Chapter 10 - The Initials M.S.
Charles refused to accuse Dr. Sloan without evidence.
Emma agreed.
Margaret Sloan had personally cared for Noah and Elise.
She had shown kindness without expecting anything in return.
Still, the initials could not be ignored.
Daniel contacted Beacon Crest's compliance office rather than confronting her.
Within hours, investigators reviewed procurement records.
The result surprised everyone.
M.S. was not Margaret Sloan.
The initials belonged to Martin Shaw.
Beacon Crest's former deputy procurement director.
He had resigned six months earlier.
Charles remembered him.
"Quiet man."
Daniel nodded.
"Twenty years with the network."
Emma looked at the ledger.
"Why would Grant pay him?"
Daniel answered.
"We don't know yet."
Martin Shaw was located that evening.
He agreed to meet investigators.
Before the interview ended, he asked to speak with Charles personally.
Charles took the call in Emma's family suite.
Emma sat nearby.
Martin appeared on video.
He looked exhausted.
"Mr. Whitmore."
Charles's voice was cold.
"Martin."
"I know how this looks."
"Then explain it."
Martin swallowed.
"Grant Holloway offered me money."
"For what?"
"To approve Vantage components for Beacon Crest."
Emma's stomach twisted.
Charles's expression became stone.
"Did you?"
"No."
"Then why is there a nine-hundred-thousand-dollar payment?"
Martin looked ashamed.
"Because I accepted the first installment."
Charles said nothing.
Martin continued quickly.
"I was drowning in debt."
"That doesn't excuse it."
"I know."
"My wife had cancer."
Charles's expression shifted slightly.
"She needed experimental treatment."
Martin wiped his face.
"I told myself I would approve the vendor if the documents were real."
"And were they?"
"No."
Martin looked directly at Charles.
"I discovered the testing certificates were altered."
Emma leaned closer.
"What did you do?"
"I refused the approval."
Charles asked, "Did you return the money?"
Martin's silence answered.
"No."
Charles closed his eyes briefly.
Martin continued.
"Grant threatened me."
"With what?"
"He knew I had taken the payment."
"So you resigned."
"Yes."
"Why didn't you report him?"
"Because reporting him meant reporting myself."
Emma understood.
Fear had protected Grant more effectively than loyalty.
Daniel asked, "Do you still have the altered certificates?"
Martin nodded.
"I kept copies."
Charles looked at Emma.
This was the proof regulators needed.
Martin continued.
"There's something else."
Daniel leaned forward.
"What?"
"Grant wasn't the person who first approached me."
Emma's eyes narrowed.
"Who was?"
Martin hesitated.
"A woman."
"Vanessa?"
"No."
Emma exchanged a glance with Charles.
"Then who?"
Martin said the name.
"Cynthia Holloway."
Emma stopped breathing.
Grant's mother.
Charles looked at Daniel.
Emma whispered.
"Cynthia knew?"
Martin nodded.
"She told me her son was building something enormous."
Emma leaned back.
Cynthia had visited Emma during pregnancy.
She knitted blankets.
She touched Emma's stomach.
She talked about becoming a grandmother.
She brought food to the apartment.
The thought that she might have known about the scheme made Emma feel almost as betrayed as Grant's affair.
"Did she know the equipment was unsafe?"
Martin shook his head.
"I don't know."
Emma picked up her phone.
There were twelve missed calls from Cynthia since the news broke.
Emma had ignored them.
Now she called back.
Cynthia answered immediately.
"Emma."
Her voice sounded relieved.
"Thank God."
Emma said nothing.
"How are the babies?"
"Alive."
Cynthia began crying.
"I've been praying."
Emma looked at Charles.
"Did you offer Martin Shaw money?"
Silence.
Cynthia stopped crying.
"Emma."
"Answer me."
"I can explain."
Emma closed her eyes.
"Then explain."
Cynthia inhaled shakily.
"Grant came to me last year."
Emma waited.
"He said the company was failing."
"It wasn't."
"I know that now."
"He said Beacon Crest was destroying him by refusing contracts."
Emma's anger rose.
"So you bribed someone?"
"I tried to help my son."
"With nine hundred thousand dollars?"
"It was money from a family trust."
Emma's voice became sharper.
"Did you know the certificates were false?"
"No."
"Did you know Vanessa owned the vendor?"
Cynthia hesitated.
Emma knew the answer before she heard it.
"Yes."
Emma stared at the wall.
"You knew about Vanessa."
"I knew she worked with him."
"That's not what I asked."
Cynthia began crying again.
Emma's voice remained calm.
"Did you know your son was sleeping with her?"
Another silence.
Then Cynthia whispered.
"Yes."
Emma's eyes closed.
"How long?"
"Seven months."
Emma's breathing changed.
Cynthia rushed to explain.
"I begged him to end it."
"But you never told me."
"I didn't want to destroy your marriage."
Emma almost laughed.
"You weren't protecting my marriage."
She looked toward the NICU above them.
"You were protecting your son."
Cynthia sobbed.
"I love you."
Emma's voice broke for the first time.
"Then you should have loved me enough to tell me the truth."
She ended the call.
Charles sat beside her.
Emma stared at her phone.
She had lost a husband.
Now she understood she had also lost the woman she thought of as another mother.
But Cynthia was not finished.
Minutes later, she sent Emma a photograph.
It showed Grant standing inside a warehouse beside crates of Vantage equipment.
A date appeared in the corner.
Four months earlier.
Beneath it, Cynthia wrote one message.
There is something I never told investigators.
May you like
Grant wasn't trying only to sell those devices.
He planned to buy the factory that made them.
