Chapter 7 - THE MAN WHO KNEW WHERE EVERYONE WAS HIDING
“Tommy,” Catherine said, “keep everyone away from Arthur.”
The security chief moved immediately.
Arthur raised both hands.
“Ekaterina, please.”
“No.”
She stepped backward, holding Daniel's notebook against her chest.
“You've had ten years to explain yourself. Tonight you've lied to me every time the truth became inconvenient.”
Arthur looked at Tommy.
“I'm not armed.”
“That isn't what concerns me,” Catherine replied.
Victor approached the table.
“Stephen Marsh has access to every major account I control.”
Arthur's eyes flickered.
Catherine noticed.
“You used him to follow Victor's finances,” she said.
Arthur sighed.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Giovanni's records were never fully recovered. I believed Victor might possess documents that could expose the remaining payments.”
“And you needed someone inside his company.”
“Yes.”
Victor looked furious.
“You've been spying on me for years?”
Arthur met his gaze.
“Your father built an empire on other people's suffering. I wanted to know whether you'd inherited his methods.”
Victor laughed bitterly.
“You could have asked.”
“Would you have answered honestly?”
Victor fell silent.
Catherine watched them.
Two men who had spent years manipulating other people's lives were suddenly offended by the discovery that they themselves had been manipulated.
But she was no longer interested in their pride.
“Did Daniel know about Marsh?” she asked.
Arthur hesitated.
“I don't know.”
“Then why does his notebook contain the information?”
“Perhaps he discovered it.”
“Or perhaps you arranged for him to discover exactly what you wanted.”
Arthur looked at her.
“You sound like your father.”
The words struck harder than he intended.
Catherine went still.
Then she answered.
“My father destroyed people to protect himself. I'm trying to find out who destroyed him.”
Arthur lowered his eyes.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
Then Sokolov approached.
“Arthur, it's over.”
Arthur turned.
“You don't understand.”
“I understand enough.”
Sokolov took a folded sheet from his jacket.
“Six months ago, Marsh approached one of my shipping executives about moving money through an offshore account. He said the instructions came from a man representing the Volkov interests.”
Catherine looked at him.
“Did you approve it?”
“No.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Sokolov's expression was ashamed.
“Because I was still hoping we could settle this privately.”
Catherine shook her head.
“That's what all of you keep hoping.”
She placed Daniel's notebook beside the watch.
“Private arrangements. Private apologies. Private promises.”
Her voice remained steady.
“And every private arrangement leaves somebody else paying the price.”
Vargas nodded slowly.
“You're right.”
Arthur sat down.
He suddenly looked exhausted.
“Then perhaps it's time I told you why Daniel stopped trusting me.”
Catherine stood across from him.
“I'm listening.”
Arthur looked at the photograph of the old estate.
“Three weeks ago, Daniel came to my office. He wanted copies of the trust records.”
“You gave them to him?”
“Most of them.”
“What did you withhold?”
Arthur swallowed.
“An agreement your father signed the year before the fire.”
Catherine felt a familiar chill.
“What agreement?”
“A transfer of controlling rights over several waterfront companies.”
“To whom?”
Arthur looked at Vargas.
“An organization formed jointly by Nikolai, Giovanni, and two other investors.”
Catherine frowned.
“What organization?”
“The East Harbor Foundation.”
Victor stared.
“That's a charitable foundation.”
“It became one,” Arthur said. “Originally, it was a holding company.”
Catherine remembered the name.
The East Harbor Foundation financed hospitals, scholarships, and housing programs.
Victor attended its annual gala every spring.
He loved being photographed beside its donors.
“Who controls it now?” she asked.
Arthur lowered his eyes.
“Stephen Marsh.”
Victor gripped the back of a chair.
“Marsh is its treasurer.”
“He controls its voting proxies,” Arthur answered.
Catherine studied him.
“You're saying the foundation's charitable funds are connected to the original ledger.”
“Yes.”
“And if the records become public?”
“Thousands of innocent people could be affected.”
Catherine stared at him.
There it was again.
The argument her father had used.
The argument every powerful man seemed to use when the truth threatened his position.
Someone innocent might suffer.
Therefore, everyone guilty should remain protected.
“No,” she said.
Arthur looked up.
“We don't protect stolen money by pretending it became clean when someone donated a portion of it.”
Vargas slowly smiled.
“That sounds like Nikolai's daughter.”
Catherine shook her head.
“No. It sounds like Daniel's sister.”
A quiet sound came from near the ballroom entrance.
Someone was applauding.
One slow clap.
Then another.
Everyone turned.
A man stood beside the open doors.
He wore a gray coat.
A thin scar crossed his left eyebrow.
His hair was darker than Catherine remembered, and his face carried the hard lines of a man who had spent years sleeping badly.
But she recognized him immediately.
Not by his face.
By the way he stood.
One shoulder slightly lower than the other.
The same nervous habit he had developed after breaking his collarbone at fourteen.
“Danny?”
The word escaped her before she could stop it.
The man looked at her.
For a moment, his expression crumpled.
“Katie.”
Catherine crossed the ballroom.
She didn't remember moving.
One second she was standing beside the table.
The next she was in his arms.
He held her so tightly she could barely breathe.
She buried her face against his coat.
“You're alive.”
“I know.”
“You're alive.”
“I'm sorry.”
She pulled back and struck his chest with an open hand.
Not hard.
Just enough to make him understand.
“Ten years!”
He nodded.
“I know.”
“You let me bury you in my head every single day.”
His eyes filled.
“I thought staying away was keeping you safe.”
“It wasn't.”
“I know that now.”
She looked at him.
He was thirty-one.
No longer the seventeen-year-old boy who had pushed her over the wall.
But when he touched her cheek, she saw the brother who used to leave the hallway light on because she hated thunderstorms.
“I'm here,” he whispered.
She cried then.
Not gracefully.
Not quietly.
She cried with ten years of grief breaking loose at once.
Daniel held her until she could breathe.
Then he looked past her shoulder.
His expression changed.
“Arthur.”
The older man slowly stood.
“Daniel.”
“You told her about the gate?”
“Yes.”
“The ferry?”
“Yes.”
“And the foundation?”
Arthur hesitated.
Daniel's jaw tightened.
“Of course you didn't tell her everything.”
Catherine stepped beside him.
“What else?”
Daniel looked at the notebook on the table.
“That notebook is mine.”
“Marsh had it.”
“I know.”
“Why?”
“Because he took it from the person who helped me recover the original ledger.”
Catherine stared.
“Who helped you?”
Daniel looked toward Khloe.
Her face went white.
Victor followed his gaze.
“No,” he whispered.
Khloe closed her eyes.
Daniel spoke quietly.
“Khloe Harrington has been working with me for eight months.”
Victor took a step backward.
May you like
His mistress had been helping his wife's brother.
And Catherine suddenly realized the woman wearing her grandmother's emerald necklace had never been quite as careless as she appeared.
