Chapter 3 - My Wife Had Been Investigating Someone Inside My Organization Before Her Death, and Theo Was the Only Child She Tried to ProtectI reopened Evelyn's old files.
For years, I'd avoided them.
Now I couldn't stop.
Her notes were hidden inside a medical textbook.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
Shipments.
And one repeated name.
Marcus Bell.
My financial director.
My closest adviser.
A man who had worked beside me for seventeen years.
I called him.
“Come to my office.”
He arrived quickly.
“What happened?”
I placed Evelyn's notes on the desk.
His face changed.
Only slightly.
But I noticed.
“You knew.”
“I don't know what you're talking about.”
“Who is Grace Carter?”
Silence.
He looked at the papers.
Then at me.
“She was a witness.”
“To what?”
“Your organization's financial transfers.”
I stared.
“What did she witness?”
Marcus hesitated.
“Your wife discovered that someone was moving money through your companies.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
I knew he was lying.
But I let him leave.
Then I searched the accounts.
Millions had been diverted.
Over twelve years.
The money went through shell companies.
One of them was controlled by a children's charity.
The same charity that had financed Theo's medical care after his mother died.
I felt sick.
My empire had been paying for the child without me knowing.
Evelyn had been protecting him using my own money.
Someone had allowed it.
Someone had been helping.
I found another letter.
Evelyn's handwriting.
Arthur,
If you're reading this, I failed to stop them.
Trust the boy.
He knows what they took from us.
I stared.
Theo?
A seven-year-old child knew something about my empire?
Then the final line:
Theodore is not Grace's only secret.
I froze.
Theo had a father.
And that father might be connected to my family.
I went to find Samuel.
He was hiding in an abandoned church.
Theo was asleep beside him.
Samuel saw me.
“You found us.”
“Yes.”
“You shouldn't have.”
“Tell me the truth.”
He looked at his son.
“I promised Grace.”
“Who is Theo's father?”
Samuel went pale.
“Your brother.”
My blood stopped.
I didn't have a brother.
At least, that's what my father had told me.
Samuel whispered the name.
“Thomas Pembroke.”
I staggered backward.
Thomas.
My father's firstborn son.
May you like
The brother I had been told died as an infant.
My entire life had been based on a lie.
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