Chapter 5 - Behind the Wall
Nathan, Sarah, and Rebecca returned to Aldercrest at 5:30 the next morning.
Technically, Nathan was suspended from executive duties.
He was still majority owner.
Charles had ordered staff not to assist him with internal investigations.
Sarah ignored the order.
“I’ll probably get fired.”
Nathan looked at her.
“You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Why?”
“Because Olivia asked me for help once.”
Nathan stopped.
Sarah looked guilty.
“When?”
“Two weeks before she disappeared.”
“What did she ask?”
“To copy door-access records.”
“And did you?”
“Yes.”
“What happened to them?”
“I gave them to her.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Sarah looked directly at him.
“Because she asked me not to.”
Nathan’s frustration rose.
Then he remembered Olivia’s letter.
Look.
“Why didn’t she trust me?”
Sarah answered gently.
“You really need me to tell you?”
No.
He didn’t.
They entered the old founder’s corridor.
Locker 417 had been resealed after police photographed its contents.
Sarah used a maintenance key to open a narrow staff door twenty feet away.
Behind the oak locker wall ran a dusty service passage.
Pipes.
Old wiring.
Abandoned call buttons.
Rebecca photographed everything.
They walked until they reached the rear of 417.
A rectangular access panel had been cut into the wall.
Sarah pointed.
“That’s how the hand appeared.”
The panel opened.
Someone could reach directly into the locker.
Nathan pictured Veronica waiting on the other side.
“What was she doing here?”
Rebecca shined a flashlight lower.
“Maybe looking for this.”
A metal bracket was mounted behind the wall.
Empty.
Something had once been attached.
Below it lay a small strip of black plastic.
Sarah picked it up with gloved fingers.
“Security seal.”
Nathan frowned.
“From what?”
Rebecca examined it.
“Possibly a hard-drive case.”
They continued deeper.
At the end of the passage was an old electrical room.
The door was locked.
The brass key Ethan had carried did not fit.
Sarah searched a cabinet.
“Maintenance keys were changed ten years ago.”
Nathan looked at the doorframe.
Scratches.
Someone had opened it recently.
Rebecca said, “Don’t force it. We preserve evidence.”
Nathan hated that she was right.
Sarah called the building engineer.
No answer.
Then footsteps sounded behind them.
Charles.
“You’re trespassing in a restricted service area.”
Nathan turned.
“In my building?”
“In an area closed for safety.”
Rebecca stepped forward.
“Rebecca Sloan.”
“I know who you are.”
“I represent Nathan.”
Charles looked at Sarah.
“You’re terminated.”
Sarah’s face went pale.
Nathan said, “No.”
Charles smiled.
“You’re suspended.”
“I still control payroll.”
“Not under yesterday’s resolution.”
Sarah swallowed.
“It’s okay.”
“No, it isn’t.”
She looked at Nathan.
“Yes, it is. Keep going.”
Charles turned toward Rebecca.
“If you damage club property, I’ll seek an injunction.”
Rebecca smiled.
“Please do. Discovery will be fun.”
Charles’s eyes shifted toward the electrical-room door.
Nathan noticed.
“You’re scared of that room.”
Charles laughed.
“Of dust?”
Nathan stepped closer.
“What was mounted behind Locker 417?”
“No idea.”
“Why did you delete the footage?”
“I didn’t.”
“Why did Olivia believe you were stealing?”
“Because Olivia was unstable.”
Nathan’s expression hardened.
“Never say that again.”
“Why? Because she’s missing?”
“Because you used the same word during my divorce.”
Charles tilted his head.
“You believed me.”
Nathan absorbed the blow.
“Yes.”
That answer again took away Charles’s weapon.
Rebecca’s phone rang.
She answered.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
She looked at Nathan.
“The forensic accountants found something.”
They left Charles in the corridor.
At Evelyn’s house, the accountants shared their screen.
Over nine years, Aldercrest had paid $14.7 million to companies linked directly or indirectly to Charles.
Another $4.9 million had gone to Meridian entities connected to Veronica.
But that was not the largest problem.
Aldercrest’s debt had increased by $38 million during the same period.
Nathan stared.
“I thought the debt funded the spa renovation and western irrigation.”
“It did,” the accountant said. “But costs appear inflated.”
“How much?”
“Potentially twenty million.”
Rebecca asked, “Where did the excess go?”
“We’re still tracing.”
Nathan thought of Olivia.
She had been financial counsel for the Bennett family office before Ethan was born.
She understood complex structures better than he did.
She had seen this.
And he had called her paranoid.
The accountant continued.
“One transaction is especially concerning.”
A $12 million loan from Aldercrest to a company called Briarcrest Holdings.
Nathan frowned.
“I never approved that.”
“Your electronic signature is on it.”
“When?”
“Six weeks before Olivia disappeared.”
Nathan stood.
“No.”
Rebecca said, “Do you remember signing?”
“No.”
“Who had access to your electronic credentials?”
Nathan thought.
His assistant.
Charles.
Occasionally Veronica.
The accountant opened the authentication log.
The signature originated from Aldercrest’s executive office at 11:48 p.m.
Nathan had been in Boston that night.
He could prove it.
Sarah whispered, “Then someone forged your approval.”
Rebecca looked at Nathan.
“We need the electrical room.”
Before they could seek a court order, Ethan came into the dining room carrying his mother’s damaged photograph.
“Dad?”
“Yes?”
“Who is that?”
He pointed to the background.
Behind Olivia and Ethan, near the old oak, stood a man Nathan had never noticed.
Not Charles.
Aldercrest’s former building engineer.
Marcus Hale.
Nathan remembered him because Marcus disappeared from work the same week Olivia vanished.
Charles told everyone he had stolen club equipment and fled.
Sarah looked at the photograph.
“Marcus knew every service passage in the building.”
Nathan immediately searched employee records.
Marcus’s emergency contact still had an old number.
Rebecca called.
Disconnected.
They searched public databases.
A current address appeared in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
Nathan stared at it.
May you like
Marcus Hale was alive.
And three days after Olivia disappeared, Aldercrest had paid him $250,000.
