Chapter 2 - THE MAN WHO KNEW
Dominic read the message twice.
Emma whispered, “He knows?”
“He knows I landed.”
“But you said only two security men knew.”
“I did.”
Dominic typed one sentence to Luca Bennett, the head of his personal protection detail.
CHECK THE FLIGHT LEAK. QUIETLY.
Then he put the phone away.
“Go wake Natalie,” he said.
Emma stared at him. “After what we just heard?”
“Yes.”
“You want her to come down here?”
“No. I want Brooke to believe she’s coming down here.”
Understanding flickered across Emma’s face.
Dominic pointed toward the back staircase. “Take the east stairs. Tell Natalie I’m home. Tell her to say nothing, call no one, and keep Noah with her.”
“What about you?”
“I’m going to see who Brooke calls when she thinks she’s alone.”
Emma left without another question.
Dominic slipped back into the wine corridor.
The passage ran behind the pantry, library, and old breakfast room, built in the 1890s so servants could move unseen during formal dinners. Most of the staff no longer used it.
Dominic had played in it as a boy.
His mother had hidden Christmas gifts there.
Now he used it to watch his fiancée steal from her grave.
He reached the narrow vent behind the breakfast room and heard Brooke before he saw her.
“You told me he wouldn’t be back until Monday.”
A man answered through her phone speaker.
Adrian.
“I told you his official schedule said Monday.”
“Then your information is worthless.”
“Lower your voice.”
Brooke paced near the windows. “Natalie hasn’t signed.”
“She will.”
“She’s stubborn.”
“So scare her.”
“I did.”
“Then scare her better.”
Dominic’s hand closed into a fist.
Brooke stopped pacing. “What if Dominic sees the authorization?”
“He won’t know it exists unless someone shows him.”
“And if Emma talks?”
A pause.
Then Adrian said, “Emma won’t be here after Saturday.”
Brooke looked toward the pantry.
“No. She won’t.”
Dominic’s eyes went cold.
Brooke opened a cabinet and removed a bottle of sparkling water. “Grant is bringing the trust file at eleven.”
“Good.”
“I want the cottage transferred before the ceremony.”
“That’s not possible.”
“Then make it possible.”
“Brooke, listen to me. We don’t need the cottage. We need Natalie to sign the distribution acknowledgment. Once she admits those payments were hers, the missing trust money becomes her problem.”
Dominic stopped breathing for half a second.
Missing trust money.
Brooke lowered her voice. “How much is still exposed?”
“Enough.”
“How much?”
“Three point eight.”
“Million?”
“Don’t say numbers on the phone.”
Brooke’s face tightened. “You said Catherine’s trust was clean.”
“It was supposed to be.”
“Supposed to be?”
“Your father got greedy.”
Dominic felt the entire board shift under his feet.
Brooke’s father, Randall Harrington, was a real-estate developer with a reputation for glossy towers, aggressive debt, and lawsuits that seemed to disappear at convenient times.
Dominic had never liked him.
But dislike was not proof.
Brooke whispered, “My father was promised repayment.”
“He took repayment. Then he took more.”
“And now?”
“Now Natalie signs. Dominic gets married. The records get folded into the new family structure. Six months from now, no one can trace what happened without tearing apart his entire empire.”
Brooke went silent.
Then she said something that made Dominic’s blood run colder than the rain outside.
“And Catherine?”
Adrian did not answer immediately.
Brooke gripped the bottle.
“You told me Catherine couldn’t prove anything.”
“She can’t prove anything now.”
The call ended.
Dominic remained behind the wall, staring through the vent.
Brooke looked at her reflection in the black window and whispered to herself.
“Two more days.”
Then she smiled.
Dominic’s phone vibrated again.
This time it was Luca.
FLIGHT LEAK CAME FROM INSIDE THE HOUSE.
A second message followed.
THE ACCESS CODE USED BELONGS TO NATALIE.
—
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