Chapter 9 - The Dead Man at the Service Plaza)
Richard watched the eleven-second clip six times.
The man in the footage had aged.
His hair was almost completely gray.
He had lost weight.
A scar crossed the left side of his jaw.
But Richard knew the way his brother stood.
Weight on the right leg.
Left shoulder slightly lower.
Hands pushed into his coat pockets.
Thomas.
Alive.
Caroline sat beside him.
"You said he died."
Richard did not respond.
"You told me he died six years ago."
"I believed he did."
"How?"
Richard looked at Malcolm.
The attorney appeared equally stunned.
"A report from Argentina."
"That's it?"
"There was a body."
"Did you see it?"
"No."
Caroline laughed in disbelief.
"So all the wealthy people in this family verify nothing?"
The comment would once have caused an argument.
Now nobody defended themselves.
Richard stared at the paused image.
Thomas beside Laura Benton.
"What happened six years ago?" Evelyn asked.
Richard finally spoke.
"Thomas had been living in South America. We hadn't spoken for years. I received a call from an attorney in Buenos Aires. There had been an accident."
"What kind?"
"Boat fire."
"Identification?"
"Passport. Dental records."
Malcolm interrupted.
"I handled the estate transfer."
Caroline looked at him.
"So you verified it?"
"I verified documents provided by Argentine authorities."
"Could they have been forged?"
"Yes."
Richard stood abruptly.
"Why would Thomas fake his death?"
Evelyn looked at the Harbor Nine ledger.
"Maybe because someone needed him legally dead."
Richard turned.
"Who?"
She held his gaze.
"That's what we have to find out."
Caroline looked at the service plaza image.
"Laura worked with Derek."
"She investigated Derek," Richard corrected.
"Maybe she wasn't helping him."
That possibility changed everything.
Evelyn replayed the sequence in her mind.
Laura disguised herself as Caroline.
Entered Richard's study.
But Derek had entered first.
What if Laura was following him?
"What did Laura do in the study?" Evelyn asked.
Malcolm called security.
They checked activity logs.
Derek entered the laptop.
The estate portal.
Then Laura entered.
At 11:39 a USB device connected.
At 11:40 files were copied.
At 11:41 something else happened.
A scheduled data transfer was canceled.
Richard frowned.
"What transfer?"
Malcolm's expression darkened.
"Security is tracing it."
Caroline looked at Evelyn.
"If Laura stopped something, she may have been protecting us."
"Or protecting evidence."
"From Derek?"
"Maybe."
Richard paced.
"Then why dress like Caroline?"
"To make anyone reviewing the hallway footage blame her."
Caroline frowned.
"But if she wanted to help, why frame me?"
Evelyn shook her head.
"Maybe she wasn't framing you."
Richard stopped.
"What?"
"If someone else was monitoring the camera live, Laura needed them to believe Caroline entered the study."
Malcolm nodded slowly.
"Meaning she knew someone was watching."
Caroline looked toward the ceiling camera outside.
"Who?"
No one answered.
Richard called Mercer headquarters.
The security director answered immediately.
Richard placed it on speaker.
"Who had remote access to my residential camera system last night?"
A pause.
"Sir, your home system isn't managed through corporate security."
Richard looked at Evelyn.
She nodded.
A private contractor maintained it.
Richard called them.
The answer came eight minutes later.
Three authorized remote users.
Richard.
Evelyn.
And the system administrator.
One remote login at 11:22 p.m.
Administrator credentials.
IP address routed through a Mercer Development server.
Richard whispered, "Someone at the company."
Malcolm looked at him.
"Or someone tunneling through the company."
The security director called back before noon.
The attempted scheduled transfer had been identified.
It was not money.
It was data.
Thirty-two gigabytes of internal documents set to upload from Richard's laptop to an encrypted server at midnight.
Laura had canceled it.
"What documents?" Richard asked.
"Board minutes. Acquisition files. Private shareholder records. Legal correspondence."
Richard's voice sharpened.
"How far back?"
"Approximately sixteen years."
Evelyn looked at the Harbor Nine document.
Sixteen years.
The same period Thomas sold his company interest.
The same period Anne began questioning Richard's handling of the buyout.
The same period someone created Harbor Nine.
This was not about Caroline's inheritance.
That was simply the pressure point that exposed everything else.
Richard sat down.
"For sixteen years someone has been hiding something inside my company."
Caroline looked at him.
"Maybe more than one person."
His phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
He answered.
No one spoke.
Then a man's voice came through.
Older.
Rough.
But Richard recognized it immediately.
"Rich."
Richard's face went white.
Caroline stood.
Thomas continued.
"If Laura got out of the house, listen carefully."
Richard gripped the phone.
"You are alive."
"Not for long if Marcus knows she found the ledger."
Richard closed his eyes.
"Where are you?"
"Don't ask."
"Six years, Thomas."
"Sixteen years, Rich. You should be asking about sixteen."
Richard's anger exploded.
"You let us bury you."
"You buried an empty box."
"Caroline cried at your memorial."
Silence.
Thomas's voice softened.
"I know."
Caroline stared at the phone.
"Uncle Thomas?"
Another pause.
"Carrie?"
No one had called her that since Anne died.
Caroline covered her mouth.
Thomas whispered, "You sound like your mother."
Then the line went silent.
Richard looked at the screen.
Disconnected.
A message arrived immediately.
One photograph.
A safe-deposit key.
Number 314.
May you like
Beneath it Thomas had typed five words.
Do not let Marcus reach it.
