Chapter 7 - THE WOMAN IN THE RED DRESS

Emily requested a meeting.

Our attorneys attended.

She looked nothing like the woman laughing beside me in the hotel hallway.

Her face was pale.

Her hands shook around a paper cup.

“I did not forge Clara’s signature.”

I said nothing.

Her attorney placed several messages on the table.

Thomas Greer had asked Emily for copies of Clara’s identification.

He claimed the documents were needed for a joint investment account.

Emily retrieved them from a file I kept on my office computer.

“You gave him my wife’s passport?”

“You told me to help Thomas with anything.”

“I did not tell you to send private identification.”

“You gave me access.”

The answer was accurate.

Access without limits becomes permission in the mind of someone who benefits from it.

Emily continued.

“Thomas opened the credit line.”

“He also moved money through an investment fund.”

“How much?”

“Nearly one million.”

I stared at her.

“Our accounts did not have one million dollars.”

“Client funds did.”

The room became silent.

Emily explained that Thomas created a private investment vehicle called North Coast Development.

Several firm clients participated.

I had introduced two of them after Thomas promised strong returns.

I received a referral bonus.

I never reviewed the underlying assets.

North Coast barely existed.

New investor money paid earlier returns.

Thomas used firm relationships to build the scheme.

Emily processed communications.

My name reassured clients.

The affair made me useful.

Thomas paid hotel expenses and gifts through the fund.

Then he categorized them as partner-development costs.

The eighty-seven thousand dollars was only the visible portion.

He used my secrecy as leverage.

If I questioned the charges, he could expose Emily.

If Emily questioned him, he could expose me to Clara and the firm.

“Why are you telling me now?” I asked.

Emily’s eyes hardened.

“Because Thomas disappeared.”

“He emptied my account.”

“What account?”

“The one you said would become our future.”

I had helped Emily open a private account.

I transferred money into it.

She added her own savings.

Thomas managed the investments.

The account was empty.

Emily had not come to protect Clara.

She came because betrayal had finally reached her.

I looked at her attorney.

“Is she cooperating with investigators?”

“Yes.”

“Will she admit everything?”

Emily answered.

“Everything I can prove.”

“And what you cannot prove?”

She looked at me.

“I will tell the truth.”

I almost laughed.

The two of us had used that phrase carelessly for months.

Soon.

After the next trip.

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When the timing is right.

Now the truth had become something we offered because lies were no longer profitable.