Chapter 2 - The Warnings He Ignored
Silence.
Nathaniel actually smiled.
Not because he found it funny.
Because his mind rejected the sentence.
“Yes. I know your maiden name.”
“Apparently you never wondered why.”
His smile disappeared.
Martin Wells looked from Rebecca to Nathaniel.
“Wait.”
Rebecca turned to him.
“My father is Howard Langford.”
No one spoke.
Outside the glass wall, Charlotte glittered thirty-eight floors below them.
Inside, Nathaniel Cross stared at the woman he had slept beside for twelve years as if she were a stranger who had entered the room wearing his wife’s face.
“That’s impossible.”
Rebecca gave a small shrug.
“It’s not.”
“You told me your father was retired.”
“He is.”
“You told me your family lived outside Asheville.”
“They do.”
“You said he worked in manufacturing.”
“He did.”
Nathaniel’s mouth opened, then closed.
Rebecca had never lied.
That realization seemed to frighten him more than if she had.
She had simply answered exactly what he asked.
And Nathaniel, once Crosswell became successful, had stopped asking.
His phone vibrated again.
This time he grabbed it.
He read the message.
Then read it again.
Helen Pierce watched him carefully.
“What?”
Nathaniel looked at Rebecca.
“The board’s reviewing my voting authority.”
Sloane stood.
“Nate, this has nothing to do with us. This is corporate.”
Rebecca turned toward her.
“Actually, that part does have nothing to do with you.”
Nathaniel’s voice hardened.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing tonight.”
“Don’t play games with me.”
“I’m not.”
“You take off your ring, announce Howard Langford is your father, and suddenly the board calls an emergency meeting?”
“The meeting was scheduled at four fifteen this afternoon.”
Nathaniel stared at her.
Two hours before dinner.
Two hours before she removed the ring.
His certainty began to crack.
“Why?”
Rebecca reached beneath her chair and lifted a slim leather portfolio onto the table.
“I was going to give you this at home.”
Nathaniel did not touch it.
“What is it?”
“An independent audit.”
Helen Pierce straightened.
Rebecca continued.
“Seven months ago, I noticed Crosswell had begun shifting unusually large payments through consulting companies I’d never heard of.”
Nathaniel scoffed.
“You don’t work at Crosswell.”
“No. But the Langford family trust owns twenty-eight percent of it.”
Someone whispered, “Jesus.”
Nathaniel looked around the room.
Rebecca continued before he could speak.
“I asked you about the transfers.”
His eyes narrowed.
“When?”
“February twelfth. At breakfast.”
He remembered.
She had been holding a tablet.
Nathaniel had barely looked up from his phone.
He remembered saying, Rebecca, please leave company matters to me.
“Then again in March,” she said. “Then May. Then June.”
Helen slowly turned toward Nathaniel.
Rebecca’s voice stayed calm.
“You told me I was worrying about things I didn’t understand.”
Nathaniel’s face tightened.
“Because you didn’t have context.”
“I asked for context.”
“You were interrogating me.”
“I was asking why six million dollars had been sent to a consulting firm with no employees.”
Sloane suddenly stopped breathing.
Rebecca noticed.
So did Nathaniel.
He looked at Sloane.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Sloane.”
“I said nothing.”
Rebecca opened the portfolio.
She slid a document across the table.
The name at the top was Avery Strategic Holdings.
Nathaniel read it.
Then slowly looked at Sloane.
Her chair scraped backward.
“Nate, there’s an explanation.”
Rebecca’s eyes remained on her husband.
“Avery Strategic received $6.4 million from Crosswell over eleven months.”
Nathaniel’s lips parted.
Rebecca continued.
“It was incorporated eighteen months ago. The registered manager is Sloane’s brother.”
Nathaniel stood so fast his chair nearly fell.
“You told me those payments went to the Phoenix expansion.”
Sloane’s eyes filled.
“They did.”
Helen Pierce shook her head.
“No. They didn’t.”
Everyone turned toward her.
Helen looked sick.
“We’ve been trying to reconcile Phoenix vendor expenditures for six weeks.”
Nathaniel stared.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did.”
“When?”
“Three times.”
That answer seemed to strike him physically.
Rebecca could almost see the memories returning.
Emails deleted.
Warnings dismissed.
Meetings shortened because Sloane had whispered that Nathaniel was late for dinner.
He looked at his wife.
“This is why you’re leaving me?”
Rebecca’s face changed then.
Not anger.
Sadness.
“No.”
He blinked.
“No?”
“I’m leaving you because when you became successful, you started treating every person who loved you like an employee who had failed to impress you.”
Nathaniel looked as though she had slapped him.
May you like
“The affair was only the last thing.”
For several seconds, nobody moved.
