Chapter 6: What the Recorder Caught
He stared at it for a long moment.
Then he laughed β a short, hard sound with nothing warm in it.
"That's inadmissible," he said.
"One-party consent doesn't cover β"
"We're in a state that requires only one-party consent," Charlotte said.
"I'm the one party.
And what you just described β draining accounts, prolonged bad-faith litigation as a deliberate strategy to destroy asset value β that's not a legal threat, Mr.
Hartwell.
That's fraud.
Possibly more."
He set the phone back down.
"You came up here alone," he said.
"No lawyer.
No security.
Just a recorder and a piece of paper." His eyes moved over her.
"You're bluffing."
"Gerald Moss is in the lobby," Charlotte said.
"My attorney is currently outside this building with copies of every document I've described.
The forensic examiner's report was filed with the court this morning at nine a.m." She looked at him steadily.
"I came up here alone because I wanted you to say exactly what you just said.
And you did."
The room was quiet.
Dominic moved to the window.
He stood with his back to her, looking out over the city.
"Your mother and I had an arrangement," he said.
"She understood the value of what I brought to this company.
The international relationships.
The capital access.
She was pragmatic."
"She was being pressured," Charlotte said.
"There's a difference."
"She was a businesswoman.
She knew how these things worked."
"She hid a document in the lining of a travel case and told her attorney to file it the moment she was gone," Charlotte said.
"That's not pragmatism.
That's a woman who knew exactly what you were planning and made sure you wouldn't get away with it."
He turned around.
For the first time, something in his face looked less like calculation and more like something older.
Something that had been sitting with him for a while.
"She was ill," he said.
"I didn't know how ill until β"
"Until it was useful," Charlotte said.
His jaw tightened.
"Vivienne didn't know about the forgery," he said.
"She believed the document was legitimate.
Whatever happened in the lobby this morning β"
"Don't," Charlotte said.
"Don't try to protect her by making her ignorant.
She knew enough to come here.
She knew enough to do what she did to me on that floor." She picked up the recorder.
"And she knew enough to answer to it."
He crossed the room in three steps.
His hand came down toward the recorder.
Charlotte pulled it back before he reached it.
"Don't," she said quietly.
He stopped.
His hand was still extended.
He was close enough that she could see the precise moment he understood that the room had run out of moves for him.
"What happens now?" he said.
"Now," Charlotte said, "you call your attorney.
And you tell Vivienne to do the same."
She walked to the door.
"The board meeting is at two o'clock," she said, without turning around.
"I'll be running it."
She stepped into the corridor and pulled the door closed behind her.
May you like
Her hands were shaking again.
This time, she let them.
