Chapter 3 - The Woman Victoria Had Forgotten
Victoria did not return to Crownwell.
She went home.
That surprised everyone.
Grace called twice.
Malcolm called four times.
Victoria answered none of them.
Logan was sitting at the kitchen island wearing a baseball cap.
He pulled it lower when she entered.
Victoria set her bag down.
“Can I sit?”
“You live here.”
“Strong point.”
She sat beside him.
For several seconds neither spoke.
Then Logan said:
“Are you going to make Ms. Prescott get fired?”
Victoria looked at him.
“She’s already suspended.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“No.”
He waited.
“I don’t control the school.”
“You control everybody.”
Victoria almost smiled.
Apparently that was how her son saw her.
CEO.
Boardrooms.
Drivers.
Assistants.
People returning calls quickly.
“No, I don’t.”
Logan touched the brim of his cap.
“She thought you did.”
Victoria thought of Ms. Prescott’s words.
You signed the paper that destroyed her career.
“Tell me everything she’s said about me.”
Logan sighed.
“It’s been weeks.”
Victoria felt guilt immediately.
“Weeks?”
“She kept saying I got special treatment.”
“Did you?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happened?”
“She made me redo assignments other kids didn’t redo.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did.”
Victoria froze.
“When?”
“Last month.”
She remembered.
Logan said:
“My English teacher hates me.”
Victoria had replied while answering email:
“Teachers don’t hate students, honey.”
He had said:
“You don’t know her.”
Victoria had told him to give the class more effort.
She closed her eyes.
“I remember.”
Logan looked away.
“I thought you were complaining.”
“I was.”
He was not making it easy for her.
Good.
“You can complain and still be right.”
He shrugged.
Victoria leaned closer.
“I should’ve asked more.”
Logan’s eyes moved toward her.
“You’re asking now.”
Late.
But something.
The doorbell rang.
Hannah and her mother stood outside.
Hannah looked terrified.
“I’m sorry.”
Victoria stepped aside.
“For what?”
“The video.”
“Why would you apologize?”
“Everybody knows I sent it.”
Logan appeared.
Hannah looked at his cap and began crying.
“I should’ve stopped her.”
Logan shook his head.
“You’re twelve.”
“So are you.”
“That’s different.”
It wasn’t.
Victoria invited them inside.
Hannah placed her phone on the table.
“I have more.”
Victoria’s pulse changed.
“More video?”
“No. Audio.”
Before class, Hannah had been recording a presentation rehearsal with her phone under the desk.
Ms. Prescott and Principal Bell spoke near the front after students entered.
Most of the recording was noise.
Then Bell’s voice became clear.
“Today?”
Ms. Prescott:
“She won’t answer me any other way.”
Bell:
“By one-fifteen, she needs to be on her way here.”
Ms. Prescott:
“You said you wanted her attention.”
Bell:
“I said today is the opportunity.”
Ms. Prescott:
“Then don’t lose your nerve.”
The recording ended.
Victoria stared.
Hannah whispered:
“I didn’t know what they meant.”
“Of course you didn’t.”
Hannah’s mother looked horrified.
“Does the school know you have this?”
“No.”
“Good,” Victoria said.
Then immediately corrected herself.
“No. Sorry. Not good because we’re hiding it. Good because I want a lawyer to preserve it before anyone touches the phone.”
She called Grace.
Twenty minutes later, Crownwell’s outside litigation counsel was arranging independent preservation.
Victoria refused to let Crownwell itself control the evidence.
Malcolm had too much influence there.
Then she opened an old company personnel archive.
Lydia Prescott.
Age at termination: thirty-one.
Internal auditor.
Employed six years.
Accused of diverting $1.8 million from Crownwell’s employee scholarship trust.
Investigation supervised by:
MALCOLM.
Final termination authorization:
VICTORIA.
Her electronic signature filled the bottom of the page.
She stared at it.
Twelve years earlier Logan had been five months old.
Victoria had just returned from maternity leave after almost four months away.
She remembered functioning on coffee and ninety-minute stretches of sleep.
Malcolm placed a folder on her desk.
“Ugly situation.”
“What happened?”
“An auditor moved scholarship money.”
“Police?”
“Let me handle it quietly. We recovered most.”
“Proof?”
“Everything’s in the file.”
Victoria skimmed.
Signed.
Then went home because daycare called to say Logan had a fever.
She had not thought about Lydia Prescott since.
Her stomach turned.
“I signed it.”
Logan stood behind her.
“What?”
Victoria closed the laptop.
“Nothing you need to carry.”
He frowned.
“Is Ms. Prescott mad because of you?”
“Maybe.”
“That means it is my thing.”
Victoria looked at him.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because whatever I did or didn’t do twelve years ago does not make what she did to you acceptable.”
He seemed to accept that.
Then her email chimed.
UNKNOWN SENDER.
Subject:
YOUR SON WAS NEVER THE TARGET.
Victoria opened it.
One sentence:
MS. PRESCOTT WANTED YOUR ATTENTION. BELL WANTED YOU OUT OF THE BOARDROOM. ASK MALCOLM WHY.
Attachment.
A scan of Lydia Prescott’s old termination agreement.
Across the first page, somebody had written in red ink:
I NEVER STOLE THE MONEY.
Victoria scrolled.
Another page.
A bank ledger.
The $1.8 million had left the scholarship trust.
But it had not entered any account belonging to Lydia.
It went to a company called:
REDWOOD EDUCATION PROPERTIES.
Victoria stared.
She knew that name.
Redwood owned the parcel Crownwell’s board had just voted to sell to Northstar.
The same forty-six-million-dollar property Grace had been questioning that morning.
Twelve years ago, Lydia Prescott had been blamed for money that helped buy the land Victoria had just refused to approve selling.
And the man who supervised Lydia’s investigation—
May you like
was the same man who pushed through today’s vote after Victoria left.
Her uncle Malcolm.
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