Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN AT OUR TABLE
Dana had eaten Thanksgiving dinner at our house for thirteen years.
She had attended my graduations. She had held my father together at my mother’s funeral.
Now her voice was on my mother’s last recording.
Marcus quietly locked the conference-room doors.
Dana didn’t panic.
“That video doesn’t prove what you think.”
“Then explain it,” my father said.
“Elaine called me that night because she was afraid. I told her to stop recording until we could protect the evidence.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because she made me promise.”
My father slammed his hand on the table.
“My wife died!”
“And if I had broken that promise, you and Amelia might have died too.”
Dana removed a sealed envelope from her briefcase.
“Elaine gave me this three days before the crash. She said I could open it only if Amelia discovered Red Harbor on her own.”
I tore it open.
Inside was a key and a handwritten note.
AMELIA—THE TRUTH IS UNDER THE PLACE WHERE YOU FIRST LEARNED TO WIN.
I knew exactly where she meant.
When I was little, my mother took me to an old public chess pavilion near Lake Mercer. She taught me to think three moves ahead there.
We drove to the park after dark.
Under the table where she had taught me, we found a rusted metal box. The key opened it.
Inside were bank records, photographs, and a small digital recorder.
The photographs showed Voss meeting with university officials. Richard Hale appeared in several.
One picture showed Chief Nolan exchanging an envelope with Chase’s father.
The recorder contained my mother’s conversation with Voss.
“You’re stealing from students,” she said.
“We’re redistributing unused capital.”
“Scholarship money isn’t unused.”
“It is if the students never receive it.”
Then another man interrupted them.
“We have a bigger problem. Nathan Sterling is asking questions.”
The speaker wasn’t Hale.
It was President Arthur Bell, the respected founder of Sterling Global and my father’s mentor.
The man I had called Grandpa Arthur my entire childhood.
My father stared at the recorder.
“He built my company with me.”
Dana nodded grimly. “And he may have built it with stolen money.”
Marcus’s phone rang.
His expression changed as he listened.
“What happened?” I asked.
He turned on the television.
Breaking news filled the screen.
Federal agents were entering Sterling Global’s headquarters.
The headline below them read:
May you like
BILLIONAIRE NATHAN STERLING ARRESTED IN UNIVERSITY FRAUD SCHEME.
Then officers surrounded my father.
