Chapter 3 - The Paper Trail
At 7:45 a.m. on Monday morning, the third-floor office of Avery Claims Group smelled like stale drip coffee, old paper, and wet winter coats.
Clare sat at her desk, her computer screen casting a pale blue glow over three open folders of property liens. She wore a simple burgundy cardigan, black trousers, and her dark hair pulled back into a neat clip.
She hadn't slept well over the weekend.
Every time she closed her eyes, she felt the warm, heavy pressure of Leandro Vitali’s hand against the small of her back. She kept replaying the waltz, the way his gravelly voice sounded in her ear, and the terrifying, electric charge that had passed between them in front of six hundred people.
He was just being nice, she tried to tell herself for the hundredth time, taking a sip of her lukewarm coffee. He wanted to spite Wesley and Blair. He’s a billionaire mobster—or close enough—and I’m a woman who buys her clothes off the clearance rack at Macy’s. It was one night.
The glass door to the office suite suddenly flew open with a loud thud.
Arthur Avery, the sixty-two-year-old owner of the firm—a short, balding man with wire-rimmed glasses and a permanent nervous twitch—stumbled into the room. He was clutching a morning cup of coffee so hard the paper cup was crushed in his fist.
"Clare!" Arthur gasped, his eyes wide behind his lenses. "Clare, tell me you didn't do anything illegal over the weekend."
Clare frowned, setting her mug down. "What are you talking about, Arthur?"
"There are two black suburban SUVs parked in our loading zone!" Arthur hissed, rushing over to her desk and pointing wildly toward the window. "Four guys in dark suits with earpieces are standing near the elevator! The security guard downstairs almost called the police until one of them showed him an executive badge from Vitali Architectural!"
Clare’s heart gave a sudden, violent thud against her ribs.
Before she could stand up, heavy footsteps echoed in the hallway outside.
The frosted glass door opened again.
Leandro Vitali walked in.
He was breathtaking. He wore a dark navy three-piece suit made of wool so fine it looked like polished slate. His dark hair was combed back, exposing the sharp, scarred line of his jaw. He carried a heavy, dark-leather briefcase in his right hand.
Behind him stepped two large security guards who remained stationed by the door, instantly turning their backs to protect the entryway.
Arthur Avery looked as though he were about to suffer a massive coronary event. "M-Mr. Vitali... good morning, sir! Welcome to Avery Claims Group! How... how can we serve you?"
Leandro didn't even look at Arthur. His good hazel eye went straight to Clare.
"Ms. Donnelly," Leandro said softly.
"Mr. Vitali," Clare replied, her voice remarkably steady despite the rapid pounding in her chest. "You're fifteen minutes early."
"I don't like waiting," Leandro said.
He walked over to her desk, set the heavy leather briefcase on the wooden surface, and unlatched the silver buckles. He opened the briefcase, pulled out a thick, black plastic binder sealed with yellow evidence tape, and laid it gently in front of her.
"What is this?" Clare asked, leaning forward.
"That," Leandro said, leaning his broad hands against the edge of her desk, bringing his scarred face within twelve inches of hers, "is the financial ledger for the North Loop Commercial Development Project."
Clare blinked. "Wesley Hartwell’s project?"
"The very same," Leandro murmured. "On Saturday night, after our dance, I ordered an immediate forensic audit of the steel and glass subcontracts on that site. My investigators discovered something interesting. Three million dollars of structural materials have been billed through an offshore shell company called Meridian Maritime."
Clare’s professional instincts instantly flared to life, burying her personal nervousness under a wave of sharp, intellectual curiosity. She pulled the binder toward her, snapping the yellow tape with a brass letter opener.
"Meridian Maritime," Clare murmured, flipping open the first page. She scanned the corporate registration codes, her eyes darting across the page numbers. "Registered in the Cayman Islands... secondary address in Delaware... Arthur, pass me the State Lien Registry database."
Arthur, still terrified, practically threw his tablet onto her desk before backing away into his private office and slamming the door shut.
Clare ignored her boss. She began typing rapidly with one hand while her other hand turned the pages of the ledger.
Leandro pulled up a wooden chair from the adjacent cubicle, turned it around, and sat down beside her, resting his broad arms across the backrest, watching her work.
For twenty minutes, the only sound in the office was the rapid clack of Clare’s keyboard and the soft rustle of turning pages.
"They're double-billing," Clare whispered suddenly, her eyes going wide as she stared at the screen. "Look here, Leandro."
She called him by his first name without even realizing it.
Leandro leaned in closer, his arm brushing against hers. "Show me."
"Wesley isn't just withholding your three hundred and forty thousand dollars," Clare explained, pointing her fingernail at a row of transaction figures. "He’s using Meridian Maritime to buy substandard structural bolts from an uncertified factory in East Europe, marking up the price by four hundred percent on paper, and submitting those fake receipts to the city insurance fund. He’s skimming the difference."
She turned her head to look at Leandro. Their faces were inches apart. She could see the tiny flecks of gold in his Hazel right eye and the intricate, pale networks of scar tissue along his jaw.
"The structural bolts holding the curtain wall anchors on the North Loop site are fake, Leandro," Clare whispered, horror dawning in her eyes. "If a winter storm hits that building while it's under construction, the whole north facade will collapse into the street."
Leandro’s eyes turned cold—a flat, terrifying slate grey.
"And if that building collapses," Leandro said softly, "my company's name is on the glass contract. I’ll be ruined. My father's name will be dragged through the mud, and Wesley Hartwell will collect a fifty-million-dollar insurance payout from his shell company."
He looked at Clare, his expression turning deadly serious.
"Can you prove this in court before the city inspector signs off on Thursday?" he asked.
May you like
Clare looked at the screen. She looked at the binder. Then she looked at the scarred man sitting beside her, trusting her with his family's legacy.
"Give me forty-eight hours," Clare said, a slow, determined smile spreading across her lips. "I’ll trace Meridian Maritime back to Wesley’s personal bank account if it’s the last thing I do."
