Chapter 8 - My Grandfather’s Final Secret
I hated that Mark’s words bothered me.
But they did.
That evening, David and I opened the final sealed packet from my grandfather’s estate.
Inside was a handwritten letter.
Anna,
If you are reading this, the trust has transferred successfully.
There is something you deserve to know.
Whitmore Aeronautics was nearly destroyed fifteen years ago by internal corruption.
Your father discovered it.
My breathing stopped.
My father had died when I was nineteen.
I continued reading.
He uncovered illegal payments tied to procurement contracts.
Before he could expose everything, evidence disappeared.
Your father believed someone inside the company had help from outside.
I looked at David.
“Did you know?”
“No.”
The letter continued.
I protected the voting shares because I believed one day someone would try again.
I chose you because you have something money cannot buy.
Discipline.
Mark had apparently found part of this correspondence months earlier.
That was why he became obsessed with the company.
He believed there was hidden evidence.
And Victor had connections to one of the executives implicated fifteen years ago.
Suddenly, Sterling Ridge Solutions looked very different.
It wasn’t simply a failing consulting company.
It might have been created to regain access to Whitmore Aeronautics.
My phone rang.
Claire.
“Colonel, we found something.”
“What?”
“Victor gave investigators an encrypted drive.”
“And?”
“It contains financial records going back fifteen years.”
I stood.
“My father’s investigation?”
“We think so.”
“Where did Victor get it?”
Claire went silent.
“Claire?”
“From Mark.”
I stared through the window.
May you like
Mark had been holding evidence connected to my father’s death for months.
And he had never told me.
