Chapter 5 - THE MAN WHO KNEW MY MOTHER'S SECRET
“Arthur, put that photograph on the table.”
He stopped inside the doorway.
For a moment, the kindly elderly gentleman who had escorted me into the gala seemed to disappear.
His shoulders straightened.
His eyes sharpened.
“Vivien,” he said, “you should have gone home.”
Logan immediately stepped between us.
“What the hell is going on?”
Arthur ignored him.
I held out my hand.
“The photograph.”
He studied me.
Then placed it on the table.
My mother's face had been scratched away with something sharp.
The rest of the picture showed her standing outside the Valois archive in Queens.
She was holding the blue journal.
Beside her stood Arthur.
Much younger.
Smiling.
I felt my throat tighten.
“Why did you do that?”
His expression softened.
“I didn't damage the photograph.”
“Then who did?”
“I found it among materials removed from the foundation's storage rooms.”
“When?”
“This morning.”
I looked at Eleanor.
She appeared just as unsettled.
Arthur continued.
“Someone has been moving archive records through the foundation's accounts. When I discovered the photograph, I understood that tonight's gala might be used to force a financial crisis.”
Lydia folded her arms.
“That's convenient.”
Arthur turned toward her.
“Your father made a career of exploiting distressed families, Miss Beaumont. You should be cautious about accusing others.”
Lydia went pale.
“My father also left me twenty years of correspondence showing your involvement in those transactions.”
Arthur said nothing.
I looked from one to the other.
“You both knew something about my mother. And neither of you told me.”
Arthur lowered his eyes.
“Yes.”
The admission hurt more than I expected.
My grandmother had trusted him.
I had trusted him.
When she died, Arthur had been one of the few people who attended her private memorial.
He had held my hand beside the grave.
Now I remembered how carefully he'd avoided speaking about my mother.
“Tell me what happened to Madeleine,” I said.
Arthur pulled out a chair.
“Not here.”
“Yes. Here.”
He looked toward the ballroom.
“Vivien, certain people attending tonight have financial interests in those manuscripts.”
“Then they can wait.”
He studied me for a long moment.
Finally, he nodded.
“Your mother discovered that historical pieces were being transferred out of the archive under fraudulent insurance claims.”
My heart began pounding.
“She was investigating theft?”
“Diversion of assets. Some manuscripts were used to secure private loans. Others were sold through intermediaries.”
“Who authorized it?”
Arthur hesitated.
Then said, “Your grandmother controlled the collection.”
I stepped back.
“No.”
“Vivien—”
“Don't.”
My grandmother had raised me after Madeleine died.
She taught me French poetry, brushed my hair before school, and sat beside my bed when nightmares woke me.
She was the reason I wore the bracelet.
The reason I believed family meant loyalty.
Arthur continued quietly.
“She signed certain transactions under financial pressure. Charles Beaumont arranged them.”
Lydia looked genuinely startled.
“My father told me Madeleine stole the collection.”
“Your father knew that wasn't the whole story.”
I looked at Lydia.
For once, she had nothing cruel to say.
Logan paced across the room.
“Why does any of this matter to my company?”
Eleanor answered.
“Because those disputed assets were used to secure obligations that eventually became tangled with Northbridge Financial's portfolio.”
She turned her tablet toward me.
“Vivien, there's something else. Wright Global made substantial payments to an entity identified as Historical Recovery Services over the past three years.”
I examined the figures.
Millions.
Disguised as consulting and intellectual-property expenses.
“Who approved these?”
Logan moved closer.
“I didn't.”
Eleanor scrolled.
“The payment authorizations carry delegated executive approval.”
Lydia stared at the floor.
Logan turned toward her.
“Please tell me you weren't sending company money to your father's creditors.”
She lifted her chin.
“I was protecting something he left behind.”
“Using my money?”
“You signed the authorization framework.”
“I trusted you!”
She laughed once.
A sharp, humorless sound.
“Yes, Logan. And now you know what that feels like.”
Her words struck harder than she'd intended.
I felt Logan look toward me.
But I didn't give him the comfort of eye contact.
Arthur rose.
“Eleanor, we need independent auditors involved immediately.”
I nodded.
“And a preservation order for the archive records.”
“Agreed,” Eleanor said.
Logan looked desperate.
“If this becomes public, my investors will panic.”
I turned toward him.
“Your investors deserve accurate information.”
“You want to destroy me.”
“No. I want to know whether you allowed someone to use your company to finance a crime.”
He flinched.
Lydia's eyes filled with tears.
It was the first time I'd seen her cry.
“My father died owing money to people who threatened to expose him as a thief,” she whispered. “He left me a notebook listing every payment.”
“Where is it?”
“At my apartment.”
“Have you read it?”
“Most of it.”
“Did it mention Madeleine?”
She nodded.
“Repeatedly.”
“Then why target me?”
Lydia wiped her face.
“Because I thought you knew.”
I stared at her.
“Knew what?”
“That your inheritance was built on the same transactions that ruined my father.”
I almost laughed.
“My inheritance?”
“Your mother supposedly kept the most valuable manuscript. My father spent years trying to recover it.”
Arthur looked sharply at her.
“Which manuscript?”
Lydia hesitated.
“The blue journal.”
Arthur's expression changed.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
I noticed immediately.
“You know where it is,” I said.
He shook his head.
“No.”
“You're lying.”
He looked wounded.
But he didn't deny it again.
Eleanor opened the scanned receipt.
“The journal was released under an archival reference. Four-eleven-twenty-seven.”
My hand moved instinctively to my bracelet.
Arthur stared at it.
His expression drained.
“Vivien,” he whispered, “where did you get that bracelet?”
“My grandmother.”
He reached toward it.
I stepped away.
“Don't.”
He swallowed.
“Then she finally told you?”
“Told me what?”
Arthur looked toward the door, then back at my wrist.
“The bracelet wasn't meant to identify a manuscript.”
His voice trembled.
“It identifies the person your mother trusted with the original.”
My breath caught.
“Who?”
Arthur looked directly at Logan.
“Your husband's father.”
Logan went completely still.
His father, Edward Wright, had died when Logan was twenty-three.
Or so I had always believed.
Arthur continued.
“Edward was the last authorized custodian of the blue journal. And he left instructions that it must never be handed to either the Valois family or the Beaumont family.”
Logan whispered, “That's impossible.”
Arthur reached inside his jacket.
From an inner pocket, he withdrew an old silver pocket watch.
Its glass was cracked.
Its chain was tarnished.
Logan staggered backward.
“My father's watch.”
Arthur placed it beside the photograph.
Then opened the back.
Inside was a tiny folded slip of paper.
May you like
It contained my mother's handwriting.
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, ASK EDWARD WHY LOGAN WAS REALLY CHOSEN.
