Chapter 11 - THE WIFE HE UNDERESTIMATED
Fear lasted five minutes.
Then Claire got angry.
Not wild anger.
Useful anger.
The kind her father had taught her.
“When somebody tries to scare you,” he used to say, “figure out what they’re scared you’ll find.”
Claire looked at the message again.
Ryan wanted her to stop digging.
Which meant something remained buried.
“Natalie.”
“Yes?”
“Why did he go back to the office?”
“For documents.”
“What documents?”
“We don’t know.”
“What if it wasn’t about taking something?”
Natalie frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“What if he went there to destroy something?”
They called Gregory.
He had already ordered a full system audit.
An hour later, IT recovered deleted files.
One folder had been erased at 4:19 a.m.
PROJECT NORTHSTAR
Inside were transaction maps.
Client funds.
Shell companies.
Offshore transfers.
Ryan.
David.
Jessica.
And one more name.
Gregory Hawthorne.
Claire stared.
“No.”
Gregory looked sick.
“I didn’t know.”
Natalie crossed her arms.
“Your name is on the approvals.”
“They’re forged.”
Claire almost laughed at the irony.
Now Gregory knew what it felt like.
One document showed a transfer of $5.8 million approved using Gregory’s digital signature.
He insisted he never authorized it.
IT confirmed someone had accessed his credentials from Ryan’s office.
The pattern became clear.
Ryan and David hadn’t built one scapegoat.
They had built several.
Claire.
Gregory.
Madison.
Jessica.
Anyone could be blamed.
Except them.
Then investigators found a hidden audio recording inside the deleted folder.
David’s voice.
“I’m done.”
Ryan answered.
“You don’t get to be done.”
David sounded nervous.
“We’ve moved enough.”
“Not enough.”
“Gregory’s suspicious.”
“Then we use Claire.”
Claire’s skin crawled.
David said, “Your wife?”
“She signs what I put in front of her.”
“She might talk.”
Ryan laughed.
“Claire doesn’t understand finance.”
Claire closed her eyes.
There it was.
The thing that hurt more than the affair.
Contempt.
Ryan had not simply betrayed her.
He had thought she was stupid.
The recording continued.
David said, “And if she figures it out?”
Ryan answered without hesitation.
“She won’t.”
Claire opened her eyes.
A slow smile appeared.
Natalie saw it.
“What?”
“He made one mistake.”
“What?”
“He thought I wouldn’t figure it out.”
Claire picked up her phone.
“We’re going to make him come to us.”
Natalie frowned.
“How?”
Claire looked at the viral promotion video.
Ryan’s pride had always been his weakness.
So she posted one sentence publicly:
Ryan, I found the Northstar files.
Within seven minutes, her phone rang.
Ryan.
Claire answered.
His voice was no longer calm.
“What did you find?”
Claire smiled.
May you like
“Everything.”
And for the first time, she heard Ryan Cole panic.
