Chapter 4: The Name She Didn't Expect Him to Know
Daniel was on the phone for eleven minutes.
I know because I watched the clock on the microwave without meaning to, standing at the kitchen counter with a glass of water I hadn't drunk, while Madison sat at the table and said nothing.
When he came back out, his expression had changed.
"My attorney wants the full summons scanned and sent tonight," he said.
He picked up the papers and looked at Madison.
"He also wants to know if there are any other legal matters we don't know about."
"There aren't."
"Madison."
"There aren't, Daniel.
This is the only one."
He studied her for a moment.
Then he pulled out a chair and sat down across from her, which surprised me.
I had expected him to stay standing.
"My attorney's name is Frank Okafor," Daniel said.
"He's been handling my business contracts for six years.
He's going to look at this filing tonight and tell me tomorrow morning what our actual risk is." He paused.
"But before he does that, I need to understand something."
Madison waited.
"Carter Briggs," Daniel said.
"How did you meet him?"
"At a conference in Cleveland.
Last year."
"What kind of conference?"
"A small business expo.
I was there pitching the wellness brand."
"And he invested."
"He believed in what I was doing."
"He believed in you," Daniel said.
"There's a difference."
She didn't argue with that.
"How long before he transferred the money?" I asked.
She glanced at me.
"About six weeks."
"Six weeks," Daniel said.
"And the marriage conversation?"
"It came up naturally.
We were serious."
"Serious enough that he gave you forty-six thousand dollars."
"He wanted to be part of it.
He said it himself."
Daniel leaned back in his chair.
"His filing says you told him the money was going into a registered business account.
It says you sent him documentation showing the account."
"I did send him documentation."
"Frank says the account number on the documentation doesn't match any registered business entity in Illinois."
The color left Madison's face.
"That's—" She stopped.
"That's a mistake."
"Whose mistake?"
"The supplier.
He set up the account.
I just forwarded what he sent me."
"You forwarded financial documentation to a man who was about to give you forty-six thousand dollars," Daniel said, "and you didn't verify the account number yourself."
"I trusted the supplier."
"The supplier who then disappeared."
"Yes."
Daniel was quiet for a moment.
Then: "What's the supplier's name?"
She hesitated.
One beat too long.
"Madison.
The supplier's name."
"Ryan Garrett."
Something moved across Daniel's face.
Not anger.
Something more careful than that.
"Say that again," he said.
"Ryan Garrett.
He ran a distribution company out of—"
"I know who Ryan Garrett is."
The room stopped.
I looked at Daniel.
His jaw was set in a way I recognized — the way it looked when he was working through something he didn't want to say out loud yet.
"How do you know that name?" I asked him.
He didn't answer me immediately.
He kept his eyes on Madison.
"Ryan Garrett approached me two years ago," he said slowly.
"He wanted me to invest in a supplement distribution network.
I had Frank look into it.
Frank told me the company had no verifiable assets, no real supplier contracts, and a history of taking deposits and going quiet."
Madison's hands came up from her lap and pressed flat on the table again.
"I passed," Daniel said.
"I told him no and I didn't hear from him again." He leaned forward.
"Until right now."
"Daniel—"
"Did you know I'd been approached by him?"
"No."
"Did Ryan Garrett know you were my niece when he came to you?"
The pause before her answer was the longest one yet.
"I don't know," she said.
"That's not good enough."
"I genuinely don't know.
I never told him about you."
"But he knew your last name."
"Cole is a common name."
"It's also my last name," Daniel said.
"And my company is registered under Cole Consulting Group." He stood up.
"Frank is going to want to know about this connection.
I'm going to tell him tonight."
"Daniel, please don't make this bigger than it is."
He picked up the summons from the table.
"Madison," he said quietly, "I'm starting to think this is considerably bigger than any of us realized."
He went back to the bedroom.
The door closed fully this time.
I stood across from his niece in the silence he left behind.
Her phone was still on the counter.
Carter Briggs had stopped calling.
But there was a new notification on the screen.
A name I could read from where I stood.
May you like
*Ryan Garrett.*
He wasn't gone at all.
