Chapter 9 - Anna Reveals What Daniel Promised
The bank blocked the second transfer within seven minutes.
By then Nora had left Carter & Bloom through the underground garage.
Security footage showed her carrying one laptop bag and nothing else.
Police were notified.
Jessica expected relief.
Instead, she felt exhausted.
The betrayal had become too large to feel in one piece.
Anna sat beside her in Marcus’s office, scrolling through months of messages with Daniel.
“I keep thinking there had to be a moment when I should have known.”
Jessica looked at her.
“There probably was.”
Anna flinched.
Jessica did not apologize.
She was trying not to be cruel, but she also refused to lie for comfort.
Anna nodded.
“You’re right.”
She opened a voice message Daniel had sent six weeks earlier.
His voice filled the conference room.
“I just need to get through the board transition. Once Jessica signs off, we’re free. No more hiding. Lisbon, maybe Barcelona. Somewhere Emilee can visit when things settle.”
Jessica closed her eyes.
He had used their daughter’s name inside the fantasy he sold another woman.
Anna stopped the recording.
“I believed he was getting divorced.”
“You never asked to see papers?”
“I did.”
She opened a PDF.
A divorce petition.
Jessica’s name appeared at the top.
The case number looked legitimate.
Marcus checked it against the county court system.
No such case existed.
Daniel had fabricated an entire filing.
Anna stared at the screen.
“Who does this?”
Jessica answered before she could stop herself.
“My husband.”
The room went quiet.
Anna looked down.
“He told me you were controlling.”
Jessica almost laughed.
Of course.
“He said you used the company to control every decision. That you threatened to keep Emilee from him if he left.”
Jessica’s eyes burned.
“I have never threatened that.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because of the airport.”
Jessica frowned.
Anna continued.
“When Emilee screamed at him to let you go, you didn’t tell her to hate him. You didn’t use her against him. You were trying to get her out of the middle.”
Jessica looked away.
The observation landed somewhere tender.
Anna then revealed the part she had been afraid to say.
Daniel had asked her to open a separate bank account.
He told her it was for a consulting business they would build together after his divorce.
Anna had opened it.
She had given Daniel the routing number.
Marcus immediately asked for the records.
A deposit had appeared overnight.
$184,000.
Exactly the amount listed in the Northstar spreadsheet.
Anna stood so quickly the chair rolled backward.
“I didn’t know.”
Marcus raised a hand.
“Don’t touch the funds. Don’t transfer them. We’ll notify the bank and investigators.”
Anna was shaking.
“He did it after the airport?”
Priya checked the timestamp.
The deposit had cleared at 3:18 a.m.
Someone had triggered it after the scheme was already exposed.
Jessica understood.
“They still want you to look guilty.”
Anna covered her face.
Then she remembered something.
“Daniel said something strange in Boston.”
“What?”
“He asked whether I trusted him enough to carry something through customs without opening it.”
Marcus’s expression sharpened.
“What did you say?”
“I laughed. I thought he was joking.”
“What was it?”
“He never showed me.”
Jessica’s mind went to the safe-deposit box.
The hardware wallet.
The sealed envelope.
Maybe the money was not the only thing they intended to move.
Anna searched her messages.
“There.”
A photo Daniel had sent.
It showed a slim silver case on a hotel desk.
Beside it was a handwritten note.
Nora has the access key.
Jessica stared.
Not Daniel.
Nora.
That meant the hardware wallet could contain funds Daniel could not access alone.
The partnership had required both of them.
Until one betrayed the other.
Priya cross-referenced the company’s cryptocurrency disclosures.
Carter & Bloom held no digital assets.
So whatever was on that wallet was not company property.
Marcus called the investigator handling the bank fraud.
An hour later, law enforcement obtained authority to secure the safe-deposit box.
The hardware wallet was still there.
So was the sealed envelope.
The envelope contained a flash drive.
On it was a video.
Daniel appeared on screen, seated in his study.
The date was four months earlier.
He looked directly into the camera.
“If you’re watching this, Nora has tried to cut me out.”
Jessica stared.
Daniel continued.
“She designed Northstar. She altered the trust documents. She told me how to remove Jessica from the company without triggering the shareholder protections.”
Anna whispered, “He recorded insurance against her.”
Then Daniel said something stranger.
“Nora thinks this is about seven million dollars.”
Jessica leaned closer.
“It isn’t.”
Daniel looked almost amused on screen.
“The real money comes after Jessica is removed.”
The video ended.
No explanation.
May you like
Just one sentence that opened an even larger question.
What real money?
