Chapter 7 - THE FILE BRENDA SHOULD NEVER HAVE SEEN
By evening, we knew Brenda’s interest in the Whitmore family had begun long before Andrew met her.
A private investigator found a photograph from a charity gala eighteen months earlier.
Brenda stood beside Malcolm Pierce.
Andrew was across the room.
They were not speaking.
Brenda was looking at him.
Two weeks later, she joined the same private tennis club Andrew used.
A month after that, they met.
Andrew had always described their affair as accidental.
A connection.
A moment of weakness.
It was beginning to look more like recruitment.
At seven that night, Victor brought me another discovery.
Someone had accessed archived Whitmore debt files from the company’s document system nine months earlier.
The login belonged to Daniel Corbin.
Andrew’s former chief financial officer.
Daniel had resigned six weeks after the access.
“Where is he now?”
“Colorado.”
“Why did he resign?”
“Officially, family reasons.”
“And unofficially?”
Victor slid a printed email toward me.
Daniel had sent Andrew a warning.
I cannot support the proposed outside transfer structure.
The beneficial-party disclosure is incomplete.
If you proceed, I will have to notify the board.
Andrew had responded with one sentence.
Your resignation is accepted.
I stared at the email.
“He fired him.”
“Yes.”
“Then buried the reason.”
“Yes.”
“Get Daniel on the phone.”
Victor already had.
The former CFO appeared on a secure video call forty minutes later.
He looked tired.
He also looked frightened.
“Mrs. Escalante.”
“Thank you for speaking with us.”
“I should have called you months ago.”
“Why didn’t you?”
He looked down.
“Andrew told me your marriage was ending.”
I did not react.
“He said you had abandoned involvement in the company.”
“That was false.”
“I know that now.”
“What transfer were you refusing to approve?”
Daniel inhaled.
“A licensing arrangement with a North Vale affiliate.”
My pulse slowed.
“How much?”
“Potentially the entire robotics patent portfolio.”
Victor leaned forward.
“For what consideration?”
“Seventeen million dollars.”
I stared at him.
The patents were worth at least two hundred million.
“Why would Andrew do that?”
Daniel hesitated.
“He believed North Vale would make him chief executive after a merger.”
Of course.
Andrew had not merely been selling assets.
He had been buying himself a throne inside a larger company.
With my company’s technology.
My capital.
My risk.
Daniel continued.
“I warned him the preferred shareholders would never approve it.”
“What did he say?”
“He said the preferred shareholder problem would be gone soon.”
Silence filled the room.
“When was that?”
“About seven months ago.”
Long before the necklace accusation.
Long before last night.
They had been planning my removal for months.
I asked the most important question.
“Did he say how?”
Daniel looked into the camera.
“No.”
Then he paused.
“But Brenda did.”
My blood went cold.
“You spoke to Brenda?”
“She came to the office once after hours.”
“What did she say?”
Daniel’s voice dropped.
“She said a wife cannot block a deal if she no longer has standing to interfere.”
Victor and I exchanged a look.
“What does that mean?”
“I asked her.”
“And?”
May you like
Daniel leaned closer to the camera.
“She smiled and said, ‘By the time we’re finished, no one will trust Mariana with anything.’”
