Chapter 6 - The Brass Key
Natalie refused to answer when I called.
Detective Ruiz traced the message unsuccessfully.
The phone had already been turned off.
But her words changed everything.
Laura had survived.
At least for a while.
I went back to the metal box.
The brass key had a number engraved on one side.
Megan recognized the logo stamped on the other.
A private bank downtown.
By noon, I was sitting across from a bank manager with Detective Ruiz.
The key opened safe-deposit box 418.
The bank confirmed it had been rented by Laura six weeks before her death.
Inside were copies of financial ledgers.
Photographs.
A small notebook.
And another sealed envelope.
The ledgers showed more than embezzlement.
Nearly eight million dollars had been moved through shell companies controlled by Grant.
But his signature was not the only one appearing repeatedly.
Peter Shaw.
My family attorney.
Peter had handled Laura’s estate.
He had helped me sell her car.
He had prepared my will after I married Natalie.
He had been sitting at my kitchen table less than two months earlier.
The photographs were worse.
One showed Grant meeting Natalie in a parking garage.
Another showed Peter beside them.
The date was the day before Laura’s crash.
Then I opened Laura’s notebook.
She had written everything she knew.
Grant had discovered a method of moving company money into private accounts.
Peter created the legal entities.
Natalie helped copy internal passwords from employees.
Laura accidentally discovered the scheme while reviewing documents for a charity foundation.
She intended to tell me.
Then I reached the final page.
One sentence had been underlined three times.
Grant knows I have proof.
Natalie wants to help me, but she is terrified of Peter.
I looked at Ruiz.
“Peter.”
Ruiz was already reaching for his phone.
Then the bank manager returned.
“There is one more item.”
He placed a sealed security envelope on the table.
Inside was a memory card.
The label contained two words.
HIGHWAY CAMERA.
Ruiz inserted it into his laptop.
The video was dark and grainy.
Laura’s car appeared.
Thirty seconds later, another vehicle entered the frame.
Grant’s black SUV.
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And behind Grant’s SUV was Peter Shaw’s silver sedan.
Both vehicles followed my wife into the night.
