Chapter 6: Three Minutes
My father stood up.
"Sit down," I said.
"Olivia—"
"You're not going near that jacket.
If he sees you, it's over." I kept my voice at a murmur beneath the music.
"Daniel goes.
He has a reason to be near that table.
It's his father."
Daniel looked at me.
"What exactly are you asking me to do?"
"I'm asking you to look at your father's phone.
See if there's anything on it that matches what you photographed.
Contacts, messages, anything with dates from the last six months."
"That's not—"
"I know what it is," I said.
"I'm asking anyway."
He held my gaze for a moment.
Then he straightened his jacket and walked toward the table.
My father and I did not watch him directly.
We looked at the dance floor, at the band, at the centerpiece on the table in front of us.
I was aware of every second.
Two minutes passed.
Daniel came back.
He sat down, picked up a glass, and took a slow sip as though he had simply returned from greeting a guest.
"There's a thread," he said.
"Between my father and a man named Whitmore.
Fourteen messages going back to February.
The last one is from two days ago."
"What does it say?" my father asked.
"'Confirmation received.
Final transfer clears Monday.'"
My father's face did not change.
But his hand, flat on the table, pressed down until his knuckles were pale.
"Monday," he said.
"That's two days from now."
"Whatever is left," Daniel said, "gets moved on Monday."
I looked at my father.
"What's left?"
He was quiet for a moment.
"The warehouse property.
It was the one asset I managed to keep out of the initial restructuring.
I thought it was protected." He stopped.
"Gerald knew about it.
He's always known about it."
"Who is Whitmore?" I asked Daniel.
"I don't know.
The name isn't in my father's contacts under that name.
Just the number."
"Can you get the number?"
"I already have it." He set his phone on the table, screen down.
"I took a screenshot before I put it back."
Gerald Marsh returned from the corridor, straightening his cuffs, and settled back into his chair two tables away.
He caught my eye across the room and raised his glass with a smile.
I raised mine back.
"We need a lawyer," I said quietly.
"Not tomorrow.
Tonight."
"It's your wedding night," my father said.
"It's also the night before Gerald Marsh finishes taking everything you built." I looked at him.
"Do you have someone you trust?"
"There's a woman named Patricia Hale.
She handled the original partnership agreement.
She's been trying to reach me for three weeks — I kept putting her off because I didn't want to deal with it during the wedding planning."
"Call her."
"Now?"
"Go outside.
Call her now.
Tell her about Monday.
Tell her about the Whitmore transfer." I glanced at Daniel.
"Send her the photographs you took."
Daniel nodded once.
My father pushed back his chair slowly, like a man being careful not to draw attention.
He picked up his water glass, set it down, picked up his phone.
"I'll be back in ten minutes," he said.
He walked toward the exit at the far end of the room — not hurrying, not looking at Gerald, just a father stepping outside for some air at his daughter's wedding.
Gerald watched him go.
Then his gaze came back to me.
He smiled again.
Warm.
Easy.
The smile of a man who believed he had already won.
I smiled back.
Under the table, my hand found Daniel's.
He turned his palm up and held on.
"I need to ask you something," I said quietly, still watching the room.
"Ask."
"When you found that folder three weeks ago — what was your first instinct?
Before you thought about evidence or timing or any of it.
What did you want to do?"
He didn't answer right away.
"I wanted to call you."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because I was afraid," he said.
"Not of your father.
Not of mine." He paused.
"I was afraid you'd look at me the way you looked at me in that side room tonight."
I turned to look at him properly.
"How did I look at you?"
"Like you were deciding whether I was someone you could trust."
The band shifted into something quieter.
A few couples left the floor.
"And now?" I asked.
He looked down at our joined hands.
"I think that's still being decided."
"Yes," I said.
"It is."
Across the room, Gerald refilled his champagne for the third time and laughed at something his neighbor said.
My father had not come back yet.
Nine minutes.
Ten.
Eleven.
Then my phone buzzed on the table.
A text from an unknown number.
May you like
Four words.
*Don't trust the lawyer.*
