Chapter 16 - The Ledger
We did not drive to Mark’s office.
Every instinct in my body wanted to.
James refused.
“Police are three minutes away. We are twenty.”
He was right.
Again.
It was becoming annoying.
Deputies found Lauren in the parking lot sitting inside her locked car with the ledger pressed against her chest.
Mark was gone.
He had pounded on her window, shouted, then left when another employee came outside.
Lauren handed the ledger to investigators.
By that evening, the story cracked wide open.
The ledger was handwritten.
Old-fashioned.
Probably because Mark trusted paper more than servers.
It listed loans to Lauren.
Payments to legal offices.
Money given to Aunt Carol.
Transfers involving Mom.
And a six-figure payment from a development company labeled ADVANCE — LAKE.
There were also initials we did not recognize.
Maya did.
One belonged to a former bank employee who had processed the first refinance application.
Another belonged to a private appraiser.
The appraiser had valued the lake property at less than half its likely development value.
Mark had been building the transaction from both ends.
Make the family believe the property was worth less.
Move it into an LLC he controlled.
Then sell at the higher development price.
Lauren sat in Maya’s office across from me looking smaller than I had ever seen her.
She had agreed to give a full statement.
Not because she had suddenly become brave.
Because Mark had stopped protecting her.
Sometimes people discover morality only after losing immunity.
I could live with that if the truth still came out.
Lauren looked at me.
“I’m sorry about Emma.”
I said nothing.
“I mean it.”
“I believe you mean it right now.”
She winced.
“That’s fair.”
“No. Fair would have been my daughter being safe at Thanksgiving.”
She looked down.
Ryan sat beside his attorney across the room.
Caleb was not there.
That was important.
Adults had created this mess.
Children did not need front-row seats to the cleanup.
A detective entered carrying a printout.
“We have a problem.”
Maya frowned.
“What?”
“The development company says the advance wasn’t paid to Mark personally.”
“Who was it paid to?”
The detective placed the page on the table.
A wire transfer.
Four hundred thousand dollars.
Recipient: Bennett Property Holdings LLC.
Authorized recipient contact: Susan Bennett.
My mother.
I stared at the page.
Lauren whispered, “No.”
The detective looked at us.
“Mrs. Bennett told us Mark controlled the company.”
“He did,” I said.
“Maybe.”
He tapped the transfer.
“But the money landed in an account opened using your mother’s identification.”
James’s face hardened.
I thought of Mom crying on my couch.
Saying Mark had threatened her.
Confessing just enough to make herself look manipulated.
The detective asked the question none of us wanted to hear.
“What if your mother wasn’t Mark’s victim?”
He paused.
“What if she was his partner?”
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