Chapter 8 - The Call From Nora.
Nobody touched the ringing phone for several seconds.
The name NORA PRICE glowed on the screen, vanished, then appeared again as the caller tried a second time.
Renee looked at Theodore.
"Do you recognize this phone?"
Theodore shook his head.
Marcus said nothing.
Renee turned toward him.
"Mr. Vale?"
"No."
Daniel stared at Marcus.
"That's your old ordering phone."
Marcus looked at him.
"No, it isn't."
"It has the cracked corner from when you dropped it by the fryer."
Every eye moved toward the phone.
The lower left corner of the screen was chipped.
Marcus's jaw flexed.
Renee did not answer the call.
Instead, she photographed the screen and asked Theodore whether he would allow the device to be secured until ownership could be established.
Theodore agreed immediately.
Marcus objected.
That answered the ownership question more effectively than any receipt could have.
Olivia stared at her own phone inside the box.
"Why is mine down here?"
Marcus folded his arms.
"Safekeeping."
Vivian almost lost her composure.
"You put my daughter's phone in a locked box in a cellar."
"She was distracted during service."
"Then put it in a locker."
"This is where I keep confiscated items."
Mason's phone lay beside Olivia's.
Vivian pointed to it.
"Where is Mason?"
Marcus did not answer.
Grant immediately called the front security desk.
No one had seen Mason leave through the main entrance.
A camera showed him entering the loading corridor twenty minutes earlier.
There was no image of him coming back.
Theodore's face tightened.
"Check the loading dock."
Grant hurried upstairs.
Renee stayed with the phones.
Vivian turned to Olivia.
"Do you know your passcode?"
Olivia gave her a tired look.
"Of course."
Renee explained that Olivia could retrieve her own phone once it was documented.
A few minutes later, Olivia unlocked it.
There were twelve missed calls.
Four were from Vivian.
Three were from an unknown number.
Five were from Marcus.
Vivian stared at the last detail.
"He called you while he had your phone?"
Olivia looked confused.
Then Daniel cursed under his breath.
"He was testing where it was."
Marcus laughed.
"Or I forgot I had collected it."
Renee asked Olivia to open the message Nora had sent six weeks earlier.
Olivia searched.
The conversation was gone.
Her face fell.
"I didn't delete it."
Renee asked whether the phone had been out of her control while unlocked.
Olivia nodded.
"This morning, Marcus told me to unlock it because he said payroll needed my scheduling app."
Marcus interrupted.
"That's not what happened."
Olivia looked at him.
"You watched me type the code."
"I don't remember your code."
Olivia stared.
"Then why did you ask me whether my mother's birthday was June eleventh?"
Vivian felt a chill.
Her birthday was June eleventh.
The first four digits of Olivia's passcode were 0611.
Marcus looked away.
Renee asked Olivia to check deleted photographs.
The folder required facial recognition.
Olivia opened it.
There were dozens of images waiting for permanent deletion.
Most were ordinary kitchen photographs.
A plated tart.
A sauce station.
A grocery list.
Then Olivia found the image Nora had sent.
It showed a letter on Bell Dining Group letterhead.
The top line read CONFIDENTIAL RESOLUTION AGREEMENT.
The employee named in the letter was Nora Price.
The amount was $18,500.
The document was signed by a finance executive named Simon Bell.
Theodore stared at the screen.
"Simon?"
Vivian remembered the assistant who had arrived with Theodore.
"Your assistant?"
Theodore shook his head.
"My nephew."
Olivia zoomed in.
The settlement language stated that payment was being made to resolve disputed wage deductions and that neither side admitted wrongdoing.
Renee photographed the screen.
Theodore pulled out his phone and called his nephew.
No answer.
He called again.
Still no answer.
Marcus watched him with an expression close to satisfaction.
"Maybe your family knows more about your company than you do."
Theodore turned toward him.
"You should stop talking."
"Why?"
Marcus smiled.
"Because the truth is finally getting expensive?"
Footsteps pounded down the cellar stairs.
Grant appeared, breathing hard.
"Mason is outside."
Vivian's shoulders loosened.
"Is he all right?"
"He's fine."
Grant looked toward Marcus.
"But someone locked the loading dock from the inside after he went out."
Marcus frowned.
"Why would he go outside?"
Grant held up a small flash drive.
"To get this from his car."
Mason appeared behind him.
His face was pale, but his voice was steady.
"I copied the schedule database last month."
Marcus's eyes narrowed.
Mason continued.
"Every edit leaves a history."
Renee took the flash drive in a small evidence bag.
"What edits?"
Mason looked at Olivia.
"Her hours."
Then he looked at Daniel.
"Mine too."
He looked directly at Marcus.
"All of ours."
Marcus's face went blank.
Mason swallowed.
"The system says we worked one set of hours."
He pointed toward the ceiling, toward the restaurant above them.
"But somebody changed the payroll copy after every pay period."
Theodore's phone buzzed.
He looked down.
A message from Simon had finally arrived.
Vivian watched Theodore read it.
His face turned gray.
"What did he say?" she asked.
Theodore handed her the phone.
May you like
The message contained only one sentence.
UNCLE, DO NOT TRUST MARCUS, AND DO NOT TRUST THE LEDGER WITH MY SIGNATURE.
