Chapter 3 - THE DEAD MAN’S FILES
I could have sent men after Gavin immediately.
Five years earlier, I would have.
Age had taught me something power never did.
Sometimes the fastest way to lose the truth was to frighten the liar before you knew what he was hiding.
So I let the SUV disappear.
Jenny did not appreciate that.
“You know who that was?”
“I know who owns the vehicle.”
“And you’re just standing here?”
“I’m thinking.”
“My apartment was torn apart.”
“I noticed.”
“My husband is dead.”
“I noticed that too.”
Her eyes flashed.
“Then stop acting like this is a business meeting.”
That shut me up.
I looked at Evan.
He was sitting on the couch holding his stuffed dinosaur, watching us.
“You shouldn’t stay here tonight.”
Jenny folded her arms.
“You keep saying things like they’re decisions.”
“Fine. Would you like to stay somewhere with security tonight?”
“Where?”
“One of my hotels.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want my son sleeping somewhere owned by a stranger who might be connected to whatever killed his father.”
That sentence changed the room.
“You think David was killed?”
“I didn’t.”
“Until now.”
She looked toward the flash drive.
“Until now.”
David Reeves had supposedly died in a highway accident during a winter storm.
His car had gone through a guardrail near Joliet.
Police called it weather-related.
Jenny had accepted that because grief rarely has room for investigation.
Now she wasn’t so sure.
Neither was I.
Eventually, we compromised.
Jenny and Evan went to her sister’s apartment in Lincoln Park.
Two of my security men stayed across the street.
Jenny hated that.
She tolerated it because Evan thought they were “secret police.”
I took the flash drive to my office.
Marcus D’Angelo, my attorney, met me there with a forensic analyst named Priya Shah.
“Do not connect it to our network,” I said.
Priya gave me a look.
“I was planning to plug it into the casino slot machines.”
Marcus smirked.
I liked her immediately.
She used an isolated computer.
The drive was encrypted.
Password protected.
After twenty minutes, Priya looked at me.
“This could take hours.”
Jenny, who had insisted on coming after putting Evan to sleep at her sister’s, stood near the door.
“Try Evan’s birthday.”
Priya entered it.
Wrong.
“David’s birthday.”
Wrong.
“The day we got married.”
Wrong.
Jenny stared at the screen.
Then whispered, “Breathe easy.”
Priya looked over.
“What?”
“That’s what David always told Evan when he was scared. Breathe easy, buddy.”
She entered BREATHEEASY.
The drive opened.
Jenny sat down.
There were eight folders.
RENT ROLLS.
EVICTIONS.
VENDOR PAYMENTS.
RUSK.
LEGAL.
VITELLI.
Jenny slowly looked at me.
“I told you.”
“You told me you didn’t trust me. That was reasonable.”
Marcus opened the VITELLI folder.
Inside were corporate authorization forms.
My signature appeared on all of them.
I recognized immediately that they were fake.
“Those aren’t mine.”
Marcus leaned closer.
“Good copies.”
“What do they authorize?”
He read silently.
Then cursed.
Millions of dollars in property maintenance expenses.
Emergency plumbing contracts.
Roof replacements.
Electrical upgrades.
Security installations.
All approved under my name.
Priya checked vendor information.
The companies existed.
Technically.
But they shared mailing addresses.
Phone numbers.
Accounting firms.
Some had no employees.
Gavin had created fake maintenance vendors and billed Halberd for work that had never been performed.
Marcus did rough math.
“Fourteen million.”
Priya opened another folder.
“No.”
She scrolled.
“Closer to twenty-three.”
Jenny’s mouth fell open.
I felt nothing.
Not yet.
Anger came later for me.
First came clarity.
“David found it.”
Priya nodded.
“Looks like he started documenting discrepancies.”
The next file proved it.
David had written notes.
Gavin’s invoices inconsistent with building inspection records.
Rent receipts missing from tenant ledgers.
Cash payments not posted.
Late fees created after the fact.
Then something worse.
Evictions.
Gavin had targeted rent-controlled and long-term tenants in valuable buildings.
Payments were erased.
False notices created.
Service records forged.
Tenants were removed legally on paper.
Their apartments were renovated and rented at much higher rates.
Jenny whispered, “That’s what he did to us.”
“Why you?”
Marcus asked.
She stared at David’s files.
“Because David knew.”
Exactly.
The eviction was not about four months’ rent.
It was about getting Jenny out.
Once she was removed, management could legally clear the apartment.
During that process, David’s old possessions could disappear without looking suspicious.
Except Gavin had become impatient.
Someone had searched the apartment before the eviction completed.
Priya opened a folder labeled INSURANCE.
I leaned forward.
There were email screenshots.
David to Gavin.
I know what you’re doing. We need to report this.
Gavin to David.
Think carefully before you destroy careers over bookkeeping mistakes.
David:
These are not mistakes.
Then one final message.
Gavin:
You have a wife and kid. Act like it.
Jenny covered her mouth.
I turned toward Marcus.
“Get the police report from David’s accident.”
“Already requested.”
Priya opened another document.
“It gets worse.”
“How?”
She displayed a spreadsheet.
Payments had been sent monthly to a company called North Harbor Risk Consulting.
Marcus knew the name.
I could tell from his face.
“What?”
He slowly turned his laptop toward me.
North Harbor was owned by Victor Sloane.
That name I knew.
Everyone in my world knew it.
Sloane had once handled debt collection for criminal bookmakers.
Then he became respectable.
Private security.
Repossession.
Property enforcement.
The kind of businesses where intimidation could wear a tie.
“Why was Gavin paying Victor?” Marcus asked.
Priya scrolled through notes.
“David wanted to know the same thing.”
Jenny stood.
“I want to go to the police.”
I nodded.
“Yes.”
She seemed surprised.
“You agree?”
“This isn’t something I’m handling privately.”
Marcus looked at me.
That mattered.
There had been a time when Marco Vitelli solved problems without badges.
That time was over.
Or at least I wanted it to be.
Before we left, Priya found one audio file.
The date was three days before David died.
Jenny stared at it.
“Play it.”
David’s voice filled the room.
“I’m recording this because I don’t know who else to trust.”
Jenny began crying instantly.
Two years without hearing him.
Then suddenly he was there.
Not alive.
But close enough to hurt.
David continued.
“Gavin knows I copied the vendor accounts. He says Marco authorized everything. I don’t believe him. I’ve never met Vitelli, but nobody builds an operation this big by approving fake roofing invoices in buildings with leaking ceilings.”
Marcus looked at me.
David apparently had more faith in me than some of my own employees deserved.
The recording continued.
“If something happens to me, check North Harbor. Gavin is scared of Sloane.”
Static.
Then David’s voice lowered.
“And Jenny, if you ever hear this…”
She sobbed.
“I’m sorry.”
Another pause.
“You told me to quit this job six months ago. You were right.”
Jenny laughed through tears.
“That idiot.”
“I kept thinking I could fix it quietly.”
His voice broke.
“I love you. I love Evan. Tell him his dad never left because he wanted to.”
The recording ended.
Nobody moved.
Then Jenny noticed one final file.
A photograph.
David had taken it from inside a car.
Gavin stood in a parking garage talking to Victor Sloane.
Behind them was another man.
His face was partially turned.
I knew him anyway.
Marcus stood beside me.
For the first time that evening, my attorney looked genuinely afraid.
“Marco…”
“I see him.”
Jenny wiped her face.
“Who is that?”
I stared at the image.
A man who had attended my mother’s funeral.
A man who had managed my legitimate businesses for almost twenty years.
My chief financial officer.
Anthony Bellaro.
Jenny whispered, “He works for you?”
I answered quietly.
“Yes.”
Then Priya opened the newest file on the drive.
A scheduled note David had created on the morning he died.
It contained one sentence.
May you like
IF THEY FIND OUT I COPIED THIS, THEY WILL COME FOR JENNY NEXT.
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