Chapter 2 - Five Hundred Meals
The demand arrived eleven days before Damian’s inauguration.
Nora was reviewing payroll at Red Maple Catering when Celeste entered the office without knocking.
She placed a cream-colored folder on Nora’s desk.
“Five hundred meals,” Celeste said. “Three courses. The menu is inside.”
Nora opened the folder.
The meals were elaborate. Beef tenderloin, truffle potatoes, asparagus, artisan bread and individual chocolate desserts. The ingredient cost alone would be enormous.
“Who is paying for this?”
“The inauguration committee.”
Nora turned to the final page and found a county purchase order attached to the event plan.
The document classified the meals as emergency nutrition services.
Nora read it twice.
“This is not an emergency program.”
Celeste adjusted the pearl bracelet on her wrist.
“The inauguration is a county event.”
“That does not make it emergency relief.”
“Do not become difficult over paperwork.”
Nora studied the total.
The county had been billed almost four times the amount Red Maple Catering normally charged for a similar event.
Worse, the payment recipient was not her company.
It was Blue Meridian Hospitality.
Nora had never heard of it.
“Why is another company receiving the payment when my staff would do the work?”
Celeste’s smile hardened.
“Blue Meridian manages the contract. You are the subcontractor.”
“I never signed a subcontract.”
“Damian handled it.”
Nora closed the folder.
“I will not prepare these meals.”
Celeste leaned across the desk.
“You are not being asked.”
When Damian returned home that evening, Nora placed the purchase order in front of him.
He barely looked at it.
“My mother should not have shown you the billing documents.”
“That is your concern?”
“My concern is that you are turning a simple event into a crisis.”
“Blue Meridian is charging the county for emergency meals. Who owns it?”
Damian loosened his tie.
“It is an event management company.”
“Who owns it?”
He walked to the bar and poured himself a drink.
“You have become suspicious because Lucas fills your head with federal conspiracy stories.”
Nora waited.
Damian finally looked at her.
“The company belongs to a holding group.”
“Which holding group?”
His expression changed.
The warmth disappeared first. Then the patience.
“You are my wife,” he said. “Not my auditor.”
Nora felt something inside her become still.
She had heard anger from exhausted chefs, frightened employees and demanding clients. Damian’s tone was different. It carried the confidence of someone who believed questions themselves were disobedience.
“I will not participate in fraud.”
Damian set down his glass.
“You will prepare the meals because your company depends on county contracts.”
“My company survived before your contracts.”
“Not after I cancel them.”
The threat remained between them.
Nora understood that the man she had married and the man standing before her could no longer exist in the same memory.
She took the folder and walked upstairs.
That night, she searched the state business registry.
Blue Meridian Hospitality had been formed eighteen months earlier.
Its official owner was a corporation registered in another state. That corporation belonged to a trust. The trust’s mailing address was a private mailbox near the airport.
Nora searched the address in her accounting files.
May you like
Red Maple Catering had delivered food there once.
The order had been placed under Damian’s personal assistant’s name.
