Chapter 6: What Eunice Offered
Gerald Foss was standing in the corridor outside the business center with his briefcase open on a small side table and three documents spread across it when we found them.
Eunice had her back to us.
She didn't hear us come around the corner.
"Destroy the copies," she was saying.
"All of them.
The filing can be withdrawn — a clerical error, Gerald, people make them —"
"Eunice —"
"I will make this worth your while.
You know I can." Her voice dropped.
"You have always known I can."
Gerald saw us first.
His expression did something complicated.
Eunice turned.
She looked at Drake.
Then at me.
Then at the USB drive still in Drake's hand.
"Whatever she's told you —" she began.
"Stop." Drake's voice was quiet.
Final.
"I'm going to say this once.
You are going to step away from Gerald, and you are going to go sit at your table in that ballroom, and you are going to behave like a human being for the next three hours.
And on Monday, you are going to answer every question my lawyer asks you."
Eunice's eyes moved to the drive again.
"That is company property.
Whatever is on that —"
"It's a copy of my own analysis," I said.
"Of my own work.
Done on my own time, on my own equipment."
"You signed a confidentiality agreement —"
"I signed an NDA as Drake's fiancée attending a board meeting.
Not as an employee.
Not as an officer of the company." I had checked this three times with my lawyer.
"It doesn't cover independent forensic analysis conducted outside company premises."
Eunice's jaw tightened.
"The probate court," Drake said, "already has a flag on Dad's signature.
You knew that and you didn't tell me.
Gerald knew that and he didn't tell me." He looked at Gerald.
"That's a problem for you, Gerald.
Professionally."
Gerald closed his briefcase.
He didn't say anything.
"The eleven million," Drake continued.
"The Cayman routing.
Warren Pryce's authorization codes." He took one step closer to his mother.
"I want to understand something.
Did you think I would never find out?
Or did you think it wouldn't matter by the time I did?"
Eunice said nothing.
"Because if the amended trust had gone through — if Giselle had run this morning and I had signed those papers — you would have had sole authority over the trust.
Over Dad's estate.
Over the company." His voice stayed level.
"And I would have had nothing.
And Dad would have had no one to protect him."
"I was protecting this family."
"From what?"
"From her." Eunice's composure finally broke — not into tears, but into something harder.
"From exactly this.
A woman who walked into our lives with nothing and spent six months building a case against us.
You think that's love?
You think that's a wife?
She's been collecting evidence since the day she met us."
"She found fraud," Drake said.
"That's not a conspiracy.
That's her doing her job."
"Her job was to trap you —"
"Her job was to follow the numbers." He stepped back.
"And the numbers led to you."
Eunice looked at me then.
Really looked at me — not the calculating look from the chapel, not the composed hostess expression from a hundred dinner parties.
Something rawer than that.
"You have no idea," she said quietly, "what I built.
What I protected.
For thirty years.
While Harold traveled and delegated and took the credit.
I ran that company.
I kept it alive.
And when he had his stroke and couldn't remember my name half the time —" her voice caught, just slightly — "I did what I had to do."
The corridor was very still.
"I'm sorry about your father," I said.
And I meant it.
"I'm sorry that happened to your family.
But moving eleven million dollars into accounts he couldn't monitor isn't protection.
It's theft."
Eunice's face closed again.
Just like that.
The raw moment sealed over.
"Get a very good lawyer," she said.
To both of us.
"You're going to need one."
She picked up her handbag from the side table, straightened her jacket, and walked toward the ballroom.
Drake watched her go.
Then he looked at Gerald.
"Monday," he said.
"My office.
Nine a.m.
Bring everything."
Gerald nodded once.
He looked like a man who had just understood the full weight of a decision he'd made months ago.
We walked back toward the ballroom.
Drake's hand found mine in the corridor.
"She's not going to stop," he said.
"No," I agreed.
"She'll try something else before Monday."
"Probably tonight."
He squeezed my hand once.
"Then we don't leave the drive unattended."
I had already thought of that.
I had already sent the files to my lawyer from the anteroom, while Drake was looking out the window.
May you like
But I didn't say that yet.
Some things were better kept until they were needed.
