Part 4

At seven o’clock the following morning, the sun broke through the Boston fog, casting pale gray light across the intensive care waiting room.

Noah had finally been transferred off the high-flow oxygen cannula to standard monitoring, his fever broken, sleeping peacefully under a yellow knitted blanket.

I sat in an armchair by the corner window, reviewing forty-eight pages of credit vouchers Patrick had compiled overnight.

The heavy double doors of the waiting room banged open.

Celeste Morgan marched into the room, her designer sunglasses pushed onto her golden hair, wearing a cashmere wrap that still carried the scent of airport duty-free perfume.

Daniel followed behind her, looking hollow-eyed and disheveled, having spent the night pacing the parking garage.

"Grace," Celeste began, her voice carrying an artificial, rehearsed confidence as she stopped before my chair.

"Daniel called me at six this morning in tears.

What you are doing to this firm is reckless, vindictive, and completely unprofessional."

I didn't stand up.

I didn't raise my voice.

I merely looked at her shoes—expensive Italian sandals entirely inappropriate for a forty-degree November morning in New England.

"Miss Morgan," I said quietly.

"You are trespassing on a pediatric intensive care ward."

"I am an executive partner at Mercer Urban," Celeste countered, lifting her chin.

"And Daniel authorized my travel expenses as an essential business development stipend."

"An essential stipend?"

I lifted the top voucher from Patrick’s stack.

"Let's review the essentials.

Four thousand dollars at a five-star spa on Soufrière Bay.

Twelve hundred dollars for vintage champagne delivered to a private catamaran.

And eighteen thousand dollars charged to our commercial capital improvements card at a duty-free jewelry boutique in Castries."

Celeste’s eyes widened slightly, her confident veneer developing its first visible hairline crack.

"Those were legitimate promotional expenditures meant to entertain potential Caribbean investors," she insisted, though her fingers began to twist the strap of her bag.

"The invoice lists a platinum tennis bracelet inscribed with the initials *C.M. from D.M.*," I said, reading the certified jeweler's transcript aloud.

"Did the Caribbean investors request that specific inscription, Celeste?"

Daniel lunged forward, his face burning with deep, humiliated panic.

"Grace, stop it!

Just stop!

Celeste didn't do anything wrong!

I approved the charges!

If you want to punish someone, punish me, but don't drag her into this!"

"Oh, she is already dragged in, Daniel," a crisp, commanding voice announced from the doorway.

Arthur Bennett, my father's veteran estate litigator, stepped into the room, flanked by two uniformed Boston police officers and an investigator from the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Economic Crimes Division.

"Celeste Morgan," the investigator said, stepping forward with an open leather shield.

"We have a grand jury subpoena for all electronic devices, travel vouchers, and bank records in your possession relating to wire transfers originating from Mercer Urban Development."

Celeste backed against the wall, her sunglasses slipping down her nose as she looked between Daniel and the police officers.

"Daniel... what is this?

You told me your wife was a housewife who couldn't balance a checkbook!"