Chapter 5 - The Notebook in His Hand.
Daniel closed the apartment door behind him and looked first at Elizabeth, then at Maya, then at the building manager standing several feet away.
His face revealed no surprise.
That bothered Elizabeth more than anger would have.
"You brought an audience."
Elizabeth looked at the notebook in his hand.
"Give that to me."
Daniel glanced down as though he had forgotten he was carrying it.
"This?"
"It's mine."
"It contains company information."
"It contains my handwriting from before Northstar had a company code."
Daniel walked toward the kitchen island and placed the notebook on the counter.
Not toward Elizabeth.
Just close enough for her to see it.
"You're not taking confidential material out of this apartment while there's an active complaint."
Maya spoke before Elizabeth could.
"Daniel, you don't get to make preservation decisions about evidence involving you."
Daniel looked at her coldly.
"You should think carefully about getting involved, Maya."
Maya did not move.
"I already did."
Elizabeth held up the white envelope.
"What's this?"
Daniel's eyes moved to Vivian's sticky note.
For half a second, he looked genuinely alarmed.
Then his expression closed again.
"I don't know."
"It's in your desk."
"You lived here."
"Your mother's handwriting is on it."
"Then ask her."
Elizabeth felt her patience disappear.
"I have spent two years asking everyone around you to explain things you should have explained yourself."
Daniel's voice lowered.
"And I spent two years carrying you into rooms you never would have entered without me."
Maya's eyebrows rose.
Elizabeth simply stared at him.
There it was.
The belief underneath everything.
The gala.
The stolen credit.
His mother's contempt.
Daniel believed access was the same as ownership.
He believed that because he had introduced Elizabeth to Westbridge executives, anything she created afterward somehow belonged to him.
"You think you made me."
"I gave you opportunities."
"You gave me problems to solve."
Daniel's jaw tightened.
"And you solved them because I trusted you."
"No."
Elizabeth stepped closer.
"I solved them because I was good at it."
Daniel looked toward the building manager.
"This conversation is over."
He picked up the notebook.
Elizabeth's voice sharpened.
"Put it down."
"Or what?"
"Or we let the audit committee decide why the subject of an investigation removed the original project notebook the morning of the hearing."
Daniel stopped.
Maya quietly lifted her phone.
"I already emailed Chairman Hale that we found you holding it."
Daniel turned toward her.
For the first time, his calm broke.
"You did what?"
Maya's phone chimed.
She looked at the screen.
"He says not to touch it."
The building manager cleared his throat.
"I can secure the item in the management office until corporate counsel arrives."
Daniel looked at Elizabeth as if she had betrayed him.
The irony was almost unbearable.
He set the notebook down.
"Fine."
Elizabeth did not reach for it.
The building manager placed it inside a large property envelope and signed across the seal.
Maya signed as witness.
Elizabeth did the same.
Daniel refused.
At seven forty-five, they arrived at Westbridge headquarters.
The marble lobby that had once made Elizabeth feel like a guest now felt like a courtroom waiting room.
Security issued her a temporary visitor badge.
Daniel received one too.
His executive credential had been suspended overnight.
He looked at the badge, then at Elizabeth.
"Enjoying this?"
"No."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I expected you to defend me last night."
Daniel looked away.
The elevator doors opened on the thirty-sixth floor.
Arthur Hale was waiting with general counsel, two audit committee members, and an outside technology investigator named Rebecca Sloan.
The sealed notebook sat on the conference table.
Rebecca photographed the seal before opening it.
Every page was scanned.
Elizabeth watched silently until Rebecca reached the first Northstar page.
The handwritten date was almost eleven months old.
Arthur leaned closer.
Daniel's face remained blank.
Rebecca continued through the pages.
Then she stopped.
"There's a removal here."
Elizabeth looked up.
Several pages near the center had been cleanly cut from the binding.
"Those pages were there yesterday," Elizabeth said.
Daniel immediately shook his head.
"You can't prove that."
Rebecca examined the cut edges.
"The removal is recent."
Daniel's chair shifted.
Arthur looked at him.
"Do you know what was on those pages?"
"No."
Elizabeth did.
Her stomach dropped.
The missing pages contained notes from the first meeting where Daniel had asked her to secretly rebuild Northstar.
They also contained a sentence she remembered writing because it had made him angry.
DANIEL WANTS MY NAME KEPT OFF THE DRAFT UNTIL THE BOARD APPROVES IT.
Arthur turned to Elizabeth.
"Ms. Monroe?"
She explained what the pages had contained.
Daniel laughed once.
"Convenient memory."
Rebecca closed the notebook.
"We may not need memory."
Everyone looked at her.
She opened her laptop.
"The building elevator camera shows Mr. Hart entering the apartment at six twenty-one this morning carrying nothing."
Daniel went still.
Rebecca clicked again.
"At six thirty-eight, he left with the black notebook in his hand."
Elizabeth stared at the screen.
Daniel had removed the notebook before returning to find them in the apartment.
Arthur's expression became colder.
"Where did you take it during those seventeen minutes?"
Daniel said nothing.
Rebecca checked another screen.
"Chairman, we have a bigger problem."
"What?"
"Project Northstar is scheduled for a board presentation at nine thirty this morning."
Arthur frowned.
"It was postponed."
"Not anymore."
Rebecca turned the laptop around.
Someone had restored the presentation overnight using the chairman's executive override code.
The presenter was still listed as Daniel Hart.
Arthur looked at the timestamp.
Then he looked toward the glass wall of the conference room.
Across the corridor stood Marcus Vale, vice chairman of Westbridge Holdings.
May you like
Marcus smiled through the glass and tapped his watch.
The board meeting was forty-five minutes away.
