Chapter 2 - The Audit of Reed House
The rain started around midnight, drumming a heavy, relentless tattoo against the copper gutters of Reed House. By 7:45 a.m., the gray maritime mist had swallowed the Charleston harbor, turning the water into a sheet of hammered pewter.
Claire stood outside the heavy mahogany double doors of the second-floor private office. Her Honda civic had sputtered twice on the way across the bridge, and the nagging rattle in the engine had grown into a metallic shriek that signaled an expensive repair she couldn't afford. She had spent the last twenty minutes in the downstairs restroom smoothing down her dark trousers and trying to quiet the knot of anxiety twisting in her stomach.
She didn't want Nathan Reed’s charity. She knew how powerful men operated; they threw money at inconveniences the way people tossed breadcrumbs to pigeons, expecting gratitude and compliance in return.
She raised her hand and knocked twice.
“Come in.”
The office was vast, smelling of aged leather, pipe tobacco, and fresh parchment. Unlike the pristine, sterile public rooms downstairs, this space looked lived-in. Books lined the walls from floor to ceiling; nautical charts from the nineteenth century were framed between the windows; and a massive oak desk dominated the center of the room, covered in neat stacks of architectural blueprints, financial ledgers, and legal briefs.
Nathan sat behind the desk, wearing a charcoal turtleneck instead of his usual three-piece suit. He looked up immediately as Claire entered.
“You’re punctual,” he observed, gesturing to the leather armchair opposite him. “Sit.”
“I prefer to stand, Mr. Reed,” Claire said, keeping her hands clasped in front of her. “You mentioned yesterday that you wanted to discuss estate management. If this is about last night—about Lily being where she shouldn't have been—I’m ready to hand in my resignation to Apex right now. You don't need to invent a consulting job to punish me or to make sure I don't sue for wrongful termination.”
Nathan stared at her for several seconds. Then, a slow, humorless smile touched the corners of his mouth.
“You think I’m inventing a job to manage liability?”
“It’s happened before,” Claire said bluntly. “Wealthy employers get nervous when working-class people see them vulnerable. You want to keep me close, control my schedule, and make sure I don't talk about what I saw in the sunroom.”
Nathan leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over his stomach. “If I wanted to silence someone, Claire, I wouldn't offer them a corner office and triple pay. I’d have my corporate lawyers draft a nondisclosure agreement with enough penalties to bankrupt a small county.”
He reached across the desk and slid a thick, leather-bound ledger toward her.
“Open it.”
Reluctantly, Claire stepped forward and opened the cover. The pages were filled with meticulous handwritten entries dating back three years—inventories of silver, wine cellars, art restoration logs, and payroll disbursements.
“Recognize this?” Nathan asked.
“It’s Abigail’s household ledger,” Claire said, scanning the neat, elegant handwriting. “She managed the estate herself before she got sick.”
“Correct,” Nathan said. “And do you know what happened to this ledger after she passed away seven months ago?”
“Lydia took over.”
“Lydia took over,” Nathan repeated, his voice dropping into a harder register. “And in the last seven months, operating expenses for this house have increased by forty-two percent. Maintenance schedules have been cut in half. Three long-term kitchen staff members were let go under mysterious circumstances, replaced by an outside agency charging double the hourly rate.”
Claire looked up, surprised. “Lydia is efficient. Everyone respects her.”
“Lydia is loyal to the bottom line of the corporate holding company that manages my real estate portfolio,” Nathan corrected, standing up and walking to the window. “A holding company that my late wife’s brother, Julian Vance, has been quietly attempting to restructure behind my back.”
The name hung in the air like a drop of ice water. Julian Vance was a prominent figure in Charleston real estate—a man known for aggressive corporate takeovers, luxury condominium developments, and a ruthless ambition that had frequently clashed with Abigail’s preservationist ideals.
“What does Julian have to do with your household staff?” Claire asked cautiously.
“Everything,” Nathan turned to face her, his eyes dark with a suppressed storm. “When Abigail died, she left her personal trust—including the deed to Reed House and five million dollars in endowment funds—to be distributed according to a memorandum of wishes stored in this very office. But that memorandum has vanished.”
Claire’s breath hitched. “Vanished?”
“Stolen,” Nathan said flatly. “Three days after the funeral, the safe in the back library was accessed using Abigail’s private biometric code. The only people who knew that code were myself, our family physician, and Lydia Barnes.”
Claire stepped back, her mind racing. “And you think Lydia—?”
“I don't think,” Nathan interrupted. “I know she’s been reporting directly to Julian. Every dinner party, every donor gala, every operational decision made in this house over the last six months has been designed to wear me down, isolate me from my network, and force me to declare incompetence so Julian can legally petition the court for conservatorship of the estate.”
He walked back to the desk, stopping just inches from Claire.
“I don't need a cleaner today, Claire. I need an investigator. Someone who isn't on Julian’s payroll, someone who knows what it’s like to look at the underside of this city’s polished surface, and someone who isn't afraid of Lydia Barnes.”
Claire looked down at the ledger, then up at the millionaire who had everything in the world yet felt entirely powerless in his own home.
May you like
“And if I say no?”
“Then you go back to scrubbing toilets for minimum wage,” Nathan said quietly. “And I spend the rest of my life watching everything Abigail built get carved up into luxury parking lots and boutique hotels.”
