Chapter 8 - Jaime Found a Name Inside the Hidden Drawer
Frank laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because sometimes accusation arrives so absurdly that the body refuses to choose the correct reaction.
“You think I broke into Rebecca’s corporate office?”
Martin shook his head.
“No.”
“You looked at me.”
“I looked past you.”
We turned.
Melissa stood behind Frank.
Her face lost color.
“What?”
Martin walked toward her.
“Were you employed by Sloan Urban Properties two years ago?”
Silence.
Frank stared.
“Melissa?”
She closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
Nobody spoke.
Frank removed his cap.
“You told me you were doing bookkeeping downtown.”
“I was.”
“For them?”
“For a catering contractor inside Sloan headquarters.”
Rebecca frowned.
“That doesn’t give executive access.”
“No.”
Melissa looked toward the floor.
“But I knew someone who had it.”
Frank sat down slowly.
“Who?”
“My brother.”
Kevin.
Frank’s nephew.
The twenty-four-percent owner.
Everything tightened.
Melissa continued.
“Kevin worked overnight facilities at Sloan for four months.”
Rebecca looked at Martin.
“When?”
“Check.”
Martin typed.
Then nodded.
“Same period.”
Frank’s face crumpled in a way anger never could have produced.
“My own family.”
Melissa stepped toward him.
“I didn’t know.”
“You knew he worked there.”
“I knew he had a maintenance job.”
“You knew he wanted me to sell.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t think to mention that he worked for the company buying us?”
“I didn’t know they were buying us then.”
Frank looked away.
Melissa’s eyes filled.
“I swear.”
Rebecca asked:
“Where is Kevin now?”
“Seattle.”
Frank laughed bitterly.
“No. He told me Denver.”
Melissa frowned.
“He moved to Seattle last spring.”
“Why did he tell me Denver?”
Nobody answered.
Then Jaime approached carrying something.
“Dad.”
I had almost forgotten the children were still there.
“What?”
“There’s a name.”
“Where?”
“In the drawer.”
Frank stood.
“You kids need to stop discovering evidence.”
Jaime handed me a folded napkin.
It was old.
Maybe twenty years.
Written in blue ink:
Kevin — You are not responsible for fixing your father. You are allowed to stay.
Frank took it.
His expression changed.
“Kevin’s father?”
I asked.
“My brother, Thomas.”
Frank had never mentioned him.
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
Melissa closed her eyes.
“Uncle Frank.”
“What?”
“That note was mine.”
Frank looked at her.
She continued.
“I wrote it when Kevin was seventeen.”
“You knew he wanted to leave?”
“He was scared.”
“Of Thomas?”
She nodded.
The story beneath the corporate fight shifted.
Kevin was not simply a greedy nephew.
He had history in the diner too.
Painful history.
Frank sat.
“My brother drank.”
Melissa said nothing.
“He was better than Dad in some ways.”
A humorless smile.
“Worse in others.”
Rebecca listened.
Frank continued.
“Kevin worked here as a teenager. Thomas expected him to take over someday.”
“Kevin hated it?”
“No.”
Melissa answered.
“He loved the diner.”
Frank looked surprised.
“He hated what it meant.”
“What?”
“Being trapped.”
The word sat heavily.
Melissa pointed at the note.
“He thought if he stayed, he would become his father.”
Frank stared at the handwriting.
For years he had interpreted Kevin’s distance as rejection.
Maybe Kevin had interpreted Maple Street as a cage.
I thought of Table Six.
Things people could not say.
Sometimes notes preserved truth.
Sometimes they preserved the moment before truth changed.
Rebecca said quietly:
“We still need to find him.”
Melissa gave Martin Kevin’s number.
He called.
Disconnected.
Email.
No response.
Rebecca checked the board message again.
“We’re running out of time.”
Martin looked at her.
“You need to prepare.”
She nodded.
Then looked at me.
“Come with me.”
“What?”
“To the board meeting.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because the newspaper already thinks I’m sleeping my way into fifteen percent of a diner.”
Frank coughed.
“Strong sentence.”
“Not helping.”
Rebecca’s lips twitched.
“I need you to testify that the agreement is forged.”
“Martin can.”
“They’ll ask whether our relationship influenced me.”
“That sounds like a question for you.”
“It is.”
“So answer.”
Her expression softened.
“I intend to.”
I understood what she meant.
My pulse did something stupid.
“Rebecca.”
“I’m not proposing in a diner.”
Frank raised a finger.
“Table Six has precedent.”
She looked at him.
“No.”
“Just providing institutional history.”
I laughed.
Rebecca did too.
Then her face became serious.
“Come.”
I looked at Jaime.
“What about him?”
“Lily will be at my house with her nanny.”
Jaime immediately said:
“I can stay with Frank.”
Frank shook his head.
“Absolutely not. Your father gets one chance to watch billionaires fight.”
I sighed.
“I’m not wearing a suit.”
Rebecca looked at my navy overshirt.
“They’ll survive.”
At five thirty, I stood in the lobby of Sloan Urban Properties.
Glass.
Stone.
Security.
Everything Maple Street was not.
Rebecca rolled beside me.
People noticed her.
Then noticed me.
Then tried not to notice either.
The elevator rose to the thirty-fourth floor.
“Still time to leave,” I said.
“Yes.”
“You?”
“No.”
We entered the boardroom.
Fourteen people.
Victor Hale at the far end.
He smiled.
The board chair, Margaret Chen, gestured toward two seats.
“Ms. Sloan. Mr. Brooks.”
I sat.
Rebecca positioned herself at the table.
Margaret began.
“We are here to review potential conflicts related to the Portland redevelopment portfolio.”
Victor opened a folder.
Rebecca said:
“Before we begin, I have evidence of document fabrication.”
Several heads lifted.
Victor’s smile disappeared.
Martin distributed copies.
The forged agreement.
Signature source.
Metadata.
Executive workstation access.
Kevin Delaney’s employment record.
Victor leaned back.
“This proves nothing about me.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“I haven’t said your name.”
Silence.
She was good at this.
Terrifyingly good.
Margaret asked:
“Mr. Brooks, were you promised equity?”
“No.”
“Do you expect to receive equity?”
“No.”
“Are you romantically involved with Ms. Sloan?”
The room went still.
I looked at Rebecca.
She looked at me.
Then I answered.
“I don’t know.”
One board member coughed.
Margaret blinked.
“You don’t know?”
“We’ve had four breakfasts.”
Rebecca said:
“Five.”
I looked at her.
“This morning counts?”
“Unfortunately.”
A few people laughed.
Victor did not.
Margaret rubbed her temple.
“Ms. Sloan?”
Rebecca’s voice remained calm.
“I have personal feelings for Mr. Brooks.”
There it was.
In front of fourteen directors.
No hiding.
My heart kicked.
She continued.
“I did not halt the project because of those feelings. I halted it after discovering evidence that the property may be protected by a continuity covenant our development division failed to disclose.”
Victor interrupted.
“Allegedly protected.”
Rebecca turned.
“And potentially terminated through forged signatures.”
Victor’s face hardened.
Martin distributed the 2003 termination.
Margaret studied it.
“Mr. Hale, this appears to contain your signature.”
“It is not mine.”
“Can you prove that?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Victor opened his briefcase.
And removed another original document.
Same date.
Same covenant.
Different signatures.
My stomach dropped.
“What is that?” Rebecca asked.
Victor slid it across the table.
“The actual 2003 termination.”
Frank’s signature was not on it.
Neither was Victor’s.
The signatory was Charles Sloan.
Rebecca stared at her father’s name.
Victor said quietly:
“Your father terminated the covenant himself.”
Then Martin turned to the final page.
His face changed.
“No.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“What?”
Martin whispered:
“This document was notarized by Ruth Sloan.”
May you like
Rebecca’s mother.
The woman who had hidden the covenant under Table Six.
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