Chapter 5 - The Reason Nathan Chose Claire
Everything changed after that.
Nathan hadn't chosen Claire because she was simply the woman he loved.
He had chosen her because of me.
Claire couldn't accept it.
“He married me because of Emily?”
“Not married,” Ethan said quietly.
“Planned to.”
The detective discovered that Nathan had met Claire exactly three weeks after locating my father's old records.
He had approached her deliberately.
Claire remembered their first meeting.
A charity event.
Nathan had spilled wine on her dress.
He had apologized.
They talked for hours.
She thought it was fate.
Now she realized he had known exactly who she was.
“Why would he need Claire?” she asked.
Ethan looked at her.
“Because Nathan believed your family knew where the missing Whitmore documents were.”
Claire's face drained.
“My family?”
“Your father worked with his father.”
She shook her head.
“My father was an accountant.”
“An accountant who disappeared six months before you met Nathan.”
Silence.
Claire sat down.
She remembered.
Her father had vanished when she was nineteen.
The family had been told he ran away.
But he had never contacted them.
Never sent a letter.
Never returned.
Now the pieces began connecting.
Nathan had been searching for a financial archive.
The archive contained evidence of billions of dollars stolen from the Whitmore company.
Nathan needed it.
Daniel wanted it exposed.
Ethan had discovered it.
And I had inherited the final piece without knowing.
“What do I have?” I asked.
Ethan looked at me.
“Your father's watch.”
I touched my wrist.
The old silver watch had belonged to my father.
I had worn it for years.
“It isn't just a watch.”
The detective examined it.
The back contained tiny engraved numbers.
A code.
The same code appeared on the folder.
We returned to the Whitmore estate.
The police searched the study.
Behind a bookshelf was a hidden safe.
The watch opened it.
Inside was a flash drive.
And a letter.
The letter was addressed to me.
My hands shook as I opened it.
Emily,
If you are reading this, I failed to protect you.
Your father wasn't a poor accountant. He was the person who discovered the Whitmore family had been stealing from its own employees for decades.
He kept copies of everything.
He knew they would come for him.
If anything happens to me, trust no Whitmore.
I stopped reading.
Because one sentence was written beneath everything else.
Especially Nathan.
Claire started crying.
Then the lights went out.
The house plunged into darkness.
A gunshot shattered the silence.
The detective yelled for everyone to get down.
Another shot.
Glass exploded.
May you like
And somewhere upstairs, a man's voice whispered:
“Give me the drive.”
