Chapter 4 - LOCKER 317
Emily called Daniel before she could change her mind.
He answered on the first ring.
“Emily?”
“Someone knows about us.”
Twenty-five minutes later, Daniel stood inside her apartment with Marcus and a security specialist.
Emily hated having strangers in her home.
She hated being frightened even more.
Daniel examined the photograph without touching it.
“Did you see anyone?”
“No.”
“Has anyone contacted you about your mother recently?”
“No.”
“Anyone following you?”
“I’m a waitress and a single mom. Nobody follows me.”
Daniel looked at the photograph.
“Somebody does now.”
Noah emerged sleepily from the hallway.
“Daniel?”
Emily immediately hid the photograph.
Daniel's expression softened.
“Hey, buddy.”
“Is it my birthday again?”
Despite everything, Emily laughed.
“No.”
Noah looked disappointed and returned to bed.
Marcus examined the brass key.
“317 could be a safe-deposit box.”
Daniel nodded.
The engraving suggested Whitmore Federal, the neighborhood bank Daniel's father had used decades earlier before it merged with Commonwealth Atlantic.
By ten the next morning, they were inside a private vault.
Box 317 had remained untouched for twenty-two years.
Emily inserted the key.
The lock clicked.
Inside were three objects.
A cassette tape.
A photograph.
And a thick folder.
Emily picked up the photograph first.
Her mother stood beside Daniel's father.
They were younger, smiling in front of a tiny office.
Between them was another man.
Daniel recognized him immediately.
“Collins.”
Emily looked up.
“Mr. Collins?”
“His father.”
Walter Collins had been Daniel's father's business partner.
Marcus opened the folder.
Inside were incorporation papers for a software venture called Northstar Systems.
Three ownership percentages appeared on the final page.
Thomas Whitmore: 45%.
Walter Collins: 30%.
Rebecca Carter: 25%.
Emily stared.
“My mother owned a company?”
“Apparently.”
Daniel turned another page.
Northstar's core patent had later been transferred to a company that eventually became Whitmore Technologies.
Rebecca's signature appeared on the transfer.
Marcus examined it.
“This is strange.”
“What?”
“The notarization date is three weeks after Rebecca supposedly left the company.”
Emily felt sick.
“My mother always said someone stole something from her.”
Daniel looked at her.
“Did she say who?”
“No.”
Marcus held up the cassette.
“Maybe she did here.”
Finding a cassette player took longer than expected.
Finally, Daniel's security chief brought one from an electronics archive.
Rebecca's voice filled the room.
Emily stopped breathing.
She hadn't heard her mother's voice in twelve years.
“If Emily is hearing this, then I failed to fix what happened.”
Emily covered her mouth.
Daniel remained perfectly still.
Rebecca continued.
“Thomas Whitmore didn't steal from me.”
Daniel looked down.
“Walter Collins did.”
Emily's eyes widened.
Rebecca explained that Walter had forged documents transferring her ownership interest. When Thomas discovered discrepancies, Walter convinced him Rebecca had voluntarily sold her shares and disappeared.
Rebecca had tried to expose him.
Then threats began.
She took Emily and left the city.
“But there's something Walter never knew,” Rebecca's recording continued. “I kept the original development ledger. Without it, he could claim whatever he wanted. With it, the fraud can be proven.”
The recording crackled.
“The ledger is hidden where Emily used to count the stars.”
Emily whispered, “What?”
Daniel looked at her.
“Does that mean something?”
She shook her head.
Then memory struck.
Her childhood bedroom.
Her mother had painted blue stars across the ceiling.
Emily suddenly remembered one star that wasn't painted.
It was a glow-in-the-dark sticker covering a tiny crack above the closet.
Her old house had been demolished years ago.
But the ceiling?
Emily stood.
“My mother saved a section when we moved.”
“Where?”
“My aunt's storage unit.”
They drove there immediately.
Inside the dusty unit, Emily found an old wooden toy chest.
Beneath blankets and childhood drawings lay a rectangular section of drywall decorated with faded blue stars.
Daniel helped turn it over.
Taped to the back was a thin black notebook.
The ledger.
Marcus opened it carefully.
Transactions.
Dates.
Patent-development payments.
Original ownership percentages.
And handwritten notes documenting transfers Walter Collins had made into shell companies.
Then Daniel noticed the final pages.
Payments continued for years.
Walter hadn't acted alone.
A second set of initials appeared repeatedly.
M.C.
Emily looked at Daniel.
“Who is M.C.?”
Daniel already knew.
“Michael Collins.”
Her manager.
Walter's son.
Emily felt the floor disappear beneath her.
Michael Collins hadn't hired her accidentally.
He had known exactly who she was.
For two years, she'd been working for the son of the man who destroyed her mother's life.
Daniel's phone rang.
His security chief.
Daniel listened.
His expression darkened.
“When?”
He hung up.
Emily's stomach tightened.
“What happened?”
Daniel looked at the ledger.
“Someone broke into your apartment twenty minutes ago.”
Emily went pale.
“Noah.”
“He's at school.”
She exhaled.
Then Daniel said the part that frightened her most.
“They didn't steal your television. They didn't touch your jewelry.”
His eyes dropped to the black notebook.
“They went straight to the box under your bed.”
Someone knew about the key.
May you like
Someone knew about Rebecca.
And whoever it was now knew Emily had found the ledger first.
