Chapter 5 - Emilee Remembers the Blue Folder
Jessica called Rachel immediately.
“Is Emilee with you?”
“Yes. She’s eating pancakes.”
Jessica pressed her fingers against her forehead.
“Put me on speaker.”
A second later, Emilee’s small voice came through.
“Mom?”
Jessica closed her eyes.
“Hi, baby.”
“Did Dad go to jail?”
“No.”
“Is he going to?”
Jessica glanced at Marcus.
He looked away.
“I don’t know.”
Emilee was quiet.
Then she said, “I’m mad at him.”
“You’re allowed to be.”
“I’m mad at that lady too.”
Jessica looked at Anna.
Anna lowered her eyes.
“That lady was lied to as well.”
“But she kissed Dad.”
“Yes.”
“Did she know about me?”
Jessica’s throat tightened.
“She knew he had a daughter. She didn’t know he was still married to me.”
Emilee thought about that.
Then, as children sometimes did, she changed direction without warning.
“Mom, is the blue folder bad?”
Jessica opened her eyes.
“What blue folder?”
“The one Dad told me not to touch.”
The room changed.
Marcus leaned forward.
Jessica kept her voice gentle.
“When did you see it?”
“Before his trip.”
“Where?”
“In your office.”
Jessica’s pulse jumped.
Daniel rarely entered Jessica’s home office unless she was there.
“What was he doing?”
“He was taking pictures.”
Of course he was.
“Pictures of what?”
“The blue folder.”
Jessica stood.
She knew exactly which folder Emilee meant.
She kept original corporate share certificates, family trust summaries, and old signature exemplars in a blue archival binder inside a locked cabinet.
The cabinet key was hidden in a ceramic bird on the top shelf.
Only Jessica knew that.
Or she had believed only Jessica knew.
“Emilee, did Dad open the cabinet?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“He got the bird.”
Jessica’s skin prickled.
“How did he know where the key was?”
“I told him.”
The guilt in Emilee’s voice was immediate.
“He said you needed it and I remembered.”
Jessica’s heart broke.
“Oh, sweetheart. You did nothing wrong.”
“But—”
“Nothing. Do you hear me?”
Emilee started crying.
Jessica fought to keep her own voice steady.
“Daddy asked you a normal question. You trusted him because he’s your dad. That is not your fault.”
Marcus wrote something on a legal pad.
Jessica asked one more question.
“Did you see anyone else?”
Emilee sniffed.
“No.”
Then she paused.
“Wait.”
Jessica’s fingers tightened around the phone.
“What?”
“Dad was talking to Aunt Nora.”
Jessica felt the floor vanish again.
“On the phone?”
“No. On the computer.”
Video call.
“What did she say?”
“I don’t know.”
“Anything you remember.”
Emilee hesitated.
“She said, ‘Make sure you get the page with the red stamp.’”
Marcus looked at Jessica.
Jessica knew the page.
The red-stamped document was the original amendment to the Emilee Carter Family Trust.
It contained a special protection Jessica’s father had insisted on before his death.
No one could pledge trust assets as collateral unless Jessica signed in person before the trust attorney.
Daniel could copy it.
He could forge it.
But he could not satisfy the clause.
Unless someone changed the copy before sending it to the lender.
Marcus was already dialing.
“Who is the trust attorney?” he asked.
“Elaine Foster.”
Within minutes, Elaine confirmed the original trust amendment in her vault had never changed.
The version submitted to the lender omitted the in-person requirement.
Someone had altered the document.
That meant the loan itself might be challengeable.
For the first time all morning, Jessica saw a path through the disaster.
Then Priya spoke from her laptop.
“I recovered login history from your company cloud.”
Jessica turned.
“Nora accessed a restricted archive at two thirteen this morning.”
“What archive?”
“Executive HR and board records.”
Jessica frowned.
“Why?”
Priya clicked.
“She downloaded your psychiatric leave paperwork from four years ago.”
Jessica went cold.
Four years earlier, after a miscarriage, Jessica had taken six weeks away from work.
She had attended grief counseling.
Nora had been the person who convinced her not to feel ashamed of it.
Now Nora had downloaded those records the night before the emergency board meeting.
Marcus looked grim.
“They’re building a competence case.”
Jessica stared at the screen.
The theft was only one half of the plan.
The other half was to portray her as unstable, remove her as CEO, seize control of the company through emergency governance, and bury the fraud beneath the chaos.
Then Rachel texted.
A photograph appeared.
Emilee had taken it two weeks earlier while playing with stickers in Jessica’s office.
In the background, Daniel stood beside the open cabinet.
On Jessica’s desk lay the blue folder.
And beside Daniel’s hand was a second phone Jessica had never seen before.
On its screen, frozen in the photograph, was a video call.
The face was blurry.
May you like
But the necklace around the caller’s throat was unmistakable.
Jessica had given it to Nora for her fortieth birthday.
