Chapter 5
Brianna let Daniel’s call go to voicemail.
A message followed almost at once.
Call me before your mother signs anything.
Dad held out his hand, asking to see the screen. Brianna showed him, then looked at me.
“I didn’t know he had my number,” she said. “He must have gotten it from the office.”
Mara asked us to save the message. She also asked Dad to stop Celeste from signing or moving company documents while the review continued. Dad called her from the sitting room.
Celeste came down the stairs slowly.
“What is this about?”
“Daniel contacted Brianna,” Dad said. “He mentioned Northstar.”
Celeste looked at her daughter.
“You should have let me handle it.”
Brianna took a step back. “I don’t even know what it is.”
Dad asked Celeste whether she had approved payments to Northstar. She said she had helped organize events, but Daniel handled the invoices.
“Why were your initials on one?” he asked.
“Because I wanted the vendors paid before the dinner. It doesn’t mean I checked their accounts.”
“Did Northstar do the work listed?”
“I thought they did.”
She looked at me.
“Emma is treating every decision I made like a crime.”
“I asked about a bill for work my staff did,” I said.
Celeste folded her arms.
“I didn’t know that.”
Dad suggested she speak to Mara with her own attorney present. Celeste agreed, though she was plainly angry. Brianna went upstairs. I left with Mom’s chipped photograph to have the frame repaired.
For a few days, we learned nothing new. I worked, met with Mara, and visited Dad after his cardiology appointment. His doctor had adjusted his medication. Dad showed me the written instructions and let me put the follow-up date in my calendar.
“I can keep track of my own appointments,” he said.
“I know. I still want to be there.”
He smiled.
At the office, the outside accountant traced one Northstar payment to an account connected to Daniel. Two others went through a separate company. Mara explained that the accounting trail was still incomplete.
Then a former event coordinator sent me an email.
She remembered being told to remove Northstar’s name from a vendor list after the charity dinner. Daniel had called it an error. She had kept the original file because it was attached to her final event report.
I forwarded it to Mara.
That evening, Brianna came to my apartment without warning. She stood at the door holding a canvas bag.
“I found these in Mom’s closet,” she said.
Inside were envelopes from Northstar and a ledger with handwritten amounts.
“I shouldn’t have taken them,” she added. “I didn’t know what else to do.”
I called Mara before opening anything. She asked Brianna to bring the bag directly to her office in the morning and to write down where she had found it.
Brianna sat on my couch, twisting the bag’s strap.
“Mom says Dad is abandoning her.”
“He has asked her questions. She has an attorney and a place to live.”
“She told me you’d make sure we had nothing.”
“Brianna, I haven’t asked Dad to take anything from you.”
“I know that now. I keep hearing her voice anyway.”
I brought her water. She glanced around my apartment and saw a photograph of us from the first Christmas after she moved in. We were both wearing terrible matching sweaters.
“You kept that,” she said.
“We had a good day.”
“We did.”
She touched the edge of the frame.
“I should have stood up for you at dinner.”
“Yes,” I said.
“I want to do better.”
“Start by being honest with Mara. You don’t need to protect me from anything you remember.”
She nodded.
The next morning, Mara examined the ledger. Several entries matched payments from the company. Beside one was a note in Celeste’s handwriting about transferring a balance before Dad’s audit.
Mara called Dad into the meeting.
He read the page once, then asked Brianna where she had found it.
“In Mom’s closet. Behind the shoe boxes.”
He thanked her. Brianna began to cry.
“I didn’t bring it because I stopped loving her,” she said. “I brought it because I think she’s in trouble.”
Dad moved a chair beside her.
“You can love your mother,” he said. “We still need to know what happened.”
Mara arranged for the ledger to be preserved and reviewed. By afternoon, Daniel’s attorney had contacted her. Daniel wanted to provide records, but he claimed Celeste had directed him to use Northstar.
Celeste’s attorney said Daniel was lying.
I sat with Dad in his study while those two stories reached us by phone. The photograph of Mom was visible through the open door.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “But I will be.”
He looked at the black folder on his desk.
“There’s something I need to tell you about the transfer. I knew there might be a problem with company money before I came home that night.”
May you like
I turned toward him.
“How long had you known?”
