CHAPTER 7 — THE DEVICE IN THE DIAPER BAG
The apartment contained eleven listening devices.
One was hidden inside a smoke detector.
Two were built into electrical outlets.
Another had been placed beneath my desk.
The most recent device was found inside the diaper bag Jasper had tossed into the SUV outside the hospital.
It had recorded everything.
My conversation with the discharge nurse.
Jasper handing me the bus fare.
Gillian laughing about lunch.
Priscilla asking whether the restaurant had confirmed the private dining room.
And Jasper saying something he later denied.
“Hailey will be fine. She needs to learn she can’t use the baby to control everything.”
The recording destroyed his claim that I had voluntarily chosen the bus.
But the investigators found something far more valuable.
The devices had automatically uploaded files to a private cloud account.
Jasper had deleted many recordings from his phone.
He had forgotten about the backups.
Evelyn and I listened inside my father’s study after I was discharged from the medical center.
Toby slept in a bassinet beside me.
At first, the files contained ordinary conversations.
Arguments about furniture.
Complaints from Gillian.
Business calls Jasper took while pacing through the apartment.
Then Evelyn opened a file recorded six months earlier.
Jasper’s voice filled the room.
“Once the next round closes, I won’t need Robertson anymore.”
A second man answered.
“You mean the company or the daughter?”
Jasper laughed.
“The company needs Finnley’s network. I don’t.”
My body went cold.
The second voice continued.
“You married her for access. Don’t become sentimental now.”
“I’m not sentimental.”
“What about the baby?”
“A child makes me look stable. Investors like stable.”
I couldn’t breathe.
My father reached for the tablet, but I stopped him.
“I need to hear it.”
The recording continued.
Jasper explained that he planned to restructure the company after the funding round.
Once the new shares were issued, Robertson Capital’s influence would be diluted.
Then he intended to file for divorce.
“He thinks I’ll leave with nothing,” I whispered.
Evelyn’s expression remained unreadable.
“He also believed the loan guarantee would make you responsible for the debt.”
Another recording captured Jasper speaking with Priscilla.
She was nervous about impersonating me at the notary office.
Jasper reassured her.
“If Hailey ever finds out, she’ll be too embarrassed to expose it. She wants everyone to believe her marriage is perfect.”
He had known exactly which weakness to use against me.
Not love.
Shame.
The final recording was only eleven minutes long.
Jasper was speaking to the same unidentified man.
They discussed moving company funds through consulting agreements.
They discussed weakening my father’s voting control.
Then the other man said something that caused my father to rise from his chair.
“Finnley trusts me. He signs whatever I place in front of him.”
Dad replayed the sentence.
The voice was no longer difficult to recognize.
It belonged to Malcolm Reeve.
Robertson Global’s chief financial officer.
My father’s closest business adviser for twenty-three years.
Dad stared at the screen.
Malcolm had attended my graduation.
He had given a toast at my wedding.
He had held Toby in the hospital two days after his birth.
Jasper had not built his scheme alone.
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He had placed someone inside my father’s company.
And according to the next audio file, Malcolm was preparing to take control of Robertson Global itself.
