Chapter 7: The Last Move
Nathaniel showed Marcus the message.
Marcus read it once.
Then he picked up his desk phone and called the DA's office directly.
"Forward it to Detective Reyes," he said, after a brief exchange.
"Don't respond.
Don't delete it.
They'll want to trace the number."
Nathaniel put the phone in his pocket.
"She's already in custody."
"Then someone sent it for her.
Or she had it scheduled." Marcus set down his own phone.
"Either way, it tells us something important."
"That there's someone else."
"That there's someone else who knows enough to be frightened." Marcus looked at him steadily.
"Which means we haven't found everything yet."
Nathaniel didn't tell his mother about the message.
She was tired.
She had given everything she had to the statement and the document review, and on the drive back to the penthouse she fell asleep in the passenger seat with her head against the window, her silver hair catching the late afternoon light.
He let her sleep.
Back at the penthouse, he sat at the kitchen table with his laptop and went through everything he knew about Isabella's life before she had entered his.
The two prior relationships.
The sealed settlement.
The Edinburgh brother.
He pulled every public record he could find.
Company filings.
Property registrations.
Social media going back six years.
At eleven that night, he found it.
A limited liability company registered in Delaware eighteen months ago.
Two directors.
Isabella Crane.
And a second name: Phillip Morrow.
Nathaniel sat back.
Phillip Morrow was his business partner.
Not a close friend.
Not someone he trusted with personal matters.
But someone who had sat across from him in boardrooms for four years.
Someone who knew the structure of his assets.
Someone who would have known exactly which properties were held in family names rather than corporate ones.
Someone who would have known about Vermont.
He called Marcus at eleven fifteen.
"Phillip Morrow," he said.
Silence for three seconds.
"Say that again."
"He's a co-director of a company Isabella registered eighteen months ago.
Right around the time she and I started seeing each other."
"Nathaniel." Marcus's voice was careful.
"How much does Morrow know about your financial structure?"
"Enough.
We've been partners for four years.
He knows the Vermont property exists.
He knows it's held in my mother's name."
"Then he didn't just know about the plan," Marcus said.
"He may have designed it."
The next morning, Marcus delivered the company filing to the DA's office before nine.
By noon, Detective Reyes had called Phillip Morrow in for a voluntary interview.
By two in the afternoon, Morrow's attorney had shown up, which meant the interview was no longer voluntary in any meaningful sense.
At three o'clock, Nathaniel's phone rang.
It was a number he recognized.
Phillip Morrow.
He answered.
"I had no idea what she was doing to your mother," Morrow said immediately.
"I want you to know that."
"You registered a company with her."
"It was a separate investment.
Nothing to do with your family."
"Then why is it structured to receive property transfers?"
Silence.
"Phillip." Nathaniel's voice was quiet.
"I've known you for four years.
I'm giving you one opportunity to tell me the truth before the DA does it for you."
Another silence.
Longer this time.
"She told me it was a gift," Morrow said finally.
"That your mother wanted to simplify the estate.
That you had agreed to it.
She said it was all legitimate."
"And you believed that."
"I — " A pause.
"I wanted to believe it."
"Because you stood to benefit."
No answer.
Which was its own answer.
"The DA has the company filing," Nathaniel said.
"They have the email chain.
They have the footage.
Whatever story you're planning to tell, make sure it matches what they already know."
He ended the call.
He sat for a moment in the quiet of the kitchen.
Then he walked to the guest room and knocked softly.
"Come in," Evelyn said.
She was sitting in the armchair by the window, reading.
She looked up over her glasses.
"It's done," Nathaniel said.
She studied his face.
"All of it?"
"All of it."
She set her book down.
"Sit with me for a minute."
He sat on the edge of the bed, across from her.
Outside the window, the city was doing what it always did, indifferent and continuous.
"You look like you did when you were twelve," she said.
"After you broke your father's watch.
That same expression."
"What expression?"
"Like you're trying to decide if you did the right thing."
He looked at her.
"Did I?"
"You pulled me out of that water," she said.
"You stayed and listened when you could have walked away.
You called Marcus.
You didn't sleep." She paused.
"You cleaned up the tulips."
He almost smiled.
"That's your measure of whether I did the right thing?"
"It's one of them." She picked up her book again.
"Go to sleep, Nathaniel.
You look terrible."
He stood up.
At the door, he stopped.
"She sent a message after the arrest," he said.
"From an unknown number.
It said this wasn't finished."
Evelyn turned a page.
"She was wrong," she said simply.
May you like
He stood there a moment longer.
Then he turned off the hallway light and went to bed.
