Chapter 3 - SOMEONE KNEW
“Shut the doors,” Sebastian said.
Daniel locked the penthouse.
Charlotte stood in the center of the room, trying to think.
Her mother’s notebook was gone.
The one thing she had promised never to lose.
“What was inside it?” Sebastian asked again.
Charlotte shook her head.
“First tell me why my mother warned me about Margaret.”
Sebastian walked toward the windows.
For a moment, he looked at the city instead of her.
“Margaret has worked with me for seventeen years.”
“That doesn’t answer me.”
“No.”
He turned.
“It doesn’t.”
Charlotte waited.
Sebastian sighed.
“After your grandmother died, I became difficult.”
“That’s a polite word.”
“You really are Olivia’s daughter.”
Charlotte didn’t smile.
Sebastian continued.
“Your mother wanted control of our charitable foundation. She believed money was disappearing.”
Charlotte’s eyes sharpened.
“Was it?”
“We never proved it.”
“Who ran the foundation?”
Sebastian didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
Charlotte looked toward the locked door.
“Margaret.”
Daniel nodded.
“Yes.”
Charlotte felt a chill.
“What happened after Mom accused her?”
“They fought,” Sebastian said. “Badly. Your mother left New York three weeks later.”
“You mean you threw her out.”
“I told her if she couldn’t respect my judgment, she shouldn’t work for the company.”
“So she left.”
“I expected her to come back.”
“She didn’t.”
Sebastian’s jaw tightened.
“No.”
Charlotte folded her arms.
“And you never went after her?”
“I tried.”
“My mother said you didn’t.”
“I called. I sent letters. I sent people.”
Charlotte stared at him.
“We never got anything.”
That landed hard.
Sebastian turned slowly.
“What?”
“No calls. No letters. Nothing.”
Daniel looked at him.
“Sir.”
Sebastian went still.
Charlotte understood before he said it.
“Someone stopped them.”
Sebastian reached for his phone.
“Daniel, get me all archived correspondence from the year Olivia left. Every outgoing letter, every courier receipt.”
Daniel nodded.
“And the security footage?”
“Now.”
Daniel left.
Charlotte looked at Sebastian.
“You still trust Margaret?”
“I trust facts.”
“Good. So do I.”
She opened her mother’s letter again.
“There’s more.”
Sebastian read it.
Olivia had written about irregular transfers.
Fake vendors.
Money routed through three companies.
But she had never found proof connecting the accounts to anyone.
Charlotte tapped the letter.
“The proof was in the notebook.”
Sebastian looked at her.
“What proof?”
“My mother kept copies of account numbers, dates, and names. Before she died, she hid them behind the notebook’s back cover.”
Sebastian’s expression changed.
“Who knew?”
“Me.”
“Anyone else?”
“No.”
A phone rang.
Daniel was calling.
Sebastian put him on speaker.
“Tell me.”
Daniel’s voice sounded tense.
“I checked the cameras.”
“And?”
“The lobby footage works.”
Charlotte leaned closer.
“What about the service hallway?”
Silence.
Daniel finally answered.
“Deleted.”
“By who?” Sebastian demanded.
“We’re checking.”
Then Daniel said something worse.
“Sir, there’s another problem.”
“What?”
“The deletion happened twelve minutes before Charlotte entered the hotel.”
Nobody spoke.
Charlotte felt the hairs rise on her arms.
Someone hadn’t stolen the notebook by accident.
May you like
Someone had known she was coming.
And someone had prepared for it.
