Chapter 6: The Man Who Kept Eric's Books
The number belonged to a man named Douglas Farr.
Patricia ran it before I responded to the text.
Douglas Farr, fifty-three, accountant, sole proprietor of a small bookkeeping firm that had three listed clients.
One of those clients was a limited liability company registered eight months ago under the name Trident Advisory Group.
Trident Advisory Group's registered agent was Eric.
"He's Eric's accountant," I told Patricia over the phone.
"And he's reaching out to you voluntarily."
"Yes."
"Then he's either trying to warn you," she said, "or Eric sent him to find out what you know."
I thought about the text again.
The phrasing.
*I know about the second account too.* Not *there is a second account.* Too.
Like he was confirming something I already had.
"He read the situation correctly," I said.
"He knows I already found something."
"Meet him in a public place.
Daytime.
Take your sister.
Record everything."
We met Douglas Farr at a coffee shop two miles from my house the following morning.
He was already seated when we arrived — a compact man in a plain jacket, a coffee cup in front of him that he hadn't touched.
He stood when he saw us and shook my hand, then my sister's.
"Thank you for coming," he said.
We sat.
He wrapped both hands around his cup.
"I've been Eric's accountant for three years," he said.
"Personal and business.
I set up the LLC at his request.
He told me it was for a consulting side project." He paused.
"I believed him.
For a while."
"What changed?" I said.
"He started asking me to route transfers in ways that didn't make sense for a consulting business.
Payments to vendors I couldn't verify.
Invoices that didn't match any work product I could identify." He looked down at the table.
"I asked him about it twice.
Both times he told me not to worry about it.
That it was being handled."
"But you did worry about it."
"I have a license," he said.
"I have a family.
If he's running something through my books that isn't legitimate, I'm exposed too." He looked up.
"When he came to me last week and asked me to move the remaining balance out of the second account and into a third one — offshore — I told him I needed to think about it."
My sister's hand found my arm under the table.
"How much is in the second account?" I said.
Douglas Farr reached into his jacket and placed a folded sheet of paper on the table.
I unfolded it.
Eighty-three thousand dollars.
Plus the forty from the first account.
Plus whatever had already been moved before I found the statements.
"He was going to disappear," I said.
It wasn't a question.
"I think so," Douglas said.
"I think the plan was to be gone before the divorce was finalized.
Leave you with the house, the mortgage, and three children, and start over somewhere with enough money that it wouldn't matter."
The coffee shop was warm and ordinary around us.
A couple at the next table was arguing gently about what to order.
A child was drawing on a paper placemat with a crayon.
"Will you give a statement?" I said.
"To my attorney?"
"That's why I'm here," Douglas said.
"I'm not going down for this.
Whatever he told you I knew — I want the record to show what I actually knew and when I stopped cooperating."
"Patricia will contact you today."
He nodded.
He picked up his coffee cup for the first time, looked at it, and set it back down without drinking.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"I should have called you sooner.
I kept thinking it wasn't my place."
"It wasn't," I said.
"But I'm glad you did."
We left him there.
In the car, my sister turned to me before I started the engine.
"Offshore," she said.
"I know."
"He was actually going to do it."
I looked at the coffee shop window.
Douglas Farr was still at the table, staring at his untouched cup.
"He didn't," I said.
"That's what matters now."
I started the car.
My phone showed a missed call from a number I recognized this time.
Eric.
He had left a voicemail.
I didn't play it until we were back at the house, my sister beside me on the couch.
His voice was different from two nights ago.
The calculation was gone.
What was left underneath it was not what I expected.
He sounded afraid.
*"I know you've been talking to people.
I need you to stop.
You don't understand what you're getting into.
Call me back.
Please.
This is bigger than you think."*
May you like
I played it twice.
Then I forwarded it to Patricia without responding.
