Chapter 3 - The Missing Report
Northstar Meridian occupied forty-two floors of a black glass tower overlooking the Chicago River.
By nine the next morning, every employee had heard a version of what happened at the party.
Some said Maya had blackmailed the company.
Others said she was Samuel Reed’s secret daughter.
One rumor claimed she had stolen millions from the acquisition fund.
The truth moved more slowly than gossip.
Maya arrived at work wearing a borrowed gray suit and shoes Ethan had sent to her apartment. Her roommate, Jenna, had stayed awake most of the night waiting for her.
“You’re trending,” Jenna announced.
Maya stopped in the doorway.
“What?”
Jenna turned her laptop around.
A video showed Claire standing near the pool, one hand on Maya’s shoulder. The angle was poor. It looked almost as if Maya had stumbled into the water.
The caption read:
INTERN PRETENDS TO BE ATTACKED AFTER GETTING DRUNK AT EXECUTIVE PARTY.
The comments were brutal.
Maya scrolled once and closed the laptop.
“Who posted it?”
“An anonymous account. But it was uploaded through a media firm connected to Whitmore Financial.”
Maya dropped her bag on the chair.
“Of course it was.”
“You should report them.”
“To whom?”
“The police?”
“For a misleading video?”
Jenna stared at her.
“Maya, Claire assaulted you.”
“And now she’s trying to make me look unstable. If I react emotionally, she gets exactly what she wants.”
Jenna lowered her voice.
“What do you want?”
Maya looked toward the window.
“To finish what my father started.”
At 9:15, she received a message from Ethan.
Come to the twenty-ninth floor. Use the service elevator.
Maya arrived ten minutes later.
Ethan was waiting beside a conference room. Victor stood near the glass wall, speaking with a man in a charcoal suit.
The man was Grant Ellison.
Northstar’s chief financial officer.
Grant smiled when Maya entered.
“So this is the famous intern.”
Maya did not return the smile.
“Famous?”
“Your little stunt stopped a multibillion-dollar acquisition.”
“You mean the acquisition that depended on falsified financial statements?”
Grant’s smile disappeared.
Victor raised a hand.
“Enough.”
The conference room door closed behind Maya.
Victor placed a folder on the table.
“We reviewed your claims.”
“And?”
“We found irregularities.”
Maya looked at Ethan.
“How many?”
“Seven suspicious payments,” Ethan said. “All connected to Lakefront Advisory.”
“Only seven?”
Grant snapped the folder shut.
“You had no authority to access our accounts.”
“I didn’t access the accounts. I reviewed financial documents that were sent to me.”
“By whom?”
Maya looked at Victor.
“Someone who wanted the truth found.”
Victor’s eyes narrowed.
“What does that mean?”
“It means someone inside Northstar helped me.”
Grant stood.
“This is absurd. She is a young woman with no financial credentials, no authority, and an obvious grudge.”
Maya turned toward him.
“I have a master’s degree in forensic accounting.”
Grant froze.
Ethan looked surprised.
Victor’s expression hardened.
“Why were you hired as an intern?”
“Because your company did not hire a forensic accountant who was investigating it.”
Grant took a step toward her.
“You deceived us.”
“You lied to your own board.”
Victor slammed his palm against the table.
“That’s enough.”
For a moment, nobody spoke.
Then Ethan placed a flash drive on the table.
“We recovered a backup from the old compliance server.”
Maya stared at it.
“Where did you find that?”
“The server was scheduled for destruction next week. I had the data copied last night.”
Grant’s face changed.
Maya noticed.
Ethan noticed too.
Victor inserted the drive into the conference room computer.
A directory opened.
Most files were corrupted. Several folders were empty. One folder was marked D.CROSS—ARCHIVE.
Maya’s pulse quickened.
Victor clicked it.
A single audio file appeared.
Created eight years earlier.
Ethan pressed play.
Static filled the room.
Then a man’s voice emerged.
Daniel Cross.
“If this recording is being played, it means the board refused to review the report.”
Maya leaned forward.
Daniel sounded tired, frightened.
“Samuel Reed was right. The acquisition fund is being drained through false vendor contracts. The money is being moved to Lakefront Advisory, then redirected through accounts controlled by—”
The recording cut out.
Grant’s face had gone white.
Ethan tried to open the file again.
Nothing.
The audio ended at forty-seven seconds.
Maya looked at Victor.
“Who controlled Lakefront eight years ago?”
Victor did not answer.
Grant did.
“No one in this room.”
Maya turned toward him.
“Then why are you sweating?”
Grant pushed his chair away.
“This is a setup.”
He walked toward the door.
Two security officers appeared outside.
Victor had called them before the meeting.
“Mr. Ellison,” Victor said, “you’re not leaving.”
Grant laughed, but there was fear behind it.
“You can’t detain me.”
“No,” Victor replied. “But I can suspend you while an independent investigation begins.”
Grant stared at him.
“You’ll regret this.”
He left with the security officers.
The room remained silent.
Maya looked at the audio file.
“Someone deleted the rest.”
Ethan nodded.
“But the backup may contain another copy.”
“Where?”
“Daniel Cross had an external archive system.”
Victor slowly sat down.
“Daniel disappeared after Samuel died.”
Maya looked at him.
“Did he disappear, or did someone make sure he couldn’t talk?”
Before Victor could answer, his phone rang.
He listened for several seconds.
Then he lowered it.
“What happened?” Ethan asked.
Victor looked at Maya.
“The police found a burned car outside Joliet.”
Maya’s stomach tightened.
May you like
“Whose car?”
“Daniel Cross’s.”
