Chapter 5 - THE RELATIVE NOBODY SUSPECTEDAunt Patricia was fifty-eight years old, wore pearls to grocery stores, chaired two charity boards, and had spent most of my childhood telling everyone that family loyalty mattered more than money.
Apparently she had decided burglary was compatible with both.
Rebecca replayed the recording.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Patricia had a slight rasp on certain words from years of smoking before she quit.
I would have recognized her voice in a crowded airport.
The police took the recorder.
Then they asked when Patricia might have had access to my apartment.
She had a spare key.
Half the family did.
Or had.
Two years earlier, when I traveled frequently for work, I had given copies to my parents and Patricia for emergencies.
I never asked for them back.
That night, I changed the locks.
At 6:40 the next morning, Patricia called.
I stared at her name until voicemail picked up.
She called again.
Then texted.
I heard about the break-in. Are you okay?
Rebecca looked over my shoulder.
“That’s bold.”
“Maybe she doesn’t know about the recording.”
“Then don’t tell her.”
I replied:
I’m okay. Police are handling it.
Three dots appeared.
What did they take?
Rebecca and I looked at each other.
I typed:
Nothing important.
Patricia didn’t answer.
At ten, Detective Ruiz called.
The man on the recording could not yet be identified.
They were working on the alleged server from the wedding.
Meanwhile, the bank had responded to an emergency preservation request concerning Blue Harbor Consulting.
Ruiz couldn’t share everything.
But she could tell me one thing.
Blue Harbor had received more than our missing $480,000.
Over the previous eighteen months, nearly $2.3 million had passed through its accounts.
My family wasn’t the only victim.
I spent that afternoon rebuilding my investigation from encrypted backups.
Forensic accountants are irritating people to rob.
We make copies.
By dinner, I found something I had missed months earlier.
Blue Harbor Consulting had paid $36,000 to a company called Pritchard Event Solutions.
The payment occurred five days after the money left our trust.
Pritchard Event Solutions had dissolved the previous year.
Its former registered agent?
Patricia Mercer.
My aunt.
I leaned back from the screen.
Rebecca read the documents beside me.
“Well.”
“That isn’t proof she received the money.”
“No.”
“But it’s a bridge.”
“Yes.”
I called Ruiz.
Before the police could move, Madison appeared at my apartment.
She looked terrible.
No makeup.
Hair unwashed.
Her wedding ring was still on.
Rebecca opened the door but didn’t invite her inside.
“I need to talk to Claire.”
“Does Ethan know you’re here?”
Madison flinched.
That answered the question.
I came to the doorway.
“What happened?”
“Can I come in?”
I let her.
She sat at my kitchen island.
For almost a minute, nobody spoke.
Then Madison placed her phone on the counter.
“I asked Ethan about Blue Harbor.”
My pulse jumped.
“What did he say?”
“At first, he said he’d never heard of it.”
“At first?”
“Then I told him you said money had disappeared from the trust.”
Her voice shook.
“He became furious.”
“What kind of furious?”
“He asked what else you told me. He kept asking whether you’d shown me bank records.”
Rebecca crossed her arms.
“And?”
“I said no.”
“Was that true?”
“Yes.”
Madison looked at me.
“Then he started saying you were obsessed with destroying him.”
“What happened next?”
“He took my phone.”
I stared at her.
“He what?”
“He said I was emotional and needed sleep.”
“Did you get it back?”
“Eventually.”
“How?”
“I waited until he showered and took it.”
She swallowed.
“I left.”
“Where is he now?”
“At the hotel, I think.”
“Does he know you came here?”
“I turned off location sharing.”
Rebecca murmured, “Good.”
Madison’s eyes filled.
“There’s something else.”
Of course there was.
“There was a second phone.”
“Whose?”
“Ethan’s.”
“He already has a phone.”
“I know.”
She opened her purse.
My sister placed a black smartphone on the counter.
“I found it in his suitcase.”
Rebecca and I stared.
“Did you unlock it?”
“No.”
“Does he know you took it?”
“I don’t know.”
The phone required a six-digit code.
Madison tried Ethan’s birthday.
Their anniversary.
The last six digits of his Social Security number she remembered from mortgage paperwork.
Nothing.
We stopped before locking it permanently.
Police collected it that evening.
By then, Ethan had called Madison thirty-one times.
His messages shifted tone every few minutes.
Baby, please call me.
Then:
Your sister is manipulating you.
Then:
You’re making a serious mistake.
Then:
Come back now.
Finally:
If Claire has my property, this becomes a police matter.
Rebecca laughed at that one.
“Please. Let him call them.”
Madison didn’t laugh.
She was shaking.
I wanted to comfort her.
Part of me also wanted her to feel one percent of what I had felt standing in front of two hundred guests while she called me a liar.
Both feelings could exist.
That was the hardest part of loving somebody who had hurt you.
The police obtained a warrant for the second phone.
What they found transformed the investigation.
There were encrypted-message apps.
Photographs of bank records.
Copies of my father’s identification.
Pictures of pages from my trust notebook.
And one photograph taken inside my parents’ home office.
On the desk sat my hardware security token.
The device required for certain large transfers.
Someone had photographed it from multiple angles.
There were also conversations with a contact saved only as P.
Ruiz wouldn’t initially show us the full messages.
But she asked Madison a strange question.
“Did your aunt Patricia ever have financial problems?”
Madison and I looked at each other.
“Not that we know of.”
“What about gambling?”
“No.”
“Business debt?”
“I don’t know.”
Ruiz nodded.
Then she asked:
“When did Ethan first meet your family?”
Madison answered.
“Three years ago.”
“Where?”
“At Aunt Patricia’s Christmas party.”
I looked at my sister.
Neither of us had thought about that in years.
Ethan always said he had attended with a college friend.
Madison met him beside Patricia’s fireplace.
They exchanged numbers.
Two weeks later, he asked her to dinner.
Ruiz said quietly:
“We have reason to believe their relationship began earlier than that.”
Madison went pale.
“What relationship?”
“Ethan and your aunt.”
The room seemed to shrink.
Ruiz continued.
“Messages on the phone go back almost four years.”
“What kind of messages?”
She hesitated.
“Financial planning. Family information. Discussions about your father’s assets.”
Madison covered her mouth.
I felt sick.
Ethan hadn’t stumbled into our family and discovered an opportunity.
Someone had sent him toward us.
Toward Madison.
She whispered, “He targeted me.”
Ruiz didn’t answer.
She didn’t need to.
That evening, Patricia was brought in for questioning.
She denied everything.
Said the audio recording was misunderstood.
Said she entered my apartment because she worried I had documents belonging to my father.
Said Blue Harbor’s payment to her old company was repayment of a private loan.
When police asked about Ethan, she claimed they had barely spoken before he began dating Madison.
Then investigators showed her the messages.
Her attorney ended the interview.
Patricia went home.
But before midnight, police obtained a search warrant.
At 2:30 a.m., Ruiz called me.
They had searched Patricia’s house.
Inside a locked desk, they found documents relating to Blue Harbor.
Copies of family account statements.
A prepaid phone.
And photographs of me.
Entering my office.
Leaving the gym.
Eating lunch.
Unlocking my apartment.
Someone had been watching me for months.
But the worst discovery wasn’t in Patricia’s desk.
It was in her garage.
A green plastic storage box contained clothing.
Black pants.
White shirt.
Catering vest.
And a temporary employee badge from Bellamy Estate.
The photograph on the badge belonged to the fake waiter.
Caleb Norton.
Madison sat down hard when I told her.
“We know him.”
“What?”
She looked at me.
“I know that face.”
“From where?”
“Ethan’s bachelor party.”
My stomach turned.
“He was there?”
“He’s Ethan’s friend.”
“What’s his real name?”
Madison closed her eyes, forcing herself to remember.
“Marcus.”
Then they opened.
“Marcus Vale.”
Rebecca searched the name.
Thirty seconds later, she turned the laptop toward us.
The first result was an old business article from Boston.
Three executives investigated after investment firm collapse.
One of the names was Marcus Vale.
May you like
Another was Ethan Cole.
And beside them, listed as an outside financial consultant, was Patricia Mercer.
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