Chapter 12 - EMILY MARLOWE
Emily did not answer my calls.
Not the first.
Not the fifth.
Not the tenth.
Agent Bell told me not to go looking for her.
So naturally, every part of me wanted to.
By evening, investigators had confirmed something.
Emily Dawson was not her legal name.
Her full name was Emily Claire Marlowe.
Daughter of Evelyn Marlowe.
I sat in Daniel’s office staring at the record.
“You knew?”
I asked Agent Bell.
“We suspected.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“And you let me sit with her?”
“We were observing.”
I stood.
“You used me.”
Daniel immediately stepped between us.
Agent Bell remained calm.
“We needed to see whether she contacted her mother after speaking with you.”
“Did she?”
“Yes.”
My anger vanished.
“What did she say?”
“We don’t have the content.”
“Then what do you have?”
“Call records.”
Emily called Evelyn fourteen minutes after leaving the condo.
Then again after the safe-deposit box was opened.
Then once more after Simon was detained.
“Where is she now?”
“Unknown.”
“What about Evelyn?”
“Also unknown.”
I laughed.
“Great.”
Agent Bell placed a photograph in front of me.
It showed Emily entering an office building three months earlier.
The name outside was Marlowe Private Capital.
“She worked for her mother?”
“Not officially.”
“Then why was she there?”
“We don’t know.”
Daniel looked at me.
“Simon may have told the truth about this one thing.”
I hated hearing that.
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
One message.
I’m sorry.
Then another.
Please don’t trust Bell.
I showed Agent Bell.
His expression changed.
“Do not reply.”
I did anyway.
Where are you?
He cursed under his breath.
The answer came immediately.
Where Simon first proposed.
I looked at the message.
Emily had told me he proposed in Miami.
Daniel shook his head.
“Could mean anywhere.”
I remembered the photograph in her condo.
The beach.
The hotel logo on an umbrella.
I had stared at it long enough to recognize it.
I searched.
Harbor Crown Hotel.
Miami Beach.
Agent Bell was already making calls.
Emily sent another message.
Come alone.
Obviously, I did not.
Federal agents reached the hotel before I ever left Ohio.
Emily was not there.
But a package was waiting at the front desk.
Addressed to Rachel Carter.
Inside was a flash drive.
A handwritten note.
And Simon’s engagement ring.
Not mine.
Emily’s.
The note read:
He didn’t propose because he loved me.
I accepted because my mother told me to.
I thought Simon was using you to hide money.
He thought I was using him to find it.
We were both right.
But there is something neither of us knew.
Your grandfather didn’t steal the missing fourteen million.
My mother didn’t steal it either.
The money was moved to protect someone.
The answer is on the drive.
Do not let Leonard see it.
E.
Agent Bell inserted the flash drive into an isolated forensic laptop.
There were dozens of files.
Bank scans.
Emails.
Audio recordings.
Photographs.
One video.
The video showed Evelyn.
Current.
Gray hair.
Same pearl earrings.
She sat in front of a plain wall.
“Rachel, if you are watching this, then my daughter has finally chosen a side.”
I stopped breathing.
Evelyn looked directly into the camera.
“You have been lied to by your mother.”
My hands tightened.
“By Patricia.”
“By Simon.”
“And unfortunately, by me.”
She paused.
“The money everyone has been chasing was never fourteen million dollars.”
Agent Bell leaned closer.
“The original amount was fourteen million.”
Evelyn continued.
“But the assets purchased with that money grew.”
My pulse increased.
“By 2014, they were worth nearly forty-six million.”
Daniel whispered.
“Jesus.”
“By 2021, more than seventy.”
Nobody moved.
Evelyn continued.
“And today, depending on market valuation, they may exceed one hundred million dollars.”
I felt detached from my body.
This had become absurd.
Too big.
Too impossible.
Evelyn looked tired.
“Thomas Mercer did not steal the money.”
“He moved it.”
My grandfather.
“He discovered that several investors intended to strip the company, bankrupt smaller stakeholders, and blame the losses on employees.”
“He created a protected structure.”
“He placed control behind multiple identities.”
“One of those identities eventually became Rachel Carter.”
I stared at the screen.
“What?”
Evelyn continued.
“Rachel was a child.”
“She knew nothing.”
“Her mother knew only part of it.”
“Patricia knew more.”
“And I knew enough to understand that Thomas had built something none of us could access alone.”
Agent Bell paused the video.
“What kind of structure?”
Daniel asked.
Agent Bell shook his head.
He restarted it.
“To unlock the assets, three authorization components are required.”
“The first was given to Patricia.”
“The second remained with me.”
“The third belonged to Rachel.”
My grandfather’s letter.
The numbers.
Evelyn leaned closer to the camera.
“That is why Simon was sent to find you.”
“He believed marriage might eventually give him legal influence over your component.”
“He was wrong.”
I almost laughed.
Of course he was.
Nine years.
All that manipulation.
And he still didn’t understand the thing he was chasing.
Evelyn continued.
“Emily approached Simon because I asked her to.”
My stomach tightened.
“She was supposed to learn what Patricia had told him.”
“She was not supposed to become engaged to him.”
A faint, almost bitter smile touched Evelyn’s face.
“Apparently manipulation is hereditary.”
Emily had been using Simon.
Simon had been using Emily.
Patricia had been using Simon.
And somewhere in the middle, all of them had been using me.
Then Evelyn’s expression became serious.
“There is one person you must not trust.”
I leaned forward.
“Leonard Voss.”
Everyone looked at Agent Bell.
Evelyn continued.
“Leonard knows what Thomas built.”
“He has spent twenty years pretending he does not.”
“The missing nine hundred thousand dollars from Hart-Voss was not stolen by Simon.”
“It was paid to Leonard.”
Leonard.
The angry business partner.
The man who acted betrayed.
The man who led us to Box 814.
Evelyn’s voice lowered.
“If Leonard reaches the assets before you understand how they are structured, he can take control of everything.”
The video flickered.
Then she said the sentence that terrified me most.
“Rachel, your grandfather did not choose you because you were family.”
“He chose you because even at six years old, you had already seen the one thing none of the adults realized you saw.”
The screen went black.
I stared at my reflection.
“What did I see?”
Nobody answered.
Then Agent Bell’s phone rang.
He listened.
His face changed.
“What happened?”
He ended the call.
“Leonard Voss is gone.”
“Gone where?”
“We don’t know.”
Daniel stood.
“What about his passport?”
“Not used.”
“His car?”
“Found abandoned.”
My phone buzzed again.
Emily.
This message contained only a photograph.
A storage facility.
Unit 117.
May you like
Below it were four words.
Your memory starts here.
