Chapter 12 - What Marcus Knew
I looked at my husband until he finally met my eyes.
“I didn't know,” he said.
“That's your third version of not knowing today.”
He flinched. “I deserve that.”
Franklin examined Marcus's identification and the form. “Someone submitted a scan of your license.”
“Celia keeps copies of all our IDs,” Marcus said. “For estate records.”
Grace asked a sharper question. “Would she expect you to cooperate if the appointment were approved?”
He stared at the carpet. “Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I almost always have.”
No one spoke for a moment. Evelyn pulled out a chair.
“Sit,” she told him. “You don't get to disappear into shame. Tell us the first time you knew money was missing.”
Marcus told us about a vendor invoice he'd questioned eight months earlier, about Victor calling him disloyal, about Celia promising the grants would be restored before the annual audit. He described signing the renewal because the clinic needed its next payment. Each choice had seemed small to him at the time. Together they had formed a wall around the truth.
“Did you know they were using Jonah's picture without permission?” I asked.
“No.”
“Did you know Tasha was threatened?”
“No.”
“Did you know I was being pushed out of meetings because I wouldn't approve the numbers?”
He answered softly. “Yes.”
There it was. The answer I had feared most.
“You watched them humiliate me,” I said, “because you thought the alternative would cost you your place at the table.”
“Yes.”
Evelyn turned away. Franklin closed his briefcase.
Grace asked Marcus to surrender his company laptop for forensic preservation and stop accessing foundation systems. He agreed without bargaining.
At the door, he said, “I'll tell the truth even if you never forgive me.”
May you like
“That is the first useful thing you can do,” I said.
After he left, Grace received a call from the foundation's outside accountant. He had found something in the payroll reports: a monthly payment to my father continued for six weeks after his death.
