Chapter 15 - Elise’s Warning
Elise Ward looked nothing like the woman who had stood beside Victor beneath the chandeliers of the Drake Hotel.
There was no crimson gown.
No diamonds.
No smug smile.
When Rachel saw her through the interview-room glass at the federal building, Elise wore jeans, a wrinkled cream sweater, and no makeup. Her hair had been pulled into a loose ponytail.
She looked exhausted.
And terrified.
“You’re not going in there,” Sarah said.
Rachel kept watching.
“Elise asked for me.”
“She can ask for the Queen of England. You’re not required to entertain her.”
Agent Sloan joined them.
“She says she has information about Grant.”
“Then she can tell you,” Sarah replied.
“She already told us some.”
Rachel turned.
“What kind?”
Sloan lowered her voice.
“The deed is fake.”
Sarah’s expression sharpened.
“We knew that.”
“No. We believed it. Elise says she knows how Grant created it.”
Rachel stared through the glass.
“Why come back?”
“That’s what we’re trying to understand.”
Sloan handed Rachel a transcript.
Elise claimed Grant had planned to acquire the Joliet land for nearly a year.
He had discovered William Vance’s old property records while researching Victor’s finances.
Grant believed controlling the terminal could eventually give him leverage over Alden Enterprises.
The affair had merely opened the door.
Rachel read faster.
“He used me.”
Sloan gave her a level look.
“Grant appears to use everyone.”
Elise said Grant had obtained photographs of William’s signature from documents she secretly photographed inside Rachel’s cedar chest.
Victor had unknowingly provided access.
Grant then located Calvin Rusk, a former deputy clerk with gambling debts and a history of falsifying administrative records.
Sarah pointed at the transcript.
“So Rusk manufactured the deed.”
“According to Elise.”
“Where is he?”
“Elise doesn’t know.”
Rachel looked toward the interview room.
“She knows more.”
Sloan nodded.
“That’s my assumption.”
Rachel entered.
Sarah followed despite muttering something about terrible ideas.
Elise looked up.
For several seconds, the two women said nothing.
Once, Elise had looked at Rachel as though she were pathetic.
Now the arrogance was gone.
“Hello, Rachel.”
Rachel sat.
“What do you want?”
Elise’s lips trembled.
“Protection.”
“From Grant?”
“Yes.”
Rachel almost laughed.
“You helped him attack me.”
“I helped him steal documents.”
“You helped steal six hundred thousand dollars.”
“I know.”
“You helped destroy my marriage.”
Elise flinched.
“No. Victor destroyed your marriage.”
Rachel studied her.
It was the first honest thing Elise Ward had ever said to her.
“Why should I help you?”
“Because Grant is going to kill this company if he cannot own it.”
Sarah immediately leaned forward.
“Is that a threat you personally heard?”
Elise nodded.
“He doesn’t care about Alden Enterprises. He wants the terminal acreage because a development consortium has been quietly assembling industrial land around the interstate.”
Arthur had mentioned surrounding land values rising.
Rachel had not realized how much.
“How valuable?” she asked.
“Potentially nine figures within five years.”
Rachel felt the room shift.
The twenty-five-million-dollar demand had never been the real goal.
Grant wanted her to refuse.
He wanted litigation.
Instability.
A distressed company.
Then he could force a sale.
Elise leaned forward.
“The system failure last night wasn’t supposed to cause a crash.”
Sloan’s voice hardened.
“Explain.”
“It was supposed to shut the terminal down long enough for federal transportation regulators to investigate.”
“Who accessed the system?”
“I don’t know. Grant never tells me everything.”
“Why were you there?”
Elise’s eyes filled.
“I was trying to stop it.”
Rachel stared at her.
Elise laughed bitterly.
“You don’t believe me.”
“No.”
“I don’t blame you.”
She took a breath.
“When the accounts froze, Grant abandoned me. He told prosecutors through his attorney that I masterminded Aura Ventures.”
“Didn’t you?”
“Partly.”
Elise looked down.
“I thought Victor was stupid. I thought you were weak. I thought Grant was protecting me.”
Her voice broke.
“I was wrong about all three.”
Rachel said nothing.
Elise continued.
“Grant contacted me in London. He said he could make the charges disappear if I came home and helped him with one final transaction.”
“What transaction?”
“The land.”
“How?”
“He needs the original Vance records.”
Rachel’s heartbeat changed.
“He already photographed them.”
“Not all of them.”
Elise looked directly at her.
“There’s something Grant can’t find.”
“What?”
“A release document.”
Rachel frowned.
Elise shook her head.
“I don’t know what it releases. I heard Grant arguing with someone named Rusk. Grant said, ‘Without the release, the deed survives. With it, we’re finished.’”
Sarah immediately pulled out her phone.
“When was this?”
“Three nights ago.”
“Where is Calvin Rusk?”
Elise looked frightened again.
“Ohio.”
Rachel thought of her grandfather’s old farm.
Most of it had been sold decades ago.
But there was still a farmhouse near Mercer County that belonged to a distant cousin.
“Where in Ohio?”
Elise swallowed.
“Grant said Rusk was staying near Coldwater.”
Rachel stood.
Sloan stopped her.
“You’re not driving to Ohio.”
Rachel looked at her.
“My grandfather kept records there.”
“Then federal agents can search.”
“No.”
Sloan narrowed her eyes.
“No?”
Rachel remembered something.
A summer when she was thirteen.
Her grandfather had shown her an old steel box beneath the farmhouse office floor.
If the bank burns, paperwork survives.
She had forgotten it for thirty years.
Rachel looked at Sarah.
“My grandfather had a records box.”
“Where?”
Rachel picked up her coat.
“Under his farmhouse.”
Elise suddenly grabbed Rachel’s wrist.
Sarah moved instantly.
Elise released her.
“Don’t go alone.”
Rachel looked down at her.
May you like
For once, Elise’s fear appeared genuine.
“Grant knows about the farmhouse too.”
