Chapter 7 - THE CAMERAS
Ethan looked up.
A small security camera blinked above the garage door.
Vanessa laughed softly through the phone.
“You really thought I wouldn’t prepare?”
Max disconnected.
“Move.”
They left through the side door.
By the time they reached Daniel’s office, Vanessa had already filed another motion.
Trespass.
Harassment.
Theft of private documents.
“She is forcing you to play defense,” Daniel said.
Ethan stared at the wall.
Every move they made created evidence for her.
Rebecca paced.
“So what? We do nothing?”
“No,” Ethan said.
Everyone looked at him.
“We stop chasing her.”
Daniel waited.
Ethan continued.
“She wants us angry. Reactive. Breaking into houses. Confronting people.”
Rebecca folded her arms.
“So?”
“So we give her what she doesn’t expect.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
For the next ten days, Ethan did not contact Vanessa.
He did not respond publicly.
He transferred operational authority temporarily to the board’s audit committee.
He voluntarily submitted company records.
He attended court calmly.
Vanessa hated it.
Ethan could tell.
Her attorneys became more aggressive.
Then she made the first mistake.
She accused Ethan of concealing company funds.
The number she cited was precise:
$1.84 million.
Daniel smiled when he saw it.
“What?”
“That account isn’t in the discovery materials.”
Ethan understood.
“How would she know?”
“Exactly.”
The account belonged to a dormant acquisition subsidiary.
Only four people had access.
Ethan.
The controller.
The former CFO.
And Vanessa’s father.
Richard Hale.
Ethan frowned.
Vanessa rarely spoke about him.
They had been estranged for years.
Daniel looked up.
“Maybe not as estranged as she claims.”
They searched old company correspondence.
Richard had approved multiple suspicious transfers.
Then Ethan found one email.
Vanessa to Richard:
WHEN THIS IS OVER, YOU GET YOUR NAME BACK.
Ethan stared.
“What does that mean?”
Daniel opened a public records search.
Twenty years earlier, Richard Hale had been forced out of a family construction company after allegations of fraud.
The executive who testified against him:
Ethan’s father.
Michael Cole.
May you like
Ethan sat very still.
Vanessa had not married into the Cole family by accident.
