Chapter 7 - What Derek Knew
I agreed to meet Derek under four conditions.
Police station.
Detective present.
Marisol present.
No physical contact.
Derek accepted all four without argument.
That made me more suspicious, not less.
At 5:30 Tuesday evening, I sat in a small interview room with a scratched table bolted to the floor.
Marisol sat on my right.
Detective Harlan stood near the door.
Derek entered carrying nothing.
He looked as if he had aged ten years since Sunday morning.
His usually neat beard was untrimmed.
There were dark half-moons beneath his eyes.
He sat across from me but did not meet my gaze.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
Finally I said, “You notarized a forged bank authorization.”
Derek looked up.
“No.”
“Your seal is on it.”
“I know.”
“Your seal was on Naomi’s too.”
His face tightened.
“I know.”
“You deleted photographs at my rehearsal dinner.”
“Yes.”
Marisol shifted beside me.
Harlan said nothing.
At least he had admitted one thing.
“Why?” I asked.
Derek rubbed both hands over his face.
“Because one of them showed something I thought would get you hurt.”
“What?”
“My mother’s binder.”
I stared at him.
“What binder?”
“The red one.”
He looked toward Harlan.
“I told you about it.”
Harlan nodded once.
Derek continued.
“Victoria kept loan planning documents in a red leather binder when she was preparing a file.”
“A bride file.”
His eyes closed briefly.
“Yes.”
“You knew that term?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Years.”
Anger pressed against my ribs.
“And you did nothing.”
“I did things.”
“You helped her.”
“Yes.”
The admission was so direct that I momentarily lost the next question.
Derek leaned forward.
“I am not going to sit here and tell you I was secretly a good man the whole time.”
His voice shook.
“I wasn’t.”
The room became very quiet.
“I notarized documents without seeing signatures.”
He swallowed.
“I told myself they were administrative shortcuts.”
“I deleted records.”
“I carried envelopes.”
“I repeated lies when women accused Julian or my mother of stealing from them.”
He looked at me then.
“I helped.”
I felt no satisfaction hearing it.
Only disgust.
“Why?”
“Because the company was always one month away from disaster.”
“That’s not a reason.”
“No.”
“Because Victoria is your mother?”
“That was part of it.”
“Because you got money?”
He flinched.
“Yes.”
“At least that’s honest.”
“I thought if I kept the company alive, I was protecting thirty employees and my father’s legacy.”
I laughed once.
“You protected a machine that ate women.”
Derek lowered his eyes.
“Yes.”
Marisol spoke.
“Tell us about Elena’s file.”
Derek’s hands clasped together.
“My mother identified Elena before Julian met her.”
The words still hurt even though I had already suspected them.
“How?” I asked.
“A donor list from the historical foundation.”
“Why me?”
“Income, credit, family assets, unmarried, no children, no major debt.”
I stared at him.
“You ran a background check before I even met your brother?”
“Victoria did.”
“Using what authority?”
“None.”
“What did Julian know?”
“At first, only that Mom thought you were a good match.”
“At first.”
Derek nodded miserably.
“When did he know the financial reason?”
“Before your third date.”
I felt as if someone had punched air from my lungs.
Third date.
I remembered Julian taking me to a tiny Italian restaurant because I had mentioned missing the neighborhood where my grandparents lived.
He had ordered in Spanish with my grandfather’s accent and made me laugh until my face hurt.
I had gone home that night thinking I might be falling in love.
He had gone home knowing my credit score mattered to his mother.
“Did he ever love me?”
Marisol put one hand lightly on my wrist.
Derek looked physically ill.
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t protect him.”
“I’m not.”
“Then answer.”
“I think he convinced himself he did.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.”
I looked away.
For a few seconds, I stared at the gray wall until the edges stopped blurring.
Then I said, “What crime was Victoria planning to put on me?”
Derek’s face changed.
This was why we were here.
He leaned back.
“Last year, Mercer Residential Group received $730,000 from a private investment partnership called North Meridian Fund.”
Marisol wrote the name down.
“For what?”
“A redevelopment project.”
“Did the project exist?”
“Yes, but not the way it was represented.”
“What happened to the money?”
“Some went to the project.”
“How much?”
“About two hundred thousand.”
“And the rest?”
“Old debts, payroll, tax liens, Victoria’s mortgage obligations, Julian’s personal accounts.”
Harlan’s expression hardened.
“Investor fraud.”
Derek nodded.
“Potentially.”
“Potentially?” I snapped.
“You took money for one purpose and spent it on another.”
“Yes.”
“Who signed the investor certifications?” Marisol asked.
“Victoria and Kessler.”
“Julian?”
“On some.”
“You?”
Derek swallowed.
“One.”
Harlan finally spoke.
“You understand you are describing conduct that could expose you criminally.”
“Yes.”
“You are not being offered immunity.”
“I know.”
“Continue.”
Derek nodded.
“North Meridian started asking questions three months ago.”
“What kind?”
“Bank statements, invoices, draw schedules.”
“So Victoria needed money to replace missing funds?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“The loans in my name were to plug the hole.”
“Partly.”
There was that word again.
“What else?”
Derek looked at me.
“They were also building a paper trail that made you look like the person who arranged the refinancing.”
My skin went cold.
“How?”
“Your job.”
“I work in corporate finance, not real estate lending.”
“But you understand financial structures.”
“So?”
“So the story was going to be that you joined the family, reviewed the company books, proposed an emergency refinancing strategy, and brought in lenders using your family assets as support.”
I stared at him.
“That is insane.”
“It doesn’t have to be true at first.”
His voice was quiet.
“It only has to be documented enough that everyone argues about it for two years.”
Marisol stopped writing.
The sentence was horrifying because it was realistic.
A false story did not need to win immediately.
It only needed to create confusion.
Derek continued.
“The red binder contained draft emails written as if they came from you.”
My hands turned cold.
“What emails?”
“Messages to lenders.”
“To North Meridian.”
“To Kessler.”
“Messages saying you had reviewed the company finances and approved the use of bridge loans.”
“I never wrote them.”
“I know.”
“Were they sent?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think?”
“They were drafts.”
“On whose computer?”
“Victoria’s laptop.”
Harlan made a note.
“What else was in the binder?”
Derek hesitated.
“Copies of Elena’s work documents.”
“Stolen Sunday night,” I said.
“Some.”
“Some?”
He looked at me.
“Others were older.”
My throat tightened.
“How much older?”
“Six months.”
I felt the room tilt.
“How did she have work documents six months ago?”
Derek shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
“Who gave them to her?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were they from my computer?”
“I don’t know.”
I turned to Harlan.
“Someone has been accessing my information for six months.”
“Possibly,” she said.
Derek spoke again.
“There was also a draft affidavit.”
Marisol’s pen stopped.
“From whom?”
“You.”
I stared at him.
“What did I supposedly swear to?”
Derek’s voice dropped.
“That you discovered accounting irregularities at Mercer Residential Group after the engagement.”
“That Julian begged you to help.”
“That you created a refinancing plan.”
“That you moved money between entities without telling Victoria.”
My mouth went dry.
“They were going to blame the missing North Meridian money on me.”
“Not all of it.”
“Enough.”
“Yes.”
I stood so abruptly that the chair scraped the floor.
Harlan moved slightly, not toward me, but enough to remind me where I was.
I put both palms on the table.
“You knew this six weeks before the wedding.”
“Yes.”
“And you let me marry him.”
Derek’s face crumpled.
“I tried to stop it.”
“How?”
“I deleted photographs.”
I laughed in disbelief.
“You deleted photographs.”
“I sent anonymous emails.”
“What emails?”
“Three.”
“I never got them.”
“I know.”
“Why?”
“Julian intercepted them.”
“How?”
“He had access to your email.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
Derek looked at Harlan.
“I told you.”
Harlan’s expression confirmed it.
Derek continued.
“Julian knew your primary email password by June.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Was it the name of your childhood dog plus a number?”
I went cold.
Ava was the only person who knew that password pattern.
No.
Not Ava.
I had once told Julian the story behind the dog’s name.
And months earlier, I had logged into my email on his tablet while traveling.
He could have saved the password.
“Did he read my email?”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he delete messages?”
“Yes.”
The room seemed to pulse.
“Your warnings?”
“Yes.”
“What did they say?”
“The first said not to sign anything Victoria gave you.”
“The second said Julian was lying about the company.”
“The third told you to contact Naomi.”
I sank back into the chair.
Every warning had been sent.
Every warning had vanished before I saw it.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Derek’s eyes filled with shame.
“Because I was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“My mother.”
I stared at him.
He was a forty-year-old man.
Victoria was a sixty-three-year-old woman who wore pearls to breakfast.
Yet he said the word mother as if he were describing a loaded weapon.
Derek saw my disbelief.
“You don’t understand how she operates.”
“I understand enough.”
“No.”
His voice suddenly sharpened.
“You understand what she did to you after fourteen hours.”
He leaned forward.
“You do not understand what she does after forty years.”
Harlan interrupted.
“Stay on the facts.”
Derek inhaled slowly.
He nodded.
“I thought if I could get the bride files and the binder out, I could expose everything without putting my name on it.”
“Why the wheel boot?”
“Victoria keeps the files in a locking trunk when she moves them.”
“I planned to block her car, take the trunk, and send it to a lawyer.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
“The trunk was gone.”
“When?”
“Six weeks ago.”
“Where did it go?”
“I don’t know.”
“The photograph yesterday shows the folders in her garage.”
Derek stared at me.
“What photograph?”
Harlan immediately said, “You don’t need to answer that.”
Derek looked genuinely confused.
That mattered.
If he was acting, he was very good.
“The folders were back?” he asked.
I said nothing.
He leaned away.
“Then she moved them back after the wedding.”
“Why?” Marisol asked.
“To destroy or rewrite them.”
Derek’s face tightened.
“That means she thinks she is losing control.”
My prepaid phone buzzed inside my bag.
Harlan glanced at it.
I took it out.
A message from the anonymous number.
DEREK IS TALKING TO YOU NOW.
My blood froze.
I looked around the windowless interview room.
The sender knew where we were.
Another message appeared.
ASK HIM ABOUT THE STORAGE UNIT ON FENWICK ROAD.
I looked up slowly.
Derek’s face went white before I said a word.
I had my answer.
“What is on Fenwick Road?”
Derek stared at the phone in my hand.
“Who sent that?”
“What is on Fenwick Road?”
He looked at Harlan.
Harlan’s expression hardened.
“Answer her.”
Derek swallowed.
“A storage unit.”
“What is in it?”
He did not answer.
I slammed my palm against the table.
“What is in it?”
Derek’s voice dropped to a whisper.
May you like
“The original bride files.”
FOURTEEN HOURS - THE SMILE THEY MISUNDERSTOOD
