Chapter 3 - THE PROPERTY I NEVER SOLDThe old Prescott Textile Mill had been empty for nearly eight years.
My father bought it in 1979.
Back then, it employed four hundred people and smelled like cotton dust, machine oil, and burnt coffee.
By the time I inherited the company, manufacturing had moved elsewhere.
I kept the building because my father had loved it.
Sentimentality is expensive in business.
That night, it nearly cost my daughter her life.
Police surrounded the property.
Detective Alvarez refused to let me approach.
“If Rebecca is inside, your presence could escalate things.”
“My daughter is inside.”
“Which is exactly why you need to let us do this correctly.”
I hated her for being right.
For twenty-three minutes, I stood behind a police SUV staring at the dark windows.
Walter arrived with Leo, though I had told him not to.
“I wasn’t leaving you alone,” he said.
Leo was asleep in his arms.
I touched the boy’s hair.
He had done more to save his mother than every adult around him.
The tactical team entered through the loading dock.
Five minutes.
Ten.
Then a radio crackled.
“One victim located.”
My knees weakened.
“Status?”
Alvarez listened.
“Female. Conscious.”
I closed my eyes.
Rebecca.
They brought her out on a stretcher.
I ran despite Alvarez shouting after me.
My daughter’s wrists were bruised.
There was a bandage over her eyebrow.
But she was alive.
“Dad.”
I took her hand.
“I’m here.”
Her eyes filled.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I should’ve told you sooner.”
“No.”
“I tried.”
“I know.”
“No, Dad. You don’t understand.”
Her fingers tightened.
“This is bigger than Florence.”
An ambulance transported her to St. Catherine’s Hospital.
Police found no one else inside the mill.
Adrian had apparently left shortly before Rebecca made the call.
She had escaped a locked office after finding an old maintenance tool in a cabinet.
The call had been made from a discarded emergency phone.
Rebecca’s first question at the hospital was about Leo.
I brought him in.
He woke when he heard her voice.
“Mommy!”
The way he climbed onto that hospital bed broke something in me.
Rebecca wrapped both arms around him despite the IV taped to her hand.
“You did it,” she whispered.
Leo buried his face against her.
“I gave Grandpa the little thing.”
“I know.”
“You said he would fix it.”
Rebecca looked at me.
For years, I had been the strongest person in my daughter’s world.
That night, I had never felt smaller.
After Leo fell asleep beside her, Rebecca told us everything.
It had started five months earlier.
She was helping me organize documents for the Prescott Family Foundation.
My longtime accountant, Martin Cole, had suffered a stroke, and temporary consultants were reviewing corporate records.
Rebecca noticed a property transfer.
The textile mill had been moved from Prescott Development into a shell corporation called Hawthorne Asset Holdings.
The signature on the authorization looked like mine.
It wasn’t.
She checked another record.
Then another.
Six properties.
Two investment accounts.
A line of credit.
Nearly $8.7 million in assets and loans had been redirected.
All connected to companies controlled indirectly by Adrian Fairmont.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried.”
“When?”
“Your birthday dinner.”
I remembered.
Rebecca had pulled me aside.
“Dad, I need to talk to you about Adrian.”
Florence had interrupted us.
She claimed she was feeling faint.
I spent the rest of the evening taking care of her.
Rebecca tried again later.
I dismissed her concern as family tension.
“You told me I was looking for reasons not to like Florence,” she said softly.
Shame burned through me.
“I said that?”
“Yes.”
I remembered every word now.
I had accused my own daughter of being unable to accept that I was moving on after her mother’s death.
Rebecca had left my house crying.
“I’m sorry.”
She looked at me.
“I know.”
Two words.
No punishment.
No lecture.
That somehow hurt more.
Rebecca continued.
She had quietly hired a forensic accountant.
The deeper they looked, the worse it became.
Florence and Adrian weren’t working alone.
Someone inside Prescott Development had been approving transfers.
Someone with executive access.
“And the wedding?” I asked.
Rebecca hesitated.
“That’s why they were desperate for it to happen today.”
She explained.
Three weeks earlier, I had signed documents creating a new marital trust.
My lawyers had recommended it because of the age difference between Florence and me.
I had assumed it protected both of us.
But the final documents had been altered.
A substituted page gave Florence immediate financial authority over certain holding companies once we were legally married.
I stared at Rebecca.
“That’s impossible.”
“I have the original and the altered version.”
“My attorney reviewed everything.”
“Which attorney?”
“Charles Mercer.”
Rebecca’s face changed.
“Dad.”
“What?”
“Mercer’s name is in the files.”
I felt sick.
Charles Mercer had been my attorney for twenty-one years.
He had attended Marianne’s funeral.
He had helped Rebecca through her divorce.
He was practically family.
Rebecca opened a folder on the USB.
Payments.
Hawthorne Consulting to a Caribbean company.
That company to Mercer Legal Advisory.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Walter cursed under his breath.
I said nothing.
Betrayal has stages.
First disbelief.
Then anger.
Then embarrassment.
Because every lie becomes obvious after you know it was a lie.
Florence encouraging me to modernize my estate plan.
Adrian offering investment help.
Mercer telling me the marriage required “streamlining certain structures.”
All of them working together.
Rebecca reached for my hand.
“There’s more.”
“Of course there is.”
“The money wasn’t the final goal.”
“What was?”
She looked toward Leo.
“Your voting shares.”
Prescott Development was private.
I owned 54 percent.
A controlling interest.
Rebecca would inherit most of it.
If something happened to me after the wedding, Florence could challenge the inheritance through the altered trust.
But there was another problem.
Rebecca.
My daughter stood between Florence and full control.
“So they needed you discredited,” I said.
“Or gone.”
The room became silent.
I looked at the bruises on her wrists.
“Did Florence do this?”
Rebecca hesitated.
“Adrian tied me up.”
“And Florence?”
“She hit me.”
My jaw tightened.
Rebecca touched my arm.
“Dad.”
“I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not.”
“No. I’m not.”
For the first time in my life, I understood how a man could become dangerous without raising his voice.
I wanted Florence to suffer.
I wanted Adrian frightened.
I wanted Charles Mercer to lose everything.
Then Leo shifted in his sleep.
And I remembered what mattered.
Not revenge.
Protection.
I called Alvarez.
She returned to the hospital.
We handed over the financial records.
She listened as Rebecca described the abduction.
When she finished, Alvarez said something none of us expected.
“We found Florence.”
“Where?”
“At the hotel.”
I stared at her.
“She came back?”
“She never actually left.”
“Why?”
Alvarez’s expression was grim.
“Because she claims she’s the victim.”
I almost laughed.
“She kidnapped my daughter.”
“She says Adrian did.”
“She was on video.”
“She admits being at Rebecca’s house. She claims Adrian forced her to participate.”
Rebecca sat forward.
“That’s a lie.”
“I believe you.”
“Then arrest her.”
“We have.”
Relief lasted perhaps three seconds.
Then Alvarez added:
“But Florence made a deal offer before we even finished booking her.”
“What deal?”
“She says she can give us the person running the entire operation.”
I frowned.
“Adrian?”
“No.”
Alvarez placed a photograph on the table.
The man in it was entering my company headquarters.
I recognized him.
Of course I recognized him.
He had worked beside me for twenty-six years.
He was president of Prescott Development.
My closest business partner.
Nathaniel Price.
Alvarez said:
“Florence claims Nathaniel recruited her.”
And before I could answer, my phone buzzed.
A news alert appeared.
PRESCOTT DEVELOPMENT CEO LINKED TO MULTIMILLION-DOLLAR FRAUD INVESTIGATION.
Someone had leaked the story.
Our stock wasn’t publicly traded.
But our banks, partners, lenders, and employees would all see it.
Then another message arrived.
May you like
From Nathaniel.
We need to talk before Rebecca gets you killed.
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