Chapter 4: The Name on the Account
They landed at Miami International just after noon.
Julian had said almost nothing for the remaining two hours of the flight.
He'd ordered a whiskey from the flight attendant and finished it in two swallows.
Chloe had kept her face turned toward the window the entire time, earbuds in, not listening to anything.
When the seatbelt sign went off, Elena stood, retrieved her carry-on, and walked off the plane without looking back.
She had a car waiting.
Her phone rang before she reached baggage claim.
She answered on the second ring.
"It's filed," said the voice on the other end.
"Petition for dissolution, emergency motion to freeze joint assets, and the fraud complaint.
All three.
Stamped and time-coded as of eleven-seventeen this morning."
"The account he moved the money into," Elena said.
"Did you find the name?"
A pause.
"That's why I'm calling."
Her lawyer's name was Patricia Hale.
She had been practicing family and financial law in Boston for twenty-two years.
Elena had chosen her specifically because she did not soften things.
"The account is registered to a company," Patricia said.
"Meridian Consulting Group LLC.
Incorporated in Delaware fourteen months ago."
"I've never heard of it."
"You wouldn't have.
It has no website, no employees on record, and no client contracts we can find.
But it does have a registered agent." Patricia paused again.
"The agent is listed as a Daniel Reeves.
Does that name mean anything to you?"
Elena stopped walking.
A man behind her nearly walked into her.
She stepped to the side.
"That's Julian's brother," she said.
"I know," Patricia said.
"I pulled the family records this morning."
Elena stood beside a concrete pillar in the arrivals hall.
Around her, people moved with luggage and noise and the ordinary business of travel.
She felt none of it.
"How much went through the company?" she asked.
"The hundred and forty thousand we already knew about.
But there are two earlier transfers we've now traced.
Sixty thousand in March of last year.
Thirty-five thousand the March before that."
"Two hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars," Elena said.
"Over twenty-six months, yes."
She closed her eyes for three seconds.
Opened them.
"Daniel knew," she said.
It was not a question.
"He signed the incorporation documents.
His signature is on the registered agent filing.
Whether he knew the source of the funds—" Patricia chose her words carefully— "is something we'll let the financial investigator determine.
But his name is on everything."
Elena had met Daniel Reeves at least forty times over twelve years.
He had been at her wedding.
He had held Maya as a newborn.
He had sat at her kitchen table and eaten her food and called her his sister.
"Elena," Patricia said.
"Are you still there?"
"Yes."
"There's one more thing."
Elena waited.
"The Miami hotel reservation — the one Julian booked for this weekend — it's not under his name."
"Whose name is it under?"
"Meridian Consulting Group," Patricia said.
"He booked a romantic weekend getaway as a business expense.
Charged to the company card."
A company funded with Elena's own money.
She looked up.
Across the arrivals hall, through the glass doors, she could see Julian emerging from the terminal with his bag.
He was scanning the area.
Looking for her, or looking for a way to reach her before she reached anyone else.
He spotted her.
He started walking toward her.
Elena put the phone to her shoulder.
"Patricia.
How quickly can we add Daniel to the filing?"
"I can have an amended petition ready by end of business today."
"Do it," Elena said.
She put the phone back to her ear.
"I'll call you in an hour."
She ended the call and turned to face her husband as he crossed the hall toward her, his expression arranged into something that was trying very hard to look like concern.
"Elena, wait.
Just wait.
I need to explain about the account—"
"Which one?" she said.
He stopped.
"The one from eleven months ago?" she said.
"Or the one from March last year?
Or the first one, from the March before that?"
Julian's bag strap slipped off his shoulder.
He caught it.
"How do you—" He stopped himself.
Started again.
"Elena, I can explain all of this.
I was protecting us.
It was a financial strategy, that's all.
If you'd just let me—"
May you like
"Does Daniel know I know?" she asked.
Julian's face answered before his mouth could.
