Chapter 3 - The Numbers Beneath the Roses
The next morning, Mateo arrived carrying a cardboard drink tray and a folder.
Chelsea opened the suite door herself.
Adrian remained beside the elevator.
Rosa stood behind Chelsea, arms folded.
“Breakfast first,” she announced.
Mateo glanced at the tray. “That was the plan.”
Over eggs and toast, Chelsea learned that Dominic had failed to appear for a scheduled interview with company counsel.
Kiara’s lawyer had issued a statement describing the gala incident as an unfortunate accident exaggerated by online speculation.
The man detained near the service corridor had refused to answer questions.
“And Leonardo?” Chelsea asked.
“Suspended,” Mateo said. “He claims he tripped.”
“Convenient.”
“Very.”
He slid the folder across the table.
Chelsea did not touch it.
“What is that?”
“Access records. You asked for them before the gala.”
“I also asked you not to turn this into a private investigation.”
“These came from our systems administrator. Copies are going to Detective Ortiz.”
She opened the folder.
At eight thirty-seven the previous evening, someone had used a temporary administrator credential to reset her signing authorization.
At eight forty-two, the payment approval had been submitted.
The terminal was in Dominic’s office.
Chelsea read the page twice.
Then she pushed away her plate.
“Bellwether isn’t the destination.”
Mateo leaned forward.
“How do you know?”
“The transfers are too neat. Same amounts, clean descriptions, complete project codes. Whoever built this wanted an ordinary reviewer to see a charity vendor and move on.”
She reached for hotel stationery.
Three boxes appeared beneath her pen.
Foundation.
Bellwether.
Unknown recipient.
“Bellwether is a pass-through. We need its bank records, which means the investigators need to move before the money moves again.”
Mateo nodded.
“I’ll call counsel.”
“And tell them to preserve everything. Not just the suspicious accounts.”
His eyes met hers.
Chelsea held his gaze.
“Everything, Mateo.”
Outside the window, morning light brightened the river.
He understood what she meant.
She had never asked exactly how his late father’s shipping business had become the Romano family’s empire. She knew enough from unfinished conversations and men who stopped smiling when certain doors closed.
There had always been respectable contracts.
There had always been rumors.
And there had always been Mateo, standing between those two worlds as if he could hold them apart indefinitely.
“If investigators find something beyond Dominic,” she said, “you don’t get to decide it’s unrelated because it hurts you.”
Rosa went still.
Mateo looked down at the paper.
For a long moment, Chelsea thought he would leave.
Instead, he took out his phone.
“Adrian,” he said. “Ask Mara Bennett to meet us. Full preservation notice. All companies, all foundation records.”
He ended the call.
Chelsea released a breath she had not realized she was holding.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet.”
“I’m thanking you for doing it. We can discuss the timing later.”
That afternoon, independent counsel established a secure review room at another hotel. Chelsea participated as a witness and employee with relevant knowledge, while forensic specialists handled the original records.
She was not allowed to touch the evidence servers.
For once, she appreciated being told no.
Near four, she found the detail everyone else had overlooked.
A floral invoice.
Thirty-eight thousand dollars for the gala’s centerpieces.
The florist had received twelve thousand.
The remaining amount had been paid to an event consultancy owned by a holding company.
Chelsea recognized its mailing address.
Kiara’s townhouse.
“She wasn’t just helping Dominic,” Chelsea said.
Mara Bennett, a silver-haired attorney with the patience of a locked vault, examined the invoice.
“She had a financial interest.”
“There’s more.”
Chelsea compared the floral payment with a renovation grant issued six months earlier.
Same consultancy.
Same approval chain.
Same polite initials at the bottom.
D.L.
Dominic Lucchesi.
Mateo stood behind her chair, far enough away that she could move freely.
“How long?”
Chelsea kept searching.
“Long enough to think they owned the process.”
Then another record opened.
A beneficiary schedule for a youth housing project in Queens.
Chelsea knew that project.
She had visited the building.
She had met a thirteen-year-old named Jalen who wanted to become an electrician.
The heating repairs had been delayed twice.
The money had already been marked as spent.
Her voice changed.
“They stole from the kids.”
Mateo read the screen.
His face went pale with a kind of anger she had never seen on him before.
Chelsea stood.
“Whatever happens next,” she said, “that building gets fixed.”
“Yes.”
“And nobody calls the missing money an accounting irregularity.”
May you like
Mara closed her folder.
“No,” she said. “We won’t.”
