LOGINEli was waiting when Amara arrived, and he sat at the far end of the private conference room, a laptop open in front of him and a thick folder beside it. He looked like he hadn’t slept.“You look terrible,” Amara said.“Good morning to you too.”She dropped her handbag onto the chair.“What’s happened?”Eli turned the laptop towards her.“I found something.”Amara pulled out a chair and sat.On the screen was a series of operational reports. She recognised the layout immediately. They were AEGIS system logs, dated three years earlier.“Where did you get these?”“Backups. Some were stored outside the main company server. I managed to recover them from an old audit archive.”“Are they original?”“Copies of the original records. I’ve preserved the metadata, but they’ll still need independent forensic authentication before we use them in court.”Amara scrolled through the first report, then she stopped.A warning had been issued six hours before the warehouse disaster.She
The first thing Amara noticed when Sloane entered the room was the bruise on her wrist.It was faint, and almost hidden beneath the sleeve of her cream blouse. But Amara saw it.“Your father?”Sloane pulled her sleeve down. “Good morning to you too.”“Did he do that?”“Does it matter?”“It might.”Sloane dropped a thick brown envelope on the table.“Everything you need is inside.”But Amara didn’t touch it immediately. “You said you had records.”“I do.”“And you expect me to trust you?”“No.” Sloane pulled out the chair opposite her. “I expect you to read them.”Amara opened the envelope.There were bank statements, transaction summaries and printed emails. She flipped through the pages, as her eyes moved quickly over the figures, then she stopped.“Vantage Operations again.”Sloane nodded. “Three separate payments from Whitmore Holdings, all made before the warehouse disaster.”“How much?”“Two point four million dollars in the first transfer. Another payment follo
Sloane Whitmore stared at the figures on her laptop, as she had checked them three times.It was the same amount, dates, and recipient. Every transfer led back to an account connected to Victor Hale, and she clicked on the latest transaction.$2,400,000.The payment had been made six days before the warehouse disaster, and another transfer followed two days later. Then a third, just hours before the fire.Sloane leaned closer to the screen.Her father had always been careful with money, all of his investment was documented, every major transaction discussed with his financial advisers too. He never moved millions without a reason, so why were these payments hidden?She opened the attached records and found a company name she didn’t recognise.Vantage Operations LLC.The account had received money from Whitmore Holdings before transferring it to a subsidiary managed by Cross Meridian.Sloane reached for her phone, she had barely unlocked it when a voice came from behind her.
Amara stood outside the glass doors of Cross Meridian Group, staring at the company logo above the entrance.Three years ago, she had walked through those doors as Damian Cross’s wife and the woman whose invention had helped build his empire.Today, security had to check her name before allowing her inside.She tightened her grip around her handbag.“Ms. Quinn?”A receptionist approached her.“Mr. Cross is expecting you.”Amara followed her into the private elevator, and she watched the floor numbers climb, her mind returning to the photograph on her phone.Noah, and Victor. The warehouse, and the timestamp.11:32 p.m.The elevator opened.“His office is at the end of the corridor.”Amara didn’t thank her. She walked straight towards the double doors and pushed them open.Damian stood behind his desk, reading something on his tablet. His jacket was off, and his sleeves were rolled up.He looked up.“You’re late.”“You’re lucky I came at all.”He placed the tablet dow
Amara arrived at the restaurant twelve minutes early, and she chose a table near the window, ordered a glass of water and placed her phone beside it.The message from the previous night was still saved in her gallery.Ask your ex-husband what he did at 11:47 p.m.She had spent most of the night trying to understand it, and by morning, she had stopped wondering who sent it and started looking for someone who might know the answer.That was how she found Eli Carter, a former internal auditor at Cross Meridian. He had left the company shortly after the warehouse disaster and, according to the little information Amara could find, had never worked for another major logistics firm.At 1:12 p.m., the restaurant door opened, and a man in a dark jacket entered. He scanned the room before he walked towards her table.“Amara Quinn?”She stood.“Eli Carter?”He nodded and took the seat opposite her.“You look different from your company photograph,” he said.“You look like someone who
Amara had just stepped out of the shower when someone knocked on her hotel room door, and she glanced at the clock. It was 10:18 p.m, and another knock followed.She wrapped a towel around her hair and approached the door. Before opening it, she checked the peephole.Damian.Her fingers tightened around the handle, and the towel around her.Of all the people she expected to see tonight, he was the last.She opened the door but didn’t step aside.“What do you want?”Damian glanced at her damp hair, then met her eyes.“We need to talk.”“I’m not interested.”“Then you can listen.”Amara almost shut the door.He stopped it with his palm.“Five minutes.”She stared at him before stepping aside.“Five. And no touching anything.”Damian walked in.His eyes moved around the room, taking in the small sitting area, the laptop on the table and the documents spread beside it.“You’re staying here?”“Unless you own the hotel too.”He ignored the remark and placed a black fo







