Chapter 10 - What Daniel Had
Kessler's throat was bruised badly enough that he could only whisper.
Nora sat beside his hospital bed.
"What original?"
He asked for water.
She held the cup while he drank.
"Peter's partnership amendment."
Nora frowned.
"The share clause?"
"More than that."
The original agreement contained a misconduct provision.
If either founder's family committed fraud or violence to force a transfer of shares, their voting rights could be suspended by a court and temporarily assigned to the other founder's heir.
Nora stared at him.
"So if we prove Celeste and Daniel did this—"
"You could control Voss Maritime."
Nora sat back.
She did not want the company.
Then she thought of eight thousand employees, cleanup liabilities, pension accounts, families who had no idea what the people at the top were doing.
Want had nothing to do with it.
"Why does Daniel have the original?"
Kessler looked ashamed.
"I gave it to him."
Nora blinked.
"Why?"
"Three years ago. Peter had just died. Daniel told me he wanted to understand his obligations before marrying you. I believed him."
"You believed the man my father warned you about."
Kessler closed his eyes.
"Yes."
Another mistake made by someone educated enough to know better.
Daniel had hidden the amendment somewhere.
Kessler did not know where.
Rourke searched Daniel's home, office, storage units.
Nothing.
Then Alma remembered an odd detail.
"He keeps a wine locker at the Beacon Club."
Rourke obtained another warrant.
The locker held no wine.
It held cash, two passports, a burner phone, and a sealed envelope addressed to Nora.
She opened it with gloved hands.
Inside was a handwritten note from Daniel.
Nora,
If you're reading this, things went farther than I meant them to.
She stopped.
"Farther?"
Rourke said, "Keep reading."
Daniel claimed Celeste had ordered the first collision, not him. He said he arrived planning to stop her, then panicked when Celeste screamed that Nora had the red case.
"I chose the company," he wrote. "For about three seconds, I chose it over you and Sophie. Three seconds was enough."
Nora's eyes burned.
The final line was stranger.
The original agreement is not in the locker. It's with the person who taught me how to lie.
Alma whispered, "His mother."
Nora shook her head.
"No. Too obvious."
Then she remembered Daniel telling a joke years ago: Dad taught me business. Mom taught me survival. Peter taught me how to lie to myself.
May you like
Her dead father had the original all along.
