Chapter 7: The Accounting
Thomas arrived at two in the afternoon with a colleague named Patricia Shen, who handled financial fraud and had a manner so calm and precise it made Jennifer visibly uncomfortable the moment they shook hands.
I had asked Margaret, Jennifer, and Michael to be present.
I had not told them why.
We gathered in the dining room.
The champagne flutes were still on the sideboard.
Nobody had moved them.
Thomas set his briefcase on the table.
Patricia opened a laptop.
I placed Robert's envelope in front of me but didn't open it yet.
"Thank you all for being here," Thomas said pleasantly.
"We have some questions about the management of Daniel's accounts during his time overseas."
Jennifer looked at me.
"You brought lawyers into our family home."
"You put a shell company in my name," I said.
"We're past family."
Michael, who had been quiet since the night before, shifted in his chair.
He hadn't looked directly at me since I'd sat down.
"Michael," I said.
"Do you want to tell me about the transfers to your personal account before Thomas does?"
Michael's head came up.
"I didn't—" He stopped.
Looked at Jennifer.
"I only took what Jennifer said was my share of the management fee."
"Your share," I said.
"She said you knew.
She said you'd set it up before you left as a thank-you arrangement for the family helping out." His voice had lost its shape.
"She showed me a message.
Said it was from you."
Patricia looked up from her laptop.
"What message?"
"An email." Michael pulled out his phone with unsteady hands.
He found it and slid it across the table.
Patricia read it.
Turned the phone toward Thomas.
Thomas read it.
"Daniel," Thomas said, "did you send this email?"
I looked at it.
The address was close to mine — one letter different, a zero where there should have been an O.
The kind of thing you miss if you're not looking.
"No," I said.
Michael sat back in his chair.
The blood had left his face.
"She told me it was you," he said.
Not to me.
To the table.
Jennifer's posture hadn't changed.
She sat straight, hands folded, watching the room with the expression of someone calculating distances.
"Jennifer," Patricia said, "can you tell me who created the email account used to send this message?"
"I have no idea what account you're referring to."
"The account was created from an IP address registered to this property," Patricia said.
"Fourteen months ago.
The same week Creston Advisory Group purchased a condominium in Austin."
The room was quiet.
"I'd like to speak with my own attorney," Jennifer said.
"You're welcome to call them," Thomas said.
"We'll wait."
Jennifer didn't reach for her phone.
Margaret had not spoken since Thomas and Patricia arrived.
She sat at the end of the table with her hands in her lap and her eyes on the surface of the table in front of her.
She looked older than she had last night.
The jewelry was gone.
She was wearing a plain cardigan.
"Margaret," I said.
She looked up.
"Why?" I asked.
Just that.
One word.
She looked at me for a long moment.
Something moved across her face — not guilt exactly, but something adjacent to it.
Something that had been waiting a long time to be seen.
"You left," she said.
"You built your life somewhere else.
The money kept coming and coming and you never came home, and I thought—" She stopped.
"I thought if enough of it stayed here, you would have a reason to come back."
The table was silent.
"That doesn't make sense," I said.
"No," she said quietly.
"I know."
I opened the envelope and placed Robert's documents on the table in front of Patricia.
Jennifer looked at the papers.
For the first time since she had sat down, her composure cracked — just at the edges, just for a second.
"Where did you get those?" she said.
I didn't answer.
She looked around the table.
At Thomas.
At Patricia.
At Michael, who was staring at the wall.
Then she looked at me, and for the first time I saw something real in her expression.
Not fear.
Not calculation.
Anger.
Pure and direct.
"You have no idea what I did to keep this family together while you were gone," she said.
"You kept the money together," I said.
May you like
"That's not the same thing."
Patricia was already typing.
