Chapter 7: The Woman Who Knew Too Much
Mr.
Hargrove called back within four minutes.
"Do not respond to that message," he said.
"Not a word.
Not a question mark."
"I wasn't going to."
"I mean it, Elena.
Anything you send becomes a communication they can use to claim you engaged with their demands."
"Who is it?" I asked.
A brief pause.
"The number is registered to a woman named Cassandra Poole.
She's a journalist — freelance, mostly tabloid adjacents.
She has a history of approaching parties in high-net-worth divorces and offering to either bury or publish depending on who pays first."
"She's not a journalist," I said.
"She's a blackmailer with a press credential."
"Essentially, yes.
Marcus has almost certainly been in contact with her.
Whether he approached her or she approached him, I can't say yet."
I looked at the text again on my screen.
*What your father really did with that company.*
"What does she think she knows about my father?" I asked.
"I don't know.
It may be nothing — a bluff designed to make you panic and respond.
Or Marcus may have told her something he believes is damaging.
Something he misunderstood, or something he's chosen to frame in the worst possible light."
"My father built that company cleanly," I said.
"I reviewed every filing for six years.
There is nothing."
"I believe you," Mr.
Hargrove said.
"But belief doesn't stop a story from being written.
It only helps us respond to one."
I stood up from the desk.
Eleanor had woken and was making small sounds from the bassinet.
I went to her, lifted her, held her against my shoulder.
"What do I do?" I asked.
"You let me handle Ms.
Poole.
I'll have a letter sent today — legal, firm, and specific about what constitutes harassment and what constitutes defamation.
That usually ends it."
"And if it doesn't?"
"Then we find out what she actually has," he said.
"And we deal with it from a position of complete preparation rather than reaction."
I patted Eleanor's back gently.
"There's something else," I said.
"The text says *about the baby.* What could Marcus have told her about Eleanor?"
The silence on the line was a fraction too long.
"Mr.
Hargrove."
"Marcus may be attempting to raise a question about the trust amendment," he said carefully.
"The one you filed four months ago, naming Eleanor as co-beneficiary.
He may be suggesting — to Ms.
Poole or to anyone who will listen — that the amendment was made under duress, or that the pregnancy was used as a mechanism to alter the trust in a way that disadvantaged him."
"That's absurd."
"It's absurd and it's also the kind of thing that sounds plausible in a headline," he said.
"Which is why we need to move quickly."
I sat down on the edge of the sofa, Eleanor against my chest, and looked at the room around me.
The room Marcus had stood in three hours ago, laughing at me.
"He's not going to let this go quietly," I said.
"No," Mr.
Hargrove said.
"I don't believe he is."
"Then we don't let him make the noise alone." I took a breath.
"I want to call the Singapore director myself.
Today.
I want every key relationship in that company to hear my voice before Marcus gets to them."
"That's exactly right."
"And I want to know everything Marcus told Cassandra Poole.
Everything.
Can you find that out?"
"I can try."
"Try hard," I said.
"Because whatever story she thinks she has — I want to be the one who already knows the ending."
I ended the call and sat quietly for a moment.
Then Eleanor grabbed a fistful of my shirt and held on, the way newborns do — not knowing what they're holding, only knowing they don't want to let go.
"Neither do I," I told her.
My phone buzzed again.
Same unknown number.
May you like
This time it wasn't a text.
It was a photograph.
