Chapter 9 - RISK: MAJOR CLAIRE DONOVAN
I wanted Jason confronted immediately.
Detective Park wanted evidence that would survive longer than my anger.
She won.
The login credentials tied the instruction to Jason’s account, not necessarily to Jason’s hands.
Passwords could be shared.
Sessions could remain open.
Administrative accounts could impersonate users.
That was the frustrating difference between what looked obvious and what could be proved.
So investigators kept working.
I went on leave because Colonel Shaw had ordered me to.
I spent the first six hours of leave answering questions from nobody and thinking about everything.
At 2:00 p.m., Linda appeared at my quarters carrying a cardboard box.
She looked as if she had aged ten years since Christmas dinner.
“I called first.”
“I saw it.”
“You did not answer.”
“That was intentional.”
She nodded.
“I brought something.”
I looked at the box.
“What?”
“Christmas.”
I almost shut the door.
Then she opened the top.
Inside were envelopes, printed emails, a planner, and several folders from Dad’s home office.
“I am not asking you to celebrate.”
She swallowed.
“I am asking you to look.”
I let her in.
We placed the box on my table.
Linda pulled out a red planner.
“This is mine.”
She opened to December.
On the nineteenth, she had written Erica B. emailed Richard - tell Jason.
On the twentieth, she had written Jason office 10:30.
On the twenty-first, a note read Grant dinner confirmed, investors 6:30, Claire flight 3:10?
I looked up.
“How did you know my flight time?”
“Your father wrote it on the kitchen calendar.”
“Why the question mark?”
“Because Jason asked whether you were definitely coming.”
“When?”
“The nineteenth.”
“The day you told him Erica had emailed.”
“Yes.”
A slow, ugly realization formed.
“My being gone was not originally about the promotion.”
Linda’s eyes filled.
“I don’t know.”
“You do know.”
“I know Jason became much more insistent after I told him about Erica.”
“How insistent?”
“He said having both of you in the same house would turn Christmas into a disaster.”
“Why?”
“He said you would believe her because you already looked down on him.”
I stared at Linda.
“I barely talked about him.”
“I know.”
“He said I looked down on him because I served in the Army?”
“He said you always made him feel like he had done less with his life.”
“I was not there.”
“I know.”
“I missed half the family events he attended.”
“I know.”
“Then how was I making him feel anything?”
Linda looked down.
“By existing, I think.”
That answer hurt because it was probably true.
The rivalry I had spent years refusing to participate in had never required my participation.
Jason had built it alone.
Dad had fed it every time he tried to balance imaginary scales.
If I received praise, Jason needed praise too.
If I was promoted, Dad made sure Jason’s latest business success was mentioned in the same conversation.
If I missed a holiday because of deployment, Dad told me Jason had been there to help.
If I came home in uniform, somebody eventually joked that Jason was the “civilian success story.”
I had thought it was awkward family behavior.
Jason had treated it as a competition he was losing.
Linda removed another folder.
“This came for Richard in November.”
The envelope was certified mail.
The sender was Tomas Ruiz.
I did not recognize the name.
“Who is he?”
“I do not know.”
“Did Dad open it?”
“Yes.”
Inside was a three-page letter from a former Ridgeway driver.
He claimed he had been fired after refusing to drive a tractor with a steering problem.
He said his inspection report had been altered after he signed it.
He said Erica Bennett had tried to help him.
And he asked Dad, as a community board member associated with Grant Holloway, to convince Ridgeway to review the case fairly.
At the bottom of the final page, Dad had written one note.
Ask Jason.
I looked at Linda.
“What happened?”
“Richard gave it to Jason.”
“And?”
“Jason said the driver had failed a drug test.”
“Did anyone verify that?”
“I do not know.”
My phone rang.
Detective Park.
I told Linda not to touch anything else and answered.
“We identified the account session used to enter intercept travel,” Park said.
“Jason?”
“The session originated from Ridgeway’s Denver office.”
“Was Jason there?”
“His calendar says he was at your father’s house for lunch.”
I looked at Linda.
“On December twenty-third?”
“Yes.”
Linda heard the date and nodded.
Jason had been at the house.
“Then someone used his credentials at the office.”
“Possibly.”
“Who was physically there?”
“We are still getting badge logs.”
I rubbed my forehead.
“Anything else?”
“Yes.”
Park’s voice changed.
“Erica’s location records show her phone was queried from two different admin accounts.”
“One Jason’s?”
“No.”
I waited.
“One belonged to Hal Brennan.”
“And the other?”
“Grant Holloway.”
I stood.
“The CEO was personally checking where she was?”
“His credentials were.”
“Again, credentials are not hands.”
“Correct.”
I heard something in the background on her end.
Then Park said, “There is more.”
“We recovered a deleted calendar entry from Erica’s company profile.”
“What entry?”
“A meeting scheduled for Christmas Eve at eight p.m.”
“With who?”
“Your father.”
“I know that.”
“No.”
Park paused.
“It was not created by Erica.”
I frowned.
“Who created it?”
“Jason.”
The room seemed to narrow.
“Why would Jason schedule Erica to meet Dad?”
“We do not know.”
“When did he create it?”
“October.”
Two months before Erica emailed Dad.
That made no sense.
Unless the meeting had been planned long before Dad knew anything.
Unless Jason had been trying to control where Erica confronted him.
Unless Christmas dinner itself had been part of the plan.
I looked at Linda.
“Who was supposed to be at the house at eight besides family?”
“Grant.”
“Who else?”
“Two board members.”
“Investors?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone from legal?”
Linda’s face changed.
“One man.”
“Name?”
“Peter Sloan.”
I did not know him.
Park did.
When I gave her the name, she was silent for two seconds.
Then she said, “He is Ridgeway’s general counsel.”
I stared at the box of documents on my table.
Erica had not stumbled into Christmas dinner.
May you like
Jason had been preparing for her to appear there for months.
The real question was why.
