Chapter 4 - The Rules of the House
Graham changed the security around the house before sunrise.
Two men appeared at the eastern gate. Cameras were added to the conservatory. A black SUV began following me whenever I left the property, though Graham insisted it was “temporary.”
I hired my own attorney anyway.
Her name was Vivian Price, and she had spent fifteen years defending corporations from federal investigations before deciding she preferred defending people who had been swallowed by them. She met me in a quiet coffee shop near the Battery and listened without interrupting while I described the documents, the photograph, and the conversation outside the lounge on our anniversary.
When I finished, she stirred her coffee once.
“Do you want a divorce?”
“I want control of my life.”
“Those are not always the same thing.”
“I know.”
Vivian leaned forward. “Your husband is powerful, but power creates enemies. If your name is being used in shell companies, you may be a target or a scapegoat. Possibly both.”
“Can he be prosecuted?”
“Almost certainly. The question is whether he is the architect or the man standing in front of the architect.”
“He says he didn’t know.”
“Do you believe him?”
I looked out at the passing traffic. “I believe he knows more than he tells me.”
“That may be enough to hurt him.”
When I returned home, Graham was waiting in the library with a folder open on the table.
“You hired Vivian Price.”
“You have spies in coffee shops now?”
“I have people who report threats to me.”
“She isn’t a threat.”
“She has represented three men who tried to dismantle my company.”
“Perhaps they had good reasons.”
His eyes sharpened. “You’re provoking me.”
“I’m speaking.”
Graham rose. “You cannot go to Savannah alone.”
“I drove there yesterday.”
“That was before someone photographed you.”
“Then photograph me again. I’m not going to live in a locked house because your enemies discovered I exist.”
He came closer. “You don’t understand what they’ll do.”
“Then explain it.”
“I can’t.”
“You won’t.”
The folder on the table contained a map of Charleston Harbor, with red marks along the docks.
“What is that?”
“Nothing you need to worry about.”
I laughed once, without humor. “You keep saying that as if worry is something you can confiscate.”
Graham placed both hands on the table. “There are rules in this house.”
“I’m familiar with them.”
“You don’t leave without security.”
“No.”
“You don’t speak to anyone about the documents.”
“No.”
“You don’t meet Agent Reed.”
“Absolutely not.”
His expression turned cold. “Elena.”
“You don’t get to issue rules to the woman whose name may be attached to a federal indictment.”
For several seconds, neither of us moved.
Then he said quietly, “I did love you.”
The past tense entered the room like smoke.
“Did?”
“I do.”
“You laughed that our marriage was an investment.”
“I was speaking to men who would have used any sign of weakness against me.”
“So you used me first.”
His jaw tightened. “You heard one conversation.”
“I heard the conversation you chose to have when you thought I couldn’t.”
“There are things you don’t know.”
“Then tell me.”
He looked toward the windows, where the harbor was turning silver in the morning light.
“Not yet.”
I stepped back. “Then nothing changes.”
“Everything has changed.”
“Not for you.”
I left him there.
That afternoon, I returned to the old Calloway Maritime offices to retrieve a box of my architectural drawings. The building had been closed for renovation, but Graham’s assistant had given me a key.
In the basement archive, I found my box beneath a shelf of tax records. As I pulled it free, a loose panel behind the shelves shifted.
There was a narrow cavity in the wall.
Inside lay a ledger wrapped in oilcloth and a second photograph.
The photograph showed Graham’s father standing beside a much younger man I recognized from the news.
Dorian Voss, now the head of the rival Voss shipping syndicate.
May you like
On the back, someone had written a date from twenty-two years earlier.
The date my father died.
