sounded frightened.
“Who are you working for?”
The recording ended.
Nathaniel stared at the speakers.
“That isn’t Adrian.”
Margaret shook her head.
“No.”
Thomas whispered:
“I know that voice.”
Everyone turned.
Thomas looked sick.
“Victor Dane.”
Nathaniel’s expression changed completely.
I had never heard the name.
“Who is he?” I asked.
Nathaniel answered.
“My mother’s brother.”
His uncle.
Victor Dane had once served as Cross Meridian’s president under Nathaniel’s father.
After Nathaniel inherited control, Victor challenged the will.
He lost.
Nathaniel removed him from the company after discovering unauthorized transactions.
Victor disappeared from public business life twelve years earlier.
Nathaniel believed he had retired to Arizona.
He hadn’t.
Investigators traced holding companies linked to Cross Meridian’s debt.
Three led back to Victor.
The conspiracy was older than Vanessa.
Older than Richard’s theft.
Older than me.
Nathaniel sat silently for a long time.
Then his phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered on speaker.
Victor’s voice came through.
“Nate.”
Nathaniel’s face went white.
“Victor.”
“You finally found Richard’s little insurance policy.”
“You killed him.”
Victor laughed softly.
“Careful.”
Nathaniel gripped the phone.
“What do you want?”
“What I was promised thirty years ago.”
“The company?”
“No.”
A pause.
“The truth.”
Nathaniel frowned.
“What truth?”
Victor’s voice became colder.
“Ask Thomas how your father really died.”
Thomas stood so abruptly his chair fell backward.
The call ended.
Everyone looked at him.
Nathaniel whispered:
“Thomas?”
Thomas’s eyes filled with tears.
May you like
And that was when I knew whatever came next would change the Cross family forever.
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