Chapter 10 - The Daughter Who Ran
Ethan did not go alone.
He entered the interview room alone, as Brooke demanded, but Detective Ortiz and two federal investigators watched through mirrored glass. Ethan wore a recording device openly. Brooke's attorney sat beside her with a legal pad and the expression of a man who had already advised silence.
Brooke looked different without the satin dress, polished hair, and SUV keys. She wore gray detention clothes. Mascara shadowed her eyes. For the first time since childhood, she seemed younger than Ethan rather than merely more protected.
"You ruined everything," she said.
"Natalie survived everything. That is what ruined your plan."
Brooke's attorney touched her arm. She pulled away.
"Mom said Natalie was turning you against us," Brooke continued. "She said if the company failed, thousands of people would blame our family."
"So you stole Natalie's car."
"Mom said it was a company asset."
"You sold her wedding ring."
"I did not sell it."
"You hurt her."
Brooke stared at the table. "She made me angry. She kept asking questions."
Ethan felt his hands tighten and laid them flat. "Where is Lorraine?"
"Promise you will help me."
"I will tell the truth. Nothing more."
Brooke laughed without humor. "That sounds like her."
"No. She uses truth as a weapon after starving everyone of it. I am giving you the choice to speak."
Brooke glanced toward the mirror. Her attorney whispered that any cooperation must be formal. A prosecutor entered, and after forty minutes of negotiation, Brooke agreed to provide verifiable information in exchange for the possibility of reduced charges. No promises were made.
She began with the money.
Of the two hundred thousand Ethan sent for Natalie, eighty-three thousand paid for Brooke's SUV. Thirty-two thousand bought Lorraine's pearls and designer clothing. Twenty-one thousand covered parties and foundation expenses. Eighteen thousand paid Grant. Smaller amounts covered beauty treatments, club dues, and personal debts.
Forty thousand had been transferred to Ashford Holdings.
"What was it for?" Ethan asked.
"Mom called it an insurance premium."
"Insurance for what?"
"For keeping a dead man dead."
The room went still.
Brooke said Charles Cole survived the plane crash. She knew because she had seen him once, four years earlier, in a rented house near Tucson. Lorraine took Brooke there after she discovered old messages on her mother's tablet. Charles had aged, grown a beard, and walked with a cane. He told Brooke never to contact him. He said the family's safety depended on Ethan believing the crash had killed him.
"Why?" Ethan asked.
"He and Mom argued. He said she had turned the company into a weapon. She said he was a coward who left her to clean up his crimes. I don't know which one was telling the truth."
"Did he know about Natalie?"
Brooke shook her head. "Not at first. Mom sent him photographs two months ago. She said if he interfered, she would expose him."
"Expose what?"
"I don't know."
Brooke believed Lorraine would go to the Tucson house. She gave Ortiz an address in the foothills west of the city. Federal agents moved before the interview ended.
The property was empty when they arrived, but the kitchen was warm. A red truck sat in the garage. Lorraine's black gown burned in a metal barrel behind the house. Inside, agents found passports bearing different names, stacks of cash, and photographs of Ethan taken throughout his childhood and adult life.
One photograph showed Natalie leaving Dr. Serrano's office eighteen months earlier, before Ethan accepted the Singapore contract.
Someone had been watching her before she became dependent on Lorraine.
At the hospital, Sarah read Brooke's statement to Natalie. Ethan remained outside until Natalie invited him in. She did not react to the news that Charles might be alive. She focused on the earlier photograph.
"Your mother knew I was sick before she offered the guesthouse," Natalie said.
"Yes."
"Then Singapore was not an opportunity she exploited. It was part of the plan."
"It may have been."
Natalie looked at Sarah. "Can we prove the project delays were arranged before Ethan left?"
Sarah called the forensic accountants. An hour later, they found the first payment to the subcontractor who filed false safety complaints. It had been authorized nine days before Ethan signed the Singapore contract.
Lorraine had created the reason he would stay away before he ever boarded the plane.
The next morning, prosecutors unsealed charges against Lorraine, Brooke, and Grant. The board suspended Lorraine's voting rights pending investigation and canceled the proxy meeting. Banks froze the Larkspur and Ashford accounts. A judge granted Natalie a protective order and appointed an independent monitor over disputed assets.
The public collapse was swift. Sponsors withdrew from the foundation. The mayor's wife returned a donation. News channels replayed Lorraine's statement that Natalie was supposed to die quietly.
For Natalie, justice was slower. She could eat only small meals. She woke from sleep believing the hospital door had been locked. She startled whenever a blond nurse entered. Each improvement revealed another injury no scan could measure.
Three days later, she asked to see Brooke.
Ethan objected before remembering his promise. He stopped himself and asked why.
"Because she knows whether Lorraine acted alone," Natalie said. "And because I want her to see that I am not dead."
The meeting occurred by secure video. Brooke appeared on a screen in a private hospital conference room. Sarah and Ortiz attended. Ethan waited behind Natalie.
Natalie asked one question.
"Who changed my medicine?"
Brooke's face crumpled. "Mom filled the boxes."
"Did you ever fill them?"
"Twice. Maybe three times. She told me which pills."
"Did Grant?"
"No."
"Did Charles?"
Brooke looked toward her attorney.
"Answer her," the attorney said.
"Charles sent one package," Brooke whispered. "It had medicine in it, but Mom threw the bottle away. She said he was trying to make you stronger."
Natalie leaned closer to the screen. "Why would a man I never met send me medicine?"
May you like
Brooke began to shake.
"Because he knew what was wrong with you," she said. "He knew before any doctor did."
