Chapter 9 - THE MAN WHO BETRAYED MY FATHERDarkness swallowed my father's office.
Someone shouted downstairs.
Then glass shattered.
David grabbed my arm.
"Stay behind me."
Emergency lights should have activated.
They didn't.
Whoever had cut power knew the house.
Investigators were already on the property, which meant this was either extraordinarily reckless...
Or planned around them.
A flashlight appeared in the doorway.
I flinched.
"Ms. Beaumont?"
Detective Harris.
I exhaled.
"Power's been cut from the exterior junction."
"Martin?"
"We don't know."
An officer entered behind him.
"Vehicle at the north gate."
Harris moved.
"Stay here."
I almost laughed.
People kept telling me to stay places.
It rarely worked out.
Still, this time I listened.
For approximately forty seconds.
Then I noticed the desk phone.
No power.
My cellphone showed no signal.
Jammer?
Maybe.
David checked his.
Nothing.
"This is deliberate."
I looked toward the hidden memory card.
"Martin doesn't want that recording leaving the house."
Then a voice came through the hallway.
"Claire."
Every muscle in my body froze.
Martin Shaw stepped into the doorway.
He looked exactly as he always had.
Silver hair.
Tailored navy suit.
Wire-framed glasses.
He could have been arriving for a quarterly board meeting.
Except he held a gun.
David moved in front of me.
Martin sighed.
"Please don't make this theatrical."
"Put the weapon down," David said.
"Where's the card?"
Nobody answered.
Martin looked at me.
"I warned you."
"You wrote that note?"
"Obviously."
"Why leave evidence?"
"Because I hoped you'd understand."
"Understand what? That you had my husband try to murder me?"
His expression hardened.
"Adrian was supposed to be competent."
I actually laughed.
Martin seemed offended.
"My father trusted you."
That landed.
For the first time, emotion entered his face.
"Your father trusted nobody."
"He trusted you."
"He used me."
"By paying you millions?"
"By expecting loyalty forever."
His voice rose.
"I built that company with him."
There it was.
Another man convinced my father's success belonged partly to him.
Martin stepped closer.
"When Beaumont Maritime almost collapsed in 2009, who renegotiated the debt?"
"You."
"When the Singapore expansion failed?"
"You fixed it."
"When regulators came after us?"
"You handled it."
"And what did Thomas Beaumont get?"
I stared at him.
"Credit."
"Everything."
His hand tightened around the gun.
"And what did I get? Salary. Bonus. A watch on my twentieth anniversary."
"So this is about jealousy?"
"It is about ownership."
"You didn't own the company."
"I built it."
"My father built it."
"Your father was a salesman with instincts. I created the systems that made his instincts profitable."
Maybe some of that was true.
Companies aren't built by one person.
But Martin had confused contribution with entitlement.
"You could have left," I said.
His smile turned bitter.
"So Adrian said something similar?"
I froze.
He knew.
Of course he knew Adrian's psychology because he had cultivated it.
"That's why you chose him."
Martin smiled.
"Adrian was easy."
My stomach twisted.
"He loved you."
"Stop saying that."
"He did. That was useful."
"Useful?"
"People who hate you are unpredictable. People who love you but resent you can be guided."
The sentence made me feel physically ill.
"You poisoned my marriage."
"No."
Martin shook his head.
"I merely discovered the poison was already there."
David slowly shifted position.
Martin noticed.
"Don't."
The gun moved toward him.
I stepped sideways.
"Martin."
His eyes returned to me.
"Do you want the card or not?"
"Yes."
"It's here."
I raised the envelope.
His gaze locked onto it.
"Give it to me."
"Why?"
"Because without that recording, prosecutors have financial crimes and the word of desperate accomplices."
"You're still going to prison."
"Perhaps."
He sounded calm.
"But how long matters."
I looked at the man who had attended nearly every birthday party of my childhood.
"Did you kill my father?"
The question came out before I could stop it.
Martin stared at me.
David turned.
Silence filled the room.
Then Martin smiled.
"No."
I couldn't tell whether I believed him.
"His heart killed him."
"Did you help?"
"No."
He sounded almost offended.
"I loved Thomas."
I laughed bitterly.
"You have a strange definition of love."
"So does your husband."
Fair.
Martin extended his hand.
"The card."
I held it out.
David whispered, "Claire."
Trust me.
I stepped closer.
Martin's eyes followed the envelope.
Three feet.
Two.
Then I dropped it.
His gaze instinctively fell.
I lunged sideways.
David hit his arm.
The gun discharged.
A deafening blast filled the office.
Wood exploded from the desk.
Martin staggered.
I kicked the gun.
It slid beneath a chair.
He struck David across the face and came toward me.
I grabbed the nearest object.
My father's heavy bronze sailing trophy.
Martin stopped.
"Claire."
"Don't."
"You won't hit me."
I raised it.
"Try me."
Footsteps thundered upstairs.
Martin looked toward the hallway.
Police.
His face changed.
For the first time, the man who had controlled every variable realized there were no variables left.
He ran toward the balcony doors.
Locked.
He spun.
Officers entered with weapons drawn.
"Hands!"
Martin raised both hands.
His shoulders sank.
Detective Harris cuffed him.
As they walked him past me, Martin stopped.
"You think you've won?"
I stared at him.
"This isn't a board meeting."
He smiled coldly.
"The company will eat you alive."
"Maybe."
He leaned closer.
"You're not your father."
For years, that sentence would have hurt.
Instead I smiled.
"I know."
Martin frowned.
"That might be why I survive you."
They took him away.
Power returned ten minutes later.
The recording on the memory card was devastating.
Martin discussed my trust structures.
My scheduled takeover of Beaumont Maritime.
Adrian's access.
The medication.
The yacht route.
He never directly said, "Kill Claire."
People like Martin rarely did.
Instead he said things like:
"The problem needs to become permanent."
And:
"An accident at sea creates fewer administrative complications."
And finally:
"Once she's gone, the voting trust activates."
Combined with Vanessa's testimony, Mercer's records, Adrian's messages, the forged authorizations, and yacht recordings, prosecutors had what they needed.
Four weeks later, the indictments expanded.
Conspiracy.
Attempted murder.
Fraud.
Forgery.
Wire fraud.
Kidnapping-related charges.
Financial crimes.
Obstruction.
The legal process would take time.
Years, perhaps.
But the danger was over.
At least, I thought it was.
Then Adrian's attorney contacted David.
"He wants a deal," David told me.
"What kind?"
"Full cooperation against Martin and Mercer."
"In exchange for?"
"A reduced sentence."
I stared through the window of my office.
"What does he have left to offer?"
David hesitated.
"He claims there's another person involved."
I closed my eyes.
Of course there was.
"Who?"
"He won't tell prosecutors until negotiations begin."
"Then let him sit in jail."
"Claire, he says the person is still inside Beaumont Maritime."
That got my attention.
"Who?"
"He gave one clue."
I turned.
"What clue?"
David looked at me.
"He says it's someone who knew your father even longer than Martin did."
I felt cold.
There were very few people who fit that description.
Then my office door opened.
My father's former personal assistant, Eleanor Price, entered carrying coffee.
She had worked for him for twenty-eight years.
Longer than Martin.
She smiled warmly.
"Thought you might need this."
I stared at her.
May you like
And for the first time in my life...
I wondered whether the woman who had practically helped raise me was another person I couldn't trust.
