Chapter 6 - Vanessa Runs
Vanessa left the mansion at 12:14 p.m.
The security cameras captured her carrying two suitcases.
Grant followed her outside.
Even without audio, the argument was obvious.
He grabbed one suitcase.
She pulled it back.
He pointed toward the house.
She shook her head.
Then Grant noticed the camera.
The footage ended thirty seconds later.
“He disabled the system.”
Daniel turned away from his laptop.
“But not before the cloud backup.”
Vanessa called me from a gas station in Northbrook.
“I need help.”
I almost hung up.
Then I remembered Bellweather.
“Where are you?”
She hesitated.
“Why?”
“Because if Grant used your name to move twenty-two million dollars, you're in more danger than I am.”
That convinced her.
Daniel sent two vehicles.
Vanessa arrived at my father's attorneys' office less than an hour later.
She looked nothing like the woman who had smiled while I stood bleeding.
No silk robe.
No pearls.
No confidence.
Just jeans, wet hair, and mascara streaked across her face.
The moment she saw me, she stopped.
“Claire.”
“Take off the earrings.”
Her hand moved instinctively toward my mother's pearls.
“I forgot.”
“Take them off.”
She removed them.
Placed them on the conference table.
Then pushed them toward me.
“I’m sorry.”
I picked them up.
“They're the least important thing you took from me.”
Vanessa looked down.
Rachel began questioning her.
Grant had met Vanessa eighteen months earlier.
He told her my marriage was over.
He told her I refused to sign the divorce.
He told her my father controlled me.
He told her he needed temporary accounts because Arthur was trying to sabotage his company.
“Did you open Bellweather?”
“Yes.”
“Did Grant control it?”
“Yes.”
“Did you receive money?”
“I saw deposits.”
“How much?”
“I don't know.”
“Did you transfer funds?”
“When he told me to.”
Rachel's expression became severe.
“Where?”
“Different accounts.”
“Whose?”
Vanessa's lips began trembling.
“One was in the Cayman Islands.”
Arthur leaned back.
Another was in Delaware.
Another belonged to a man named Martin Hale.
The same notary who had certified my forged deed.
Then Vanessa gave us the first real weapon against Grant.
She had kept emails.
Hundreds of them.
Not because she distrusted him.
Because she thought they proved he loved her.
May you like
Instead, they proved something much more valuable.
Grant Whitmore had been writing down his own crimes.
