Chapter Nine: Follow The Money

Grant hadn’t told me to ask who owned Hawthorne.

He’d told me to ask who paid for it.

There was a difference.

I stared at the text message until the words blurred.

Across from me, Julian was already moving. He returned to his desk, pulled his keyboard closer, and began typing.

“What are you doing?”

“Following instructions.”

“Grant’s?”

“Don’t insult me.”

Despite everything, the corner of my mouth twitched.

Julian glanced up.

“Was that a smile?”

“No.”

“It looked like one.”

“Concentrate.”

“I can do both.”

“I remember.”

The words slipped out before I could stop them.

His fingers paused over the keyboard.

So did my breathing.

For one brief, dangerous second, neither of us was standing in a law office discussing shell companies and forged signatures. We were twenty-five again, sitting too close together in a law-school library, pretending the tension between us wasn’t obvious to everyone except us.

Julian’s eyes held mine.

“I remember too.”

His voice was quieter now.

I looked away first.

“Hawthorne.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Don’t call me ma’am.”

“Noted.”

He sounded entirely too amused.

I moved around the desk so I could see his monitor.

Julian opened a series of corporate filings.

“Hawthorne Acquisition Partners was organized eighteen months ago.”

“Where?”

“Delaware.”

“Of course.”

“You say that like Delaware personally offended you.”

“Delaware knows what it did.”

He laughed under his breath.

“Registered agent?”

“Commercial service.”

“Manager?”

“Another entity.”

“Which is?”

“Wellington Strategic Holdings.”

I folded my arms.

“So Wellington owns or manages Hawthorne?”

“Controls it, at minimum.”

“And Hawthorne owns fifty-one percent of Vanessa’s company.”

“According to the documents we have.”

“Which means whoever controls Wellington effectively controls Vanessa’s company.”

“Potentially.”

I looked at him.

“Potentially?”

“I’m a lawyer. We use qualifiers when we’d like to continue owning our houses.”

“You were considerably less cautious when discussing my sweatpants last night.”

“That was a factual assessment.”

“They were comfortable.”

“They had martinis on them.”

“They were pajamas.”

“I’m aware.”

His eyes flicked down my body.

Only for a second.

It was enough.

“Julian.”

“What?”

“Stop.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“You absolutely did something.”

“I looked at you.”

“You looked at me suggestively.”

His mouth curved.

“Interesting.”

“What?”

“I wasn’t aware there was a legally recognized standard for suggestive looking.”

“There will be by the time I’m finished with you.”

The smile disappeared from his mouth.

Not because he was offended.

Because I’d heard myself too.

Oh, God.

Julian leaned back slowly.

“Careful, counselor.”

Heat climbed my neck.

“That is not what I meant.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“I’m trying very hard to behave.”

“Try harder.”

His eyes held mine.

“I am.”

That shut me up.

For approximately three seconds.

“Hawthorne.”

“Right.”

He turned back to the screen, although the smile returned.

Problem.

Absolute problem.

I forced my attention onto the corporate records.

“What do we know about Wellington?”

“Private investment entity. Formed about four years ago. Minimal public footprint. It appears to make minority investments and acquisition loans.”

“Beneficial owners?”

“Not publicly disclosed.”

“Bank?”

“We’re working on it.”

“We?”

“Monroe’s forensic team.”

I looked at him.

“How much of this investigation were you conducting before my marriage imploded?”

“Enough to know something was wrong. Not enough to know what.”

“And now?”

“Now I know someone used your identity.”

I nodded toward the screen.

“And apparently my initials on a beneficial-interest notation.”

“Yes.”

“Do you think CMW means me?”

“I think assuming it doesn’t would be irresponsible.”

I paced away from the desk.

The numbers were beginning to form a pattern, but the shape remained unclear.

Wellington funded Hawthorne.

Hawthorne controlled Vanessa’s company.

Someone used my name on Whitmore legal documents.

Someone created an email account under my identity.

Grant knew enough about Hawthorne to tell me to ask who funded it.

And Vanessa claimed she knew almost none of this.

“What aren’t we asking?” I said.

Julian looked at me.

“What?”

“We’re treating Vanessa’s company like the target.”

“Because Hawthorne owns fifty-one percent.”

“Exactly. But Vanessa says Grant introduced her to clients. Whitmore paid her almost half a million dollars. Grant asked her to modify invoices. Then someone acquired control of her company without her apparently understanding the structure.”

I turned toward him.

“What if Cole Brand Strategies isn’t the investment?”

Julian’s expression sharpened.

“What is?”

“The money moving through it.”

He went still.

I continued.

“What if someone needed a legitimate operating company? Real employees, real clients, real invoices. Something that could receive substantial payments without immediately looking suspicious.”

“You think Cole is being used as a pass-through.”

“I think I don’t know enough to think anything yet.”

Julian smiled.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“You keep doing that.”

“Doing what?”

“Looking pleased with me.”

“I am pleased with you.”

“I don’t need your approval.”

“I know.”

“Then stop.”

“No.”

I blinked.

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t need my approval. I’m still allowed to admire good work.”

“You’re incredibly annoying.”

“I’ve been told.”

“By every woman you’ve dated?”

“Mostly by one woman I didn’t.”

The room went silent.

There it was.

Nine years sitting casually between us.

I looked at him.

He didn’t look away.

“Julian.”

“We’re working.”

“You brought it up.”

“I answered a question.”

“I didn’t ask that question.”

“You’re asking a lot of wrong ones today.”

I stared at him.

Then I remembered.

“You said that before.”

“What?”

“That I was asking the wrong question.”

“Yes.”

“About Grant.”

His expression changed.

The flirtation vanished.

“What question should I have been asking?”

Julian was silent.

“Why did Grant prepare for divorce before Vanessa?”

I watched his face.

Nothing.

Too much nothing.

“You know something.”

“I know a lot of things.”

“That’s not charming right now.”

“I wasn’t trying to be charming.”

“That would be a first.”

His eyebrow lifted.

I ignored it.

“Julian, Grant started restructuring things before Vanessa became pregnant. Possibly before the affair started.”

“Yes.”

“So why?”

“We don’t know.”

“You have a theory.”

“I have several.”

“Give me one.”

“No.”

Anger flashed through me.

“You don’t get to—”

“Not because I’m protecting you.”

I stopped.

“Then why?”

“Because theories become facts in people’s heads remarkably quickly when they’re frightened and angry. I won’t put one there until I can support it.”

I hated that he was right.

I hated even more that he knew I knew it.

“Fine.”

“Thank you.”

“I didn’t say you were right.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“Your face is irritating.”

“So you’ve mentioned.”

I returned to the desk.

“Show me the money.”

“That sounded vaguely indecent.”

“Julian.”

“Working.”

He opened the wire confirmation again.

Wellington had transferred $750,000 to Hawthorne eight months earlier.

“Where did Wellington get the money?”

“That is the question.”

“Can we trace it?”

“Not completely without discovery or subpoena power. But we can trace what touched Monroe.”

He opened another file.

“Wellington maintained an investment account with a private bank that participated in one of Monroe’s syndicated facilities.”

“So Monroe has due-diligence records.”

“Some.”

“And?”

“We requested them this morning.”

“How long?”

“They just arrived.”

I looked at him.

“You were sitting on that?”

“They came in while you were threatening to report me to HR.”

“Open them.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I pointed at him.

He grinned.

Then he opened the file.

For the next twenty minutes, neither of us joked.

The records were dense: account-opening documents, source-of-funds certifications, transaction histories, entity diagrams.

I read quickly.

Julian read faster.

Then his hand stopped on the mouse.

“What?”

He didn’t answer.

“Julian.”

He enlarged a transaction.

Four years earlier, Wellington had received its initial capitalization.

Two million dollars.

The originating institution was a brokerage firm I recognized immediately.

Not because of Grant.

Because of my father.

Monroe family investments had used that firm for decades.

My pulse accelerated.

“That’s not enough.”

“No,” Julian said. “It isn’t.”

“Thousands of people use that brokerage.”

“Yes.”

We kept reading.

Six months later, another contribution.

$500,000.

Then $1.2 million.

Then another $300,000.

Different accounts.

Same brokerage.

I felt something cold moving through me.

“Can we identify the originating accounts?”

“Partially redacted.”

“Partially?”

Julian opened the underlying transfer detail.

The account number was masked.

The account title wasn’t.

I read it once.

Then again.

MONROE FAMILY IRREVOCABLE TRUST FBO CAMILLE M. MONROE

The room disappeared.

I gripped the edge of Julian’s desk.

“No.”

He didn’t speak.

“That trust was terminated.”

“When?”

“When I was twenty-eight.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

I knew that trust.

My grandfather had created it when I was a child. When I reached the distribution age, the assets had been transferred into accounts under my control.

Or so I had believed.

“Who was trustee?”

“My father originally. Then a corporate trustee.”

“Which one?”

“Bancroft Trust.”

Julian started typing.

I pulled out my phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling my father.”

Julian’s hand covered mine before I could press the number.

Everything stopped.

His palm was warm against my fingers.

My eyes moved to his hand.

Then to his face.

“Move.”

“Not yet.”

“Julian.”

“If someone moved money out of a trust for your benefit and you don’t know about it, we need documents before we alert anyone.”

“My father would never—”

“I didn’t say your father did anything.”

“You stopped me from calling him.”

“I stopped you from announcing what we found before we understand it.”

I looked at his hand again.

He removed it immediately.

No hesitation.

No lingering touch.

That somehow made me more aware of where it had been.

“Sorry,” he said.

I flexed my fingers.

“For touching me?”

“For stopping you physically instead of asking.”

The distinction hit me harder than it should have.

Grant would have explained why he was entitled to do it.

Julian apologized.

Immediately.

“It’s fine.”

“No. It was presumptuous.”

“Julian.”

“Yes?”

“You can stop being emotionally healthy for five minutes. It’s unsettling.”

He laughed.

“There she is.”

I rolled my eyes, but something inside me had softened.

Dangerous.

Very dangerous.

I returned my attention to the screen.

“If the trust funded Wellington, and Wellington funded Hawthorne, then—”

“Hawthorne may have been acquired using money beneficially connected to you.”

“And Hawthorne owns Vanessa’s company.”

“Fifty-one percent.”

I stared at the ownership chart.

My money.

Possibly.

Funding an entity that controlled my husband’s mistress’s company.

Nothing about that made sense.

Unless—

My phone rang.

Grant.

Julian looked at the screen.

“Don’t.”

“I thought you weren’t deciding things for me.”

His jaw tightened.

“Fair.”

I answered.

“What?”

Grant didn’t bother with hello.

“Did Cross find it?”

Every hair on my arms rose.

“Find what?”

A pause.

Then Grant exhaled.

“The trust.”

I looked at Julian.

His expression hardened.

“You knew.”

“Camille, listen to me.”

“No. You listen to me. Why is money from my trust connected to Hawthorne?”

“It isn’t what you think.”

“I don’t know what I think yet.”

“Good. Keep it that way until I explain.”

“Then explain.”

“Not over the phone.”

I laughed.

“Everyone suddenly wants to talk to me in person.”

“Come home.”

“You don’t live there anymore.”

Silence.

A small victory.

Petty.

I enjoyed it anyway.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll come to you.”

“No.”

“Camille.”

“Tell me now.”

Another pause.

Then Grant said something I wasn’t prepared for.

“I didn’t create Wellington.”

I looked at Julian.

“Who did?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Can’t.”

My patience snapped.

“Grant, if you tell me one more time that you can’t explain why my name, my signature, or my money appears somewhere it shouldn’t, I swear to God—”

“The money isn’t yours.”

I stopped.

“What?”

“The trust money. It isn’t yours.”

I almost laughed.

“My name is literally on the account.”

“I know.”

“Then explain.”

His voice lowered.

“Ask Evelyn.”

My stomach dropped.

“Aunt Evelyn?”

Julian straightened.

Grant continued.

“Ask your aunt why Wellington exists.”

The call ended.

I lowered the phone.

Julian was already watching me.

“What did he say?”

I looked at the trust record on his monitor.

Then at the ownership chart.

Then at the woman I’d trusted since childhood in my mind’s eye.

“Grant says Evelyn created Wellington.”

Julian didn’t respond.

And there it was again.

That fraction of a second.

Too much silence.

My eyes narrowed.

“You knew.”

“No.”

“But you’re not surprised.”

He leaned back slowly.

“Camille—”

“Why aren’t you surprised?”

Julian looked at me for a long moment.

Then he reached for the ownership chart.

“Because I’ve seen the name Wellington once before.”

“Where?”

He turned the page over.

On the reverse was a handwritten note from the Monroe Capital file.

Three words.

E. Monroe — authorized.

My aunt’s initials.

My aunt’s handwriting.

I stared at it.

Julian’s voice was quiet beside me.

“I think it’s time we talk to Evelyn.”