Chapter 3 - TYLER DISAPPEARS
For several seconds, I forgot about the attempted wire.
I forgot about the trust requests.
I forgot about the company.
All I heard was one sentence.
Tyler is missing.
Richard knocked again.
"Helen."
"Open the door."
Martin's voice stayed steady through my phone.
"Do not let him in until hotel security is present."
I walked toward the door but stopped three feet away.
"Where is Tyler?"
I raised my voice so Richard could hear me.
"I don't know."
"That's why I'm here."
"How did you find me?"
Silence.
That silence answered more than words would have.
"Richard."
"How did you find me?"
"We can discuss that inside."
"No."
His palm hit the door.
"For God's sake, Helen."
"My son is gone."
"His phone is off."
"His car is gone."
"My mother says he left twenty minutes after Martin did."
I looked at my phone.
"Martin heard you."
Richard stopped.
Then he spoke more quietly.
"Of course he did."
"You've turned him against me too."
Martin muttered something I could not quite hear.
I almost smiled.
"Security is coming," I said.
"If you want to talk, you can talk in the lobby."
"I'm not discussing my family in a hotel lobby."
"Then we are not discussing it."
Richard exhaled loudly.
For one second, I could picture him perfectly.
One hand on his hip.
The other rubbing his forehead.
The posture he used whenever the world refused to organize itself around him.
"Helen."
His voice softened.
"Please."
That word almost made me open the door.
Almost.
Seven years of habit is difficult to kill in one night.
Then I remembered the messages.
COME HOME.
YOU ARE HURTING THE COMPANY.
Not one apology.
Not one question about whether I was all right.
I stayed where I was.
"Tell me what happened."
Richard lowered his voice.
"After Martin left, the bank called."
"They told me about the attempted draw."
"I asked Tyler if he knew anything."
"He denied it."
"Then his phone started going off."
"He wouldn't tell me who was texting him."
"My mother told me to leave him alone."
That detail bothered me.
"Why?"
"Because she's my mother."
"No."
"Why did she specifically tell you to leave Tyler alone after his name appeared on an unauthorized trust request?"
Richard did not answer.
Martin did.
"Good question."
I waited.
Finally Richard said,
"I don't know."
"Then what?"
"I went upstairs to call the bank back."
"When I came down, Tyler was gone."
"My mother said he needed air."
"Did she know where he was going?"
"She said no."
"Did you believe her?"
Another silence.
That one was longer.
"Not completely."
I closed my eyes.
Richard distrusted his mother.
That was new.
Hotel security knocked from the hallway.
"Security."
I checked the peephole.
Two employees stood several feet from Richard.
One wore a dark suit.
The other had a radio clipped to his belt.
I opened the door only after sliding the chain into place.
Richard looked terrible.
Yesterday's shirt.
Unshaven jaw.
Bloodshot eyes.
His anger surfaced the moment he saw the chain.
"Seriously?"
I looked at him.
"Yes."
The security manager introduced himself.
I explained that Richard was my husband, that we were separating, and that I had not given him my room number.
The manager's expression changed immediately.
"Mr. Cole, did a staff member provide this room number?"
Richard looked at me.
"No."
"Then how did you obtain it?"
Richard hesitated.
"I checked a shared account."
My stomach dropped.
"What shared account?"
He looked annoyed now.
"Our credit card."
"I didn't use our credit card."
Richard's face changed.
Just slightly.
The security manager noticed.
So did I.
"Then how did you find me?"
He looked away.
"Richard."
His jaw worked.
"Location services."
A cold wave moved through me.
"On what?"
"Your phone."
"You do not have access to my location."
"We set up family sharing years ago."
"I turned it off."
"Apparently you didn't."
Martin cut in through the phone.
"Helen, do not argue about this now."
But I was staring at Richard.
"You tracked my phone."
"My son is missing."
"You tracked my phone before you knew he was missing."
He stopped.
There it was.
The timing.
If Tyler left after Martin had gone, Richard had already known where I was before Tyler disappeared.
"Why were you checking my location?"
"Because you're my wife."
"That is not an answer."
"Because you left in the middle of the night."
"After you told me I was grounded."
His face tightened.
The security manager glanced between us.
Richard lowered his voice.
"I was angry."
"So was I."
"I said something stupid."
The apology was so close.
All he had to say was I am sorry.
Instead he continued.
"But you escalated this beyond anything reasonable."
There it was.
I almost laughed.
"Someone tried to steal one hundred and eighty thousand dollars from my personal account this morning."
Richard froze.
"What?"
For once, the shock looked real.
"And someone has been siphoning money from my trust for almost a year."
He stared at me.
"Helen, I didn't know."
"I didn't say you did."
That hurt him more.
Because I no longer trusted him enough even to accuse him.
He had become one possibility among several.
"Do you think Tyler did it?"
"I think Tyler knows something."
Richard rubbed his mouth.
"Then help me find him."
I looked at the security manager.
"Can we use a conference room downstairs?"
He nodded.
"Of course."
I closed the door long enough to change clothes and grab my notebook.
Martin stayed on the phone.
"You are not going anywhere alone with him."
"I know."
"Do not let him touch your phone."
"I know."
"And Helen?"
"Yes?"
"Turn off every sharing feature you can find."
I did.
Then I changed my passwords.
All of them.
Banking.
Email.
Cloud storage.
Trust portal.
Phone account.
By the time I reached the conference room, Richard was sitting at a table with his head in his hands.
He looked up when I entered.
For one second, he looked like the man I had married.
Scared.
Human.
Then his eyes moved to the hotel employee who stayed near the door.
His pride returned.
"Is this necessary?"
"Yes."
He leaned back.
"Fine."
I sat opposite him.
"Start from the beginning."
Richard told me everything again.
This time with details.
Tyler had received three calls during breakfast.
He declined all three.
Then a message arrived.
He read it and left the room.
Margaret followed him into the kitchen.
They argued quietly.
Richard could not hear the words.
Five minutes later, Tyler went upstairs.
Ten minutes after that, he came back down carrying a backpack.
"What backpack?"
"Black canvas."
I knew it.
I had given it to him two Christmases earlier.
"What was inside?"
"I don't know."
"Did he take clothes?"
"My mother said he did."
"Did you see them?"
"No."
"Laptop?"
Richard thought.
"Yes."
"He had his laptop."
"Anything else?"
Richard looked away.
"What?"
"He went into your office."
Everything inside me stopped.
"When?"
"Before he left."
"How long?"
"A minute."
"Maybe two."
I stood.
"Did he take anything?"
"I don't know."
"Richard."
"I wasn't watching him every second."
"You had just learned someone used my authorization code."
"You suspected Tyler."
"And then you watched him walk into the room where I keep financial records?"
Richard slammed his palm on the table.
"I was dealing with a bank crisis!"
The hotel employee straightened.
I did not flinch.
"Sit down."
Richard stared at me.
"Don't talk to me like that."
"Then stop behaving like the loudest person in the room is automatically right."
He looked ready to explode.
Then he saw the employee near the door.
He sat.
I called Martin.
"We need someone at the house now."
"Already arranged."
"Who?"
"A licensed evidence preservation team."
Richard looked up sharply.
"Evidence team?"
I ignored him.
"They have authority to enter?"
"You own the property."
"I also had Richard served with a preservation notice thirty minutes ago."
Richard stared at my phone.
"You served me?"
I looked at him.
"Apparently."
"I haven't received anything."
His phone buzzed.
He checked it.
Then his face darkened.
"You've got to be kidding me."
I almost smiled.
"That might be it."
Martin continued.
"The team will image the office desktop, secure the notebook if it's there, and preserve access logs."
"Good."
"Helen."
"Yes?"
"There is another problem."
Richard leaned forward.
I put the phone on speaker.
Martin's voice filled the room.
"I just heard from the trust administrator."
"The forty-thousand-dollar request was withdrawn at 9:31 this morning."
I looked at the clock.
"That's after Tyler left."
"Yes."
Richard stared at me.
"Can Tyler withdraw it from his laptop?"
Martin answered.
"Not without the same authorization pathway used to submit it."
"Meaning my code."
"Yes."
Richard stood.
"Then he has it."
"Maybe," Martin said.
"But there is something else."
"The withdrawal request originated from the IP address registered to your house."
Richard stopped moving.
I felt the room tighten.
"That's impossible," he said.
"Tyler was already gone."
Martin's voice stayed calm.
"Someone was still inside the house."
Richard and I looked at each other.
There had been only one person left there besides him after Tyler drove away.
Margaret.
Richard whispered the word before I could.
"My mother."
His phone rang.
He looked at the screen.
Margaret.
For three seconds, neither of us moved.
Then Richard answered on speaker.
"Mom?"
Her voice came through immediately.
Breathless.
Sharp.
"Richard, you need to come home."
"Why?"
"There are strangers in the driveway."
"They're here because Helen sent them."
Then her voice changed.
"And they found something in her office."
I stood slowly.
"What did they find?"
Margaret stopped breathing for a beat.
She had not realized I was listening.
"Helen?"
"What did they find, Margaret?"
She did not answer.
A man's voice sounded in the background.
Then another.
Then Margaret shouted,
"You cannot take that!"
The call disconnected.
Ten seconds later, Martin called back.
He did not bother with a greeting.
"They found your black notebook."
I exhaled.
"Good."
"No."
His tone made my stomach drop.
"Helen, the notebook was not in your desk."
"Where was it?"
He paused.
May you like
"In Margaret's overnight bag."
