Chapter 4 - The Second SpreadsheetLena Ortiz was found twelve hours later.
Alive.
She had checked into a motel under her middle name.
When Vivian asked why she had disappeared, Lena gave a simple answer.
“I panicked.”
She had discovered the second spreadsheet Thursday night.
The internal board version claimed nine hundred redundancies.
The bank-financing version projected fifteen hundred.
Then Lena found a third calculation.
A private file.
That version expected nearly two thousand employees to be removed within twelve months.
Why?
Because Adrian’s team had overstated Westbridge’s profitability.
The acquisition only made financial sense if labor costs were gutted.
“But that still doesn’t explain hiding it from the board,” Vivian said.
Lena looked at her.
“There’s something else.”
Westbridge owned three distribution properties in California.
Their book value was listed at $90 million.
Adrian’s team knew a redevelopment company had quietly offered $240 million.
Hartwell would acquire Westbridge cheaply.
Then sell the properties.
The transaction would create an enormous short-term profit.
“Who owns the redevelopment company?”
“That’s what scared me.”
Lena handed Vivian the ownership chart.
Three shell companies.
One family trust.
Beneficial owner:
Graham Cross.
Adrian’s father.
Vivian stared.
Adrian was engineering a deal in which Hartwell would buy assets, destroy much of the target workforce, and then sell the most valuable properties to his own family’s investment vehicle.
At a below-market price.
“How much would the Cross family make?”
“Possibly a hundred million.”
Vivian closed the folder.
“Does Melissa know?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why did you run?”
Lena showed her phone.
A photograph of her apartment building.
Message:
Stop digging.
Same method used against Evelyn.
Vivian’s anger became cold.
“Who knew you found the file?”
“Adrian.”
“Anyone else?”
“I emailed Melissa.”
“When?”
“Friday at six fourteen.”
“Response?”
“None.”
Vivian returned to headquarters and summoned Melissa Grant.
Melissa entered ten minutes later.
“You wanted to see me?”
Vivian placed Lena’s email on the table.
“Did you receive this?”
Melissa read it.
Her face changed.
“No.”
“It was sent to your account.”
“I never saw it.”
“The system shows it was opened.”
Melissa sat.
“I did not open this.”
Vivian studied her.
“You understand how that sounds.”
“Yes.”
“Your credentials changed the model.”
“I know.”
“From your house.”
“I wasn’t home Friday night.”
“Where were you?”
Melissa hesitated.
“At a hotel.”
“With?”
Her expression hardened.
“That is personal.”
“Right now, personal information may be the only thing separating you from a fraud investigation.”
Melissa looked away.
Then whispered:
“With Martin Hale.”
Vivian went still.
“The chairman?”
“Yes.”
“Relationship?”
“Two years.”
That changed everything.
Martin Hale.
The man who recruited Vivian.
The man who approved her appointment.
The board chairman.
Vivian did not care about the affair.
She cared that Melissa had been with Martin while her credentials were being used from home.
“Who has access to your house?”
“My housekeeper.”
“Anyone else?”
Melissa stared at Vivian.
Then slowly said:
“Adrian.”
“Why?”
“My younger sister dates him.”
Vivian sat back.
There it was.
“Does he have a key?”
“He has visited.”
“Could he access your computer?”
Melissa’s face went pale.
“Yes.”
Vivian called cybersecurity.
Physical access logs showed Adrian’s corporate phone connected to a cell tower near Melissa’s home Friday between 8:12 and 9:03 p.m.
He had claimed he was at dinner in Midtown.
Now Vivian had evidence of fraud.
But she wanted the entire network.
“Do not confront him,” she told Melissa.
“What are you going to do?”
Vivian looked toward the rainy skyline.
“Let him think the deal is alive.”
Melissa stared.
“You’re going to restart the acquisition?”
“Publicly.”
“That’s risky.”
“So is warning him.”
Vivian called Adrian into her office the next morning.
He entered cautiously.
She had deliberately hung the cleaned cream trench coat behind her chair.
He noticed it.
“Mr. Cross.”
“Ms. Hart.”
“I may have been too aggressive yesterday.”
Adrian blinked.
Vivian continued.
“The Westbridge deadline matters.”
“Yes.”
“I want the acquisition presented for conditional approval Friday.”
His eyes brightened.
“Absolutely.”
“But I need updated numbers.”
“Of course.”
“And complete transparency.”
He smiled.
“You’ll have it.”
Vivian smiled back.
“I’m counting on you.”
Adrian left thinking he had survived.
Vivian waited until the elevator doors closed.
Then told Claire:
“Now we see what he destroys.”
That night, Adrian deleted forty-three files.
Cybersecurity preserved every one.
And among them was a folder named:
V.H. contingency.
Vivian opened it.
Inside was a photograph taken Monday morning.
Vivian standing on the sidewalk.
Covered in mud.
Below it, a message from Adrian to an unknown recipient:
New CEO looks easier than expected.
Vivian stared at the words.
May you like
Then smiled.
He had been wrong twice in one morning.
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