Chapter 5 - The Dead Man's Bank Account

We met Adrian at a twenty-four-hour diner with sticky tables and a waitress who called everybody honey. He arrived alone, without the tuxedo, looking younger in a gray sweater and twice as tired.

Jo sat beside me with her laptop open. "Any sign we were followed?"

"I parked six blocks away," Adrian said. "Changed cars at my office."

"You get points for effort," she said. "Not trust."

Adrian slid a printout across the table. A wire transfer for $3.2 million had left a Sterling Foundation reserve account and landed in the name of Daniel A. Reyes. The approval used the same digital certificate that should have expired when my father died.

"Who received the money?" I asked.

"An escrow company. Pelican Harbor Services."

Jo typed the name. "Registered agent in Delaware. Two directors, both dead. Adorable."

"I tried to freeze it," Adrian said. "Someone with administrator access reversed my order."

"Who has that access?"

He took out his phone and showed us a list: his CFO, a compliance officer, and Vanessa.

I watched his face when I read her name. There was no satisfaction in it. He looked sick.

"You built the system," I said. "How could you not know?"

"Because I trusted the people approving charity transfers. You can call me stupid. I already have."

The diner waitress brought coffee. Jo thanked her, then turned the laptop toward us. "Pelican Harbor paid a property company this morning. Guess who owns the property?"

A picture of an abandoned riverfront warehouse appeared on the screen. The same brick building where Bellwether stored its paper records before the fire.

"My dad used to take me there," I said. "He'd let me stamp the backs of donation envelopes."

For a moment I smelled the old ink and heard him laughing because I stamped one on my own forehead.

Adrian touched the printout. "There's more. Your father's certificate was used to approve another transfer scheduled for tomorrow, 8 a.m."

"How much?"

"Forty-eight million."

Jo stopped typing.

"Conrad is moving the remaining trust assets," Adrian said. "If the transaction clears, whatever paper trail existed is gone."

My phone buzzed. A message from my mother: MARA, DO NOT GO TO B-14. THEY'RE WATCHING THE BOX.

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Then a second message came through.

I NEVER TOLD JO ABOUT THAT KEY.