Chapter 11
I carried the resignation notice out of headquarters folded inside my board folder, as if the board’s demand might hurt less if I couldn’t see it.
Marisol was waiting on the sidewalk beneath the building’s glass awning. Wind pushed cold air between the towers and lifted the corners of the papers in her hand.
“You’re not going back in?” I asked.
“I’ve already been told not to.” Her mouth tightened. “Apparently the review is independent until someone asks it to look at the wrong thing.”
“Then help me preserve the right things.”
Her gaze dropped to my folder. “The original transaction records?”
“Every version. The filing trail, the approval history, the source documents. Not another partial index that someone can call a misunderstanding.”
“I can request a hold through the board’s reviewer and the records custodian,” she said. “But before I do, you need to know what I heard from two directors.”
I waited.
“They’re frightened of being sued from both sides. They’ll support an independent review. They will not support you based on your account, or Chloe’s recording, alone.”
I thought of the word alone on the resignation notice. It seemed to have followed me out of the building.
“So what would they support?”
“Something the company doesn’t control. A record from an outside source.”
Marisol looked at my face, searching for the blow she expected me to take.
I felt it. I just didn’t let it choose what I did next.
“Then we find one.”
A car door shut behind us. Dana hurried across the sidewalk, clutching a padded envelope against her coat. She looked tired, but not uncertain.
“I have it,” she said. “The backup.”
Marisol’s eyes sharpened. “From the security vendor?”
Dana nodded and opened the envelope. Inside was a printed access report, each page stamped with the vendor’s retrieval time. The entry for 8:47 p.m. matched the archive alert I had saved. Beside the credential assigned to me was the identifier for a terminal in Julian’s office.
I read the line once. Then again.
“So his terminal used my credentials,” I said.
“That’s what the vendor’s backup shows,” Dana said. “It doesn’t show who was sitting there.”
The distinction mattered. I would not turn a location into a person just because I needed the person to be Julian.
But it was independent. It was outside the company system Grant controlled, outside the folders that vanished when I turned my back.
Marisol took a careful photograph of each stamped page. “I’ll send this directly to the reviewer and the directors. They can decide what it proves.”
“Send the original too.”
“I will.”
My phone rang from an unfamiliar number.
I answered. “Claire.”
A breath caught on the other end, thin and ragged.
“Chloe?” I asked.
“I’m using someone else’s phone.”
Her voice broke on the last word. A gust of wind tore at my coat; I turned my back to it, trying to hear her clearly.
“He took mine,” she said. “Julian took my phone. He told me to leave town before the board meets.”
Dana’s expression changed. Marisol lowered the pages.
“Where are you?” I asked.
“I don’t know if I can tell you.”
“Then don’t. Not on this call.”
A silence opened between us, full of everything she had done and everything Julian could do next.
“I’m sorry,” Chloe whispered. “I know you don’t have a reason to believe me.”
“You’re right. I don’t.”
She made a small, wounded sound.
“But I believe you’re scared,” I said. “That doesn’t erase what you did. You helped him remove footage. You let people think I was lying. You helped build the story he’s using to push me out.”
“I know.”
“No. You know the words. I need you to understand that if you tell the board what happened, you tell all of it. Not just the parts that make Julian look guilty.”
“I will.”
“And I won’t promise to protect you from the consequences.”
“I understand.”
I looked through the glass doors at the bright lobby. People moved beneath the lights, going about their morning as though a company could not be shaken apart by the people at its center.
“But I won’t help him silence you,” I said. “If you’re in immediate danger, I’ll help you get somewhere safe.”
Her breathing steadied, then faltered again.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Send me a place when you’re ready. Keep the original recording somewhere he can’t reach. And don’t go with anyone just because they say I sent them.”
“Okay.”
The call ended.
Dana touched my sleeve. “You could have told her to call the police.”
“I could have told her a lot of things from here.” My throat felt tight. “I don’t know what she’ll do. I know what I won’t do.”
Marisol slid the report back into its envelope. “And the board?”
“They can have the vendor record. They can have the resignation notice. I’m not resigning because Julian wrote a story and put my signature on it.”
For a moment, none of us spoke. Then Marisol turned toward the entrance, already dialing the records custodian. Dana stayed beside me, watching the street.
My phone buzzed.
A location pin appeared in the thread with Chloe’s number.
May you like
I opened it. Before I could say anything, another message came through.
Julian is coming back.
