Chapter 4 - THE PRICE OF A HUSBAND'S LOYALTY
“Why would anyone pay my ex-husband half a million dollars to destroy my computer?”
Rebecca Shaw stared at the employment agreement I'd placed on her desk.
“Because they believed something valuable was on it.”
“There's nothing on that laptop worth twelve million dollars.”
“Maybe not money,” she replied. “Maybe evidence.”
I looked at the blue folder again.
Arthur Harrington's signature sat beneath Brent's proposed compensation.
I had known Arthur for fifteen years.
He'd been my father's friend, my business adviser, and one of the people I trusted to make difficult decisions when I wasn't available.
He had also recommended Sloane Prescott for the Lumina CEO position.
That fact suddenly seemed much more important.
“Has Arthur been contacted?” I asked.
“Daniel told him the emergency meeting was postponed.”
“Good. I don't want him knowing what we've found until we understand the records.”
Rebecca looked at the final page.
“There's another problem, Whitney. This contract offers Brent a title, but it doesn't identify actual responsibilities.”
“Which suggests the salary wasn't payment for legitimate work.”
“Or someone expected him to perform services they didn't want written down.”
I rubbed my forehead.
For seven years, Brent had complained about feeling unsuccessful.
I had supported him through career changes, paid most of our household expenses, and helped him prepare for interviews.
He'd always insisted that his breakthrough was coming.
Now I wondered whether someone had exploited that insecurity.
Someone who understood exactly how desperate he was to feel important.
That evening, I returned to our former apartment.
My name was still on the lease through the end of the month, and the building manager had agreed to let me collect my remaining belongings.
The apartment looked different without my books and photographs.
The living room smelled faintly of Brent's expensive cologne.
I stood beside the desk where I'd once worked late at night while he watched television.
My laptop was gone.
But its old carrying case remained in the bottom drawer.
I opened it.
Inside was a charging cable, a forgotten receipt, and a small black notebook.
The notebook belonged to Brent.
I remembered buying it for him after he announced he wanted to start his own consulting business.
On the first page, I'd written:
For every wonderful thing you're going to accomplish. Love, Whitney.
I almost closed it.
Then I noticed a list of dates.
The first entry was six weeks before our divorce.
Dinner with S. Discussed opportunity.
The next read:
A. says the position is practically guaranteed.
A.
Arthur?
Several pages later, Brent had written:
Need access to W's old machine. S. says authorized. No reason to worry.
My stomach tightened.
There was another entry.
Ask why they won't put the computer request in writing.
And beneath it, circled three times:
Don't be an idiot.
That was unmistakably Brent.
He wrote those words whenever he knew something was wrong but wanted to convince himself otherwise.
I slipped the notebook into my handbag.
For the first time since our divorce, I wasn't simply angry at him.
I was afraid of what he might have allowed himself to become.
The following morning, I found Brent waiting outside a coffee shop near his old office.
I'd chosen a public location.
He looked exhausted.
The confident man who had humiliated me at The Alder Room had disappeared.
“Whitney,” he said, standing.
“Sit down.”
He obeyed.
I placed a copy of the consulting agreement between us.
His face went pale.
“Where did you get that?”
“It was delivered with my belongings.”
He stared at Arthur's signature.
“I was going to tell you.”
“When? Before or after somebody destroyed my computer?”
He swallowed.
“I didn't destroy anything.”
“Then explain what happened.”
Brent rubbed his hands together.
“Sloane told me Lumina had an opportunity to expand. Arthur was helping her structure a deal. She said my sales experience could be valuable.”
“You haven't worked in technology sales.”
“I know.”
“And you didn't find a $420,000 salary suspicious?”
His jaw tightened.
“Not everyone needs your approval to get a good job.”
There he was.
The familiar defensive anger.
I leaned forward.
“This isn't about whether you're successful, Brent. Someone used my identity to authorize millions in transfers. Your new employers wanted my computer destroyed. Do you understand how serious that is?”
He looked toward the window.
“Sloane said your old files were creating a security problem.”
“What files?”
“She wouldn't tell me.”
“Did you give her access?”
“I let her use the computer that night. She connected a small silver device and copied something.”
I felt my heart sink.
“What did it look like?”
“Like a flash drive. She said it was an encrypted corporate tool.”
“Did she take my computer afterward?”
“No.”
“Then where is it?”
He hesitated.
“Arthur's office.”
I stared at him.
“Arthur Harrington has my personal laptop?”
“He collected it the morning you moved out. Said Aegis needed to retire an unsecured company device.”
I slowly leaned back.
Arthur hadn't merely signed Brent's employment agreement.
He had arranged for the removal of my computer.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because I thought it belonged to your bookkeeping company.”
“Brent, you know the name of the firm I worked for.”
He stared at the tabletop.
“I never paid much attention.”
The answer was so painfully familiar that I almost laughed.
Instead, I asked one final question.
“Did you marry Sloane because you loved her?”
He raised his eyes.
“I thought I did.”
“That wasn't my question.”
His silence lasted several seconds.
“Being with her made me feel like somebody,” he finally admitted.
I stood.
“That feeling may have cost you more than you realize.”
At Aegis headquarters, Rebecca listened carefully as I described the meeting.
She immediately arranged for our security team to preserve access records for Arthur's office.
But an hour later, she returned with troubling news.
“Arthur's office has been cleared.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“His personal belongings are gone. His assistant says he left yesterday afternoon for a scheduled trip.”
“Where?”
“Connecticut.”
I looked toward Daniel, who had entered behind her.
“Did Arthur attend yesterday's investment committee call?”
“No,” Daniel answered.
“Was anything unusual discussed?”
Daniel exchanged a look with Rebecca.
“Actually, yes.”
He placed a meeting agenda on my desk.
Lumina was scheduled for a major restructuring vote in eleven days.
The proposal would transfer certain Beacon intellectual-property rights into a newly formed holding company.
I read the first page.
“Who proposed this?”
“Arthur.”
“And who's acquiring the rights?”
“Northbridge Advisory and its financing partners.”
I stared at the name.
The same consulting company receiving questionable payments.
“What's the proposed valuation?”
“Twenty-eight million dollars.”
I looked at Daniel.
“Beacon has already received more than eighty million in development funding. Why would we sell the underlying rights for twenty-eight?”
“That is exactly what our technical advisers have been questioning.”
Rebecca placed a second report beside the agenda.
“There's more. The valuation was based on a report claiming Beacon failed a major security evaluation.”
“Did it?”
“We haven't been able to locate the original test results.”
The room fell quiet.
I remembered something Sloane had said during the board meeting.
We were weeks away from a breakthrough.
If Beacon was close to commercial success, somebody stood to make an enormous profit by purchasing its intellectual property at a depressed valuation.
And if Lumina lost its most valuable asset, hundreds of employees could lose their jobs.
Arthur had known that.
He had also known my father.
I looked at the silver bracelet on my wrist.
Know what you own.
My father had taught me to inspect every transaction that looked too good to be true.
But he had also taught me something else.
The most dangerous betrayals often came from people who knew exactly where you placed your trust.
Rebecca interrupted my thoughts.
“Whitney, we recovered an access log from the secure document archive.”
“What does it show?”
“Someone attempted to remove the original Beacon technical assessment.”
“When?”
“Three nights before your divorce.”
I looked up sharply.
“That was the night Brent borrowed my laptop.”
Rebecca nodded.
“And the system recorded the account used to request the deletion.”
“Whose?”
She placed the report in front of me.
It wasn't Sloane's account.
It wasn't Arthur's.
It was mine.
Beneath the account name was a note from the security system.
Secondary verification completed through previously registered recovery device.
I stared at the entry.
Only one person outside Aegis knew where I kept that recovery device.
Brent.
Then Daniel spoke from the doorway.
“Whitney, our technical team found something else. The original Beacon evaluation wasn't deleted.”
“Where is it?”
May you like
He looked at me.
“Someone copied it onto the silver device your husband described. And the last recorded owner of that device was Sloane Prescott.”
