Chapter 7 - Julian Had Recorded More Than Coraline RealizedNathaniel wanted Julian nowhere near the corporate investigation.
Julian disagreed.
“I’m the one who found it.”
“You’re ten.”
“That doesn’t make me blind.”
Nathaniel almost smiled.
Mara had used the same tone.
Julian was staying with Nathaniel’s sister, Vivian, in a house twenty minutes away.
Nathaniel sat with him on the back porch.
“Do you remember hearing Coraline talk to anyone that afternoon?”
Julian nodded.
“Uncle Gideon.”
Nathaniel’s chest tightened.
“How do you know?”
“She said his name.”
“What did she say?”
Julian tried to remember.
“She said, ‘Gideon, he saw the assignment.’”
“Anything else?”
“She said, ‘I can fix this.’”
Nathaniel looked toward the yard.
“Did Gideon say anything you could hear?”
“The phone was on speaker for a little bit.”
“Why?”
“She was trying to put papers back.”
Julian frowned.
“He said something about making sure I couldn’t explain it.”
Nathaniel’s jaw tightened.
“Exact words?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Julian’s eyes widened.
“My tablet.”
“What about it?”
“It records screen time.”
Nathaniel frowned.
“What?”
“I was making a video.”
“Of what?”
Julian looked embarrassed.
“The dog.”
Nathaniel waited.
“I was trying to make one of those videos where you hide treats and see how fast he finds them.”
“Okay.”
“I forgot it was recording when I went looking for my math folder.”
Nathaniel sat straighter.
“Julian.”
“What?”
“Was the camera still recording when Coraline found you?”
The boy’s face changed.
“I think so.”
Coraline had taken the tablet.
Police recovered it from her bedroom.
The visible gallery had been deleted.
But forensic technicians found temporary files.
Thirty-eight minutes of footage.
Most useless.
A carpet.
Dog paws.
Julian laughing.
Then the camera moved.
The business bag.
Papers.
Julian whispering:
“Grandpa?”
The video showed his small hands turning pages.
The Restoration Agreement.
The account schedule.
The forged assignment.
Then Coraline entered.
“What are you doing?”
Julian startled.
The tablet fell sideways.
The camera continued recording the edge of the sofa and part of the room.
Nathaniel listened from Detective Bennett’s office.
“You’re not supposed to touch my bag,” Coraline said.
“I saw Grandpa’s name.”
“Give me the tablet.”
“Why does it say Rourke owns fifty-one?”
“Julian.”
“Does Dad know?”
“Give me the tablet.”
“No.”
Movement.
Then Coraline’s phone rang.
She answered.
“Gideon.”
Nathaniel’s breathing changed.
Coraline’s voice:
“He saw the assignment.”
Pause.
“I don’t know how much.”
Pause.
“No, Nathaniel isn’t home.”
Another pause.
Coraline:
“He’ll tell him.”
Then Gideon’s voice became audible through the speaker.
“If the boy saw the assignment, make sure he can’t explain it clearly.”
Nathaniel closed his eyes.
Coraline:
“What does that mean?”
Gideon:
“You told me you had something for your anxiety.”
Silence.
Nathaniel’s hands curled.
Coraline whispered:
“He’s ten.”
Gideon’s response came calmly.
“I didn’t say hurt him.”
“Make him tired.”
“If Nathaniel walks in and the kid is hysterical, confused, barely coherent, who is he going to believe?”
Nathaniel had to stop the recording.
He stood.
Walked to the window.
Detective Bennett waited.
After several seconds, Nathaniel turned back.
“Play it.”
Coraline’s voice again:
“No.”
Gideon:
“Then lose the documents and handle him yourself.”
There was a long silence.
Then Julian said:
“I’m telling Dad.”
Coraline:
“Julian, sit down.”
“No.”
“Give me the tablet.”
Movement.
A crash.
The tablet landed under furniture.
Then Coraline’s voice changed.
Soft.
“Take this.”
Julian:
“What is it?”
“It’ll calm you down.”
“No.”
“Julian.”
“No!”
Then struggling.
Nathaniel heard his son scream.
He looked away.
The recording continued.
Gideon was still on the phone.
He had not disconnected.
At one point, Coraline shouted:
“I said help me!”
Gideon replied:
“You chose to marry into this.”
“Fix it.”
Nathaniel felt disgust.
Then his own voice appeared from the front hall.
“Julian?”
Everything changed.
Coraline whispered:
“Oh God.”
The phone call ended.
Nathaniel entered seconds later.
The recording captured the moment Coraline released Julian.
Captured her first fake confusion.
“Nathaniel… what’s happening?”
Detective Bennett stopped the audio.
No one spoke.
The memory-loss claim was destroyed.
Coraline had been fully aware seconds before Nathaniel entered.
Nathaniel asked:
“Can this be used?”
“Yes.”
“Against both?”
“Potentially.”
He nodded.
Then Bennett said:
“There’s more.”
Nathaniel looked at her.
“After you called 911, Coraline sent one message before officers arrived.”
“To Gideon?”
“Yes.”
“What did she write?”
Bennett turned the phone.
I did what you said. It didn’t work.
Nathaniel stared.
Gideon replied thirty seconds later.
Then the boy becomes your problem, not mine.
Nathaniel felt something break inside him.
Gideon Arden had attended Julian’s birthdays.
Bought him his first bicycle.
Taught him to fish.
Called him “champ.”
And the moment Julian became inconvenient, Gideon reduced him to a problem.
Nathaniel stood.
“I want him out of the company.”
Bennett said:
“That is a corporate decision.”
“No.”
Nathaniel looked at the photograph of his uncle holding Thomas’s stolen seal.
“It’s about to become a criminal one.”
Then Helen Ward called.
Her voice sounded shaken.
“We found the original board minutes from 1982.”
Nathaniel froze.
“What do they say?”
“Russell Arden knew Elias Rourke never pledged his shares.”
Nathaniel stopped breathing.
Helen continued.
“The debt document used to seize them was fabricated.”
There was no longer an alleged historical wrong.
May you like
His grandfather had stolen half the company.
And Nathaniel had inherited the proceeds.
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