Chapter 4 - MY MOTHER’S LAST SECRETMy father refused to explain until Maya and I were somewhere warm.
Twenty minutes later, I sat in my own kitchen wearing wool socks, holding a mug of coffee I had no intention of drinking.
Julian was gone.
Serena was gone.
The security team remained outside.
My father sat across from me with Maya asleep against his chest.
I had never seen him hold a baby.
He looked terrified of moving.
That almost made me smile.
Almost.
“What happened to Mom’s foundation?”
His gaze stayed on Maya.
“Elena—”
“Don’t.”
He looked up.
“Don’t protect me by lying.”
“I never lied.”
“You said she shut the foundation because she was sick.”
“She did.”
“That isn’t the whole story.”
No answer.
I leaned back.
“How does Julian know something I don’t?”
That question worked.
My father’s jaw tightened.
“He shouldn’t.”
“But he does.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Nathaniel handed Maya to me carefully.
Then he rose and walked toward the kitchen windows.
“Your mother discovered financial irregularities.”
My heartbeat changed.
“At the foundation?”
“Yes.”
Margaret Ward had created the Bright Harbor Foundation twenty-two years earlier to support housing programs for women leaving abusive relationships.
It was the work she loved most.
Sometimes more than my father’s company.
Possibly more than anything except me.
“She thought someone was diverting money through vendors,” Dad continued.
“How much?”
“Initially, perhaps two hundred thousand.”
“Initially?”
“When outside auditors examined the accounts, they suspected considerably more.”
“How much more?”
“Possibly seven million over several years.”
I stared at him.
Seven million.
“Who?”
“We never proved it.”
“Who did she suspect?”
He didn’t answer.
“Dad.”
“One of the financial consultants was connected to Halcyon.”
Ice crawled down my back.
“Julian?”
“No. This began before you met him.”
“Then who?”
“A man named Charles Vale.”
I knew the surname immediately.
“Serena.”
“Her father.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Serena had told me her father died when she was sixteen.
“He worked for the foundation?”
“His consulting company did.”
“And Mom suspected him of stealing?”
“She suspected several people. Charles was one.”
“What happened?”
“He died before the investigation was completed.”
“How?”
“Car accident.”
I looked toward the driveway where Serena had stood wearing my mother’s necklace less than an hour earlier.
“How did Serena end up working for Julian?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t think that’s a coincidence.”
“No.”
Neither did I.
My father returned to the table.
“Your mother’s health deteriorated rapidly during the investigation. She closed Bright Harbor because she no longer had the strength to oversee it personally.”
“And the investigation?”
“Continued privately.”
“How privately?”
“Only four people knew.”
“Were you one?”
“Yes.”
“Was Mom?”
“Of course.”
“The others?”
“Our attorney and the forensic accountant.”
“Then how did Julian know?”
“I don’t know.”
I remembered the files on Julian’s laptop.
The emails.
North Harbor Holdings.
Serena’s brother.
Kingsley.
Suddenly, what had looked like an affair tangled inside potential corporate misconduct was becoming something older.
Much older.
“What did the auditors find?”
My father hesitated.
“They found evidence that the missing foundation funds may have been routed through shell companies and eventually used to purchase commercial real estate.”
“Halcyon real estate?”
“Some of it.”
I stared.
“Did Mom know?”
“She suspected.”
“And then she died.”
My father’s eyes hardened.
“Your mother died of pancreatic cancer.”
“I wasn’t implying—”
“I know.”
But he had answered too quickly.
I noticed.
“Dad.”
“No.”
“Did you ever think her death wasn’t natural?”
His chair scraped lightly against the floor as he stood.
“She had advanced pancreatic cancer, Elena.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
He closed his eyes.
For one moment, Nathaniel Ward wasn’t a billionaire chairman.
He was an old man who still missed his wife.
“No,” he said at last. “I never had evidence suggesting anything else.”
Evidence.
Not belief.
I noticed that too.
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
I almost ignored it.
Then a message appeared.
You don’t know what Julian is capable of.
Another followed.
Neither did I.
Then a photograph.
Serena.
Her face was swollen.
Blood marked the corner of her mouth.
The timestamp said twelve minutes earlier.
I stood so quickly my chair tipped over.
My father reached for the phone.
“What happened?”
I showed him.
Another text arrived.
He found me at the hotel. Please don’t tell him where I am now.
“Call the police,” Dad said.
I did.
Within minutes, Serena was speaking to an officer from wherever she had gone after leaving the hotel.
I stayed on the line until dispatch confirmed officers were heading to her location.
Then another message arrived.
I have something Margaret Ward left my father.
My hands went cold.
I typed:
What?
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Appeared again.
Finally:
A flash drive.
My father read over my shoulder.
His face changed.
“Ask her where.”
I typed.
Serena replied:
I found it after Dad died. I didn’t understand what it was until Julian started asking questions about Bright Harbor.
Then:
He married you because of it.
I stopped breathing.
My father took the phone from my hand.
I reread the sentence over his shoulder.
He married you because of it.
“No,” I whispered.
My father looked at me.
“Elena.”
“No.”
I stood and walked away from him.
I needed space.
Air.
Anything.
Julian and I had met at a museum fundraiser six years earlier.
I had been twenty-eight.
He was charming.
Confident.
Funny.
He spilled champagne on my shoes and spent the next hour making me laugh about it.
He asked me to dinner.
He proposed fourteen months later.
Had all of that been planned?
Impossible.
But so had this morning.
My phone rang.
Serena.
I answered.
“Elena?”
Her voice trembled.
“Are you safe?”
“For now.”
“Where are you?”
“I’d rather not say.”
“That’s fine. Police are coming?”
“Yes.”
“Serena, what did you mean?”
Silence.
Then a broken inhale.
“My father kept records.”
“Of what?”
“I don’t know everything.”
“Tell me what you do know.”
“He worked with Bright Harbor through Vale Strategic Partners. Toward the end, he started drinking heavily. He told my mother he’d made a terrible mistake.”
“What mistake?”
“He said powerful people had used him.”
My father moved closer.
Serena continued.
“After his funeral, I found a safe-deposit key. Years later I opened the box. There was a flash drive and a letter.”
“What did the letter say?”
“He wrote that if anything happened to him, the drive should go to Margaret Ward.”
My father whispered, “My God.”
I gripped the phone.
“Why didn’t you give it to her?”
“I was sixteen when Dad died. Your mother died not long afterward. I didn’t know what any of it meant.”
“Then how did Julian find out?”
“I told him.”
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
The same year my father and I stopped speaking.
My stomach turned.
“Why?”
“Because we were drinking after work. Julian was talking about wanting to move higher at Halcyon. I mentioned my father had once worked with the Ward family.”
“And?”
“He became obsessed.”
“Obsessed how?”
“He started asking about the drive. The foundation. Margaret Ward’s daughter.”
My heart pounded.
“Me.”
“Yes.”
“Did he know my name then?”
“I don’t know. But about two weeks later he asked whether I had ever heard of an Elena Ward.”
I sat down slowly.
Serena started crying.
“I didn’t know you were his wife at first. He never brought you around the office.”
A horrifying memory returned.
Six months after our wedding, Julian insisted I use Cross professionally.
“You’re building your own identity,” he told me.
I thought he was encouraging me.
Maybe he simply didn’t want anyone connecting me to Ward.
“Serena,” I said, “when did you and Julian start sleeping together?”
“Eight months ago.”
“Why?”
Silence.
Then:
“Because I was stupid.”
At least she didn’t insult me with an excuse.
“Did he ever ask you for the drive?”
“All the time.”
“Did you give it to him?”
“No.”
“Does he know where it is?”
“No.”
My father held out his hand for the phone.
I put it on speaker.
“Serena,” he said.
She became silent.
“Mr. Ward?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
“We can discuss apologies later. Right now, I want you safe. Have the officers arrived?”
A knock sounded faintly through her phone.
“I think so.”
“Verify who they are before opening the door.”
“I will.”
“And Serena?”
“Yes?”
“Do not give that drive to anyone except law enforcement or one of the attorneys I personally identify to you.”
“All right.”
My father paused.
“Did Julian ever tell you why he wanted it?”
“He said it could make him rich.”
“How?”
“He said the drive contained proof of who really owned certain properties.”
Dad and I exchanged a look.
“What properties?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
Then Serena said something that changed everything.
“But yesterday he told me one of them was the Kingsley site.”
My father went completely still.
I had never heard him swear in front of me.
He did then.
“What?” I asked.
He started pacing.
“Project Kingsley is our largest redevelopment plan in fifteen years.”
“How large?”
“Nearly four billion dollars.”
My mouth went dry.
“And Julian knows where it’s going?”
“He appears to.”
The answer came from Martin, who had just entered the kitchen holding a tablet.
“Sir,” he said.
My father looked at him.
“Internal audit found something.”
Martin placed the tablet on the table.
A corporate diagram filled the screen.
At the top:
NORTH HARBOR HOLDINGS LLC
Below it, a web of subsidiaries.
One purchased warehouses.
One owned vacant industrial parcels.
Another owned a narrow strip of land bordering the proposed Kingsley development.
And beside the ownership interests were two names.
Marcus Vale.
Serena’s brother.
And another company.
JXC Capital Partners.
I stared at the initials.
J.
X.
C.
Julian Xavier Cross.
My husband had spent three years secretly acquiring property around a confidential development zone.
Using information he should never have had.
Maybe information connected to money stolen from my mother’s foundation.
My father looked at me.
“Elena, this is bigger than adultery.”
I thought of Julian’s final words.
You have no idea what I know about your family.
“No,” I said.
I picked up my phone.
“But I think my husband does.”
Then the front security camera sent an alert.
Movement at the gate.
I opened the feed.
A silver sedan was parked outside.
A man stepped out.
He wore a baseball cap and sunglasses.
He approached the intercom.
Then lifted his face toward the camera.
My father cursed again.
“You know him?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Nathaniel stared at the screen.
“The forensic accountant who investigated your mother’s foundation.”
The man pressed the buzzer.
And spoke directly into the camera.
“Elena Ward?”
I hit the audio button.
“Yes?”
His voice came through the speaker.
“My name is Peter Lang.”
My father grabbed my arm.
“Don’t open the gate.”
Peter looked over his shoulder.
Then back toward the camera.
“I need to speak with you before Julian Cross finds me.”
My father stared.
Peter continued.
“Your mother didn’t close Bright Harbor because she was sick.”
May you like
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“She closed it because she discovered someone inside Ward Consolidated had been stealing from her for nine years.”
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