Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN WAITING DOWNSTAIRS
Matthew kissed Lauren before the elevator reached the lobby.
The camera recorded everything.
His hand around her waist.
Her fingers adjusting his crooked tie.
The whispered laughter between them.
The complete absence of panic on the face of a man who had just beaten his wife twenty times.
At 11:24 p.m., they walked through the lobby together.
Matthew did not look back.
Lauren did.
She glanced toward the security camera with a slow, satisfied smile, as though she wanted someone to know she had won.
Detective Ortiz watched the footage twice.
Then she ordered the building manager to copy every recording from the previous forty-eight hours.
Across Manhattan, Matthew believed the night was unfolding exactly as he had planned.
He and Lauren entered a private suite at the St. Regis shortly before midnight.
Lauren poured champagne.
Matthew opened his laptop.
Then the first message appeared.
CREDIT FACILITY TEMPORARILY SUSPENDED.
He frowned and refreshed the page.
A second notification arrived.
Sterling National Bank had frozen a sixty-million-dollar revolving line of credit.
A third message followed.
Whitmore Ventures was postponing its scheduled investment.
Then another.
And another.
Within three minutes, seven members of the NexusCore board had requested an emergency meeting.
Lauren watched the color drain from Matthew’s face.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
He typed rapidly.
“That doesn’t look like nothing.”
“It’s a technical issue.”
His phone began ringing.
The chief financial officer.
The chairman.
The company’s outside counsel.
Two investors.
Matthew silenced every call.
Lauren crossed the room and took the phone from his hand.
“You told me Clare had no relationship with her family.”
“She doesn’t.”
“You said her father cut her off.”
“He did.”
Lauren turned the screen toward him.
A breaking-news alert from a financial publication had already appeared.
STERLING CAPITAL HALTS NEXUSCORE FUNDING PENDING INTERNAL REVIEW.
Lauren’s expression changed.
“You said Jonathan Sterling did not care what happened to her.”
“He doesn’t.”
“Then why is he setting your company on fire?”
Matthew slammed the laptop shut.
“Because Clare called him.”
Lauren went still.
“You left her with her phone?”
“I left her on the floor.”
“That was not my question.”
Matthew stepped closer.
His eyes narrowed.
“Be careful.”
Lauren stared at him.
For months, she had believed she understood the arrangement between them.
Matthew was trapped in a loveless marriage.
Clare was spoiled, unstable, and emotionally cruel.
The divorce would be completed quietly.
Lauren would become the wife standing beside the youngest technology billionaire in New York.
That was the future Matthew had promised her.
But a man capable of leaving his wife injured on a floor was not a man controlled by love.
He was controlled by fear.
And frightened men rarely kept their promises.
“What exactly did you do to her?”
Matthew poured himself another drink.
“I taught her a lesson.”
Lauren stared at the bourbon trembling against the rim of his glass.
“How bad?”
“She’ll survive.”
“That is not an answer.”
He turned away.
Lauren reached for her handbag.
“We need to go back.”
Matthew looked over his shoulder.
“Why?”
“There are things in the penthouse.”
“What things?”
“The property notice.”
“I destroyed it.”
“The photographs.”
“Gone.”
“The blue folder from your office?”
Matthew stopped moving.
Lauren’s voice dropped.
“You told me you moved it.”
He said nothing.
Her face tightened.
“Matthew, the folder contains the Hamptons accounts.”
“It also contains Clare’s signature.”
“A forged signature.”
The room fell silent.
Lauren stepped closer.
“If the police search that apartment and find those documents, this stops being an affair.”
Matthew set down the glass.
“It becomes fraud.”
His phone vibrated again.
This time, the caller was his attorney.
He answered.
“What?”
The attorney spoke for less than ten seconds.
Matthew’s expression collapsed.
“Say that again.”
Lauren watched his fingers tighten around the phone.
“What do you mean the police are already there?”
Another pause.
Then Matthew looked toward the hotel window.
Far below, red and blue lights moved through the Manhattan streets.
His attorney continued speaking.
Matthew slowly turned toward Lauren.
“They found the cane.”
Lauren swallowed.
“They also have security footage of us leaving together.”
For the first time that night, Lauren’s confidence vanished.
“What are you going to do?”
Matthew looked at the locked hotel door.
Then at the laptop.
May you like
Then at the woman who knew where every hidden account had been buried.
“I’m going to make sure Clare never gets the chance to testify.”
