Chapter 17 - The Woman in Red
Vanessa called Adrian twenty-seven times. He answered once, with Ortiz beside him and the call on speaker.
"Someone hacked my account," she said.
"Then report it," Adrian replied.
"You don't understand. Elliot has my passwords. He has everything."
"Meet with the detective."
"He'll ruin us."
"You already helped him."
She went quiet.
Ortiz asked Vanessa to come in voluntarily. Instead Vanessa arrived at my apartment building after dark, alone, wrapped in a black coat over a plain dress. Without the chandeliers, she looked tired and much younger than I remembered.
"I know you hate me," she said through the intercom.
"You tried to kick me in the face."
"I know."
I kept the building door locked and called Simone before speaking further. Vanessa agreed to wait for counsel and the detective at a nearby public office. I wasn't going to become another secret meeting on someone's phone.
When Ortiz arrived, Vanessa admitted Elliot had pressured her for years, but she had also signed false authorizations to protect her position. She'd believed the money would be replenished before anyone noticed. Later she'd used the stolen funds to silence trustees and secure a chair she thought her brother didn't deserve.
"Why attack Maya?" Ortiz asked.
Vanessa stared at her hands.
"Elliot told me she was bringing evidence. He said if I made her look dangerous, nobody would believe her."
"So you tried to hurt her?"
"I wanted to scare her."
I spoke for the first time. "You don't get to decide which part of what you did counts."
She looked up. "I know that now."
"Do you?"
Vanessa slid a small card across the table. On it was the address of a lakeside property held by Northstar Civic Partners.
"Elliot is moving the original books tonight," she said. "He's taking everything that ties him to the warehouses."
Ortiz rose to call for a warrant. Vanessa caught her sleeve.
"There's something else. Heller isn't just moving records. He has a person there."
"Who?" I asked.
May you like
Vanessa's voice broke.
"My grandmother."
