Chapter 14 - The Name in the File
Malik's mother, Simone Johnson, had died four years earlier. David stood so abruptly his chair scraped the floor.
“Choose your next words carefully,” he said.
Harold blinked. “I mean his mother—his guardian. The travel profile said a woman authorized the trip.”
Evelyn had submitted the minor-travel form, but she hadn't contacted Elliot. The mismatch exposed how little Harold had checked before inventing an explanation.
Rachel stopped the interview and asked him to clarify whether he knew the source personally. He did not. He had assumed the emergency-contact field meant a parent and repeated Elliot's claim.
David sat back down, hands shaking beneath the table. For one terrible second, Harold had dragged his dead wife's name into the room to cover a lie.
Later, Malik found his father on Evelyn's back porch.
“Grandma said you had a hard day.”
David tried to smile. “You could say that.”
“Did somebody say something about Mom?”
“Something careless. They didn't know her.”
Malik sat beside him. “I remember how she used to sing when she burned pancakes.”
David laughed, unexpectedly and painfully. “She burned them on purpose after a while. You liked the crispy edges.”
They stayed outside until the porch light came on. The investigation mattered, but so did the ordinary work of keeping a family whole.
Inside, Marissa reviewed the investor disclosures and discovered a discrepancy: a consulting payment connected to the Vance affiliate had been described as airport customer research. The actual invoice mentioned passenger-priority analytics.
There was no immediate proof of misuse, but the description pointed toward access to passenger data.
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A board member had approved the invoice without declaring his financial interest.
His name was Richard Vance, Elliot's father.
