Chapter 3 - Follow the Money
Kendra did not go home.
She drove to a coffee shop three neighborhoods away, parked beneath a sycamore tree, and sat behind the wheel with the untouched lunch on the passenger seat.
Her hands finally started shaking.
She let them.
For ten minutes she stared through the windshield.
Then she took out her phone.
Emotion could wait.
Records could disappear.
Kendra had spent twelve years in corporate procurement before leaving full-time work two years earlier. She knew what people did when they realized someone had begun asking questions.
They deleted emails.
They changed passwords.
They manufactured explanations.
She opened the online portal for Mercer Nail Lounge.
Adrian had always handled daily operations, but Kendra still had access because she had funded much of the salon’s launch.
Five years earlier she had transferred $180,000 from her inheritance into the business.
The documents were clear: $100,000 was a secured member loan, and the remaining $80,000 purchased a forty-nine-percent membership interest in Mercer Beauty LLC.
Adrian owned fifty-one percent and served as managing member.
His favorite phrase had always been my salon.
Legally, that had never been entirely true.
Kendra searched recent transactions.
Normal expenses appeared first.
Payroll.
Inventory.
Utilities.
Then she noticed a vendor she did not recognize.
Linden Advisory Group.
$18,500.
$22,000.
$14,750.
$31,000.
Her eyes narrowed.
The payments began nine months ago.
One month before Brielle said the affair started.
Kendra opened the vendor profile.
Consulting services.
No website listed.
No contract attached.
Mailing address: a suite in a shared-office building.
She downloaded every transaction she could see.
Total paid to Linden:
$287,250.
Kendra stopped breathing.
She called Adrian.
He answered immediately.
“Kendra, thank God.”
“What is Linden Advisory Group?”
Silence.
Then:
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“Kendra, can we please deal with our marriage before you start interrogating me about the business?”
“Who owns Linden?”
“It’s a consulting firm.”
“For what?”
“Expansion strategy.”
“What expansion?”
Another pause.
“We’ve been considering a second location.”
Kendra looked through the windshield.
“You never mentioned a second location.”
“I didn’t want to discuss it until it was viable.”
“Two hundred eighty-seven thousand dollars is a lot of money for something that isn’t viable.”
“Kendra—”
“Who owns it?”
“I don’t know personally.”
“That’s a lie.”
His breathing changed.
She had known Adrian long enough to hear the exact second he began calculating.
“Kendra, where are you?”
“Why?”
“We need to talk face-to-face.”
“No.”
“Please come home.”
“Send me the Linden contract.”
“I’m at work.”
“Send it.”
“I’ll find it.”
“You have ten minutes.”
She hung up.
Three minutes later, a password-reset notification appeared.
Someone was attempting to change the accounting portal credentials.
Kendra immediately called the bank.
As a member and authorized signer, she could not unilaterally shut down Mercer Beauty LLC’s operating account.
But she could report suspected unauthorized transactions.
She did.
The bank opened a fraud review and temporarily flagged large outgoing transfers pending verification.
Then Kendra called the salon’s outside bookkeeper.
Voicemail.
Next she searched the state’s corporate registry.
Linden Advisory Group had been formed ten months earlier.
Registered agent: a commercial service.
Manager information was not public.
Kendra leaned back.
Too clean.
Her phone rang.
Brielle.
She rejected it.
It rang again.
Rejected.
A text arrived.
PLEASE LET ME EXPLAIN.
Kendra ignored it.
Another.
ADRIAN IS LYING TO YOU ABOUT SOME THINGS.
Kendra stared at the message.
Then another appeared.
BUT YOU’VE BEEN LYING TO ME TOO.
Kendra’s jaw tightened.
She typed:
ABOUT WHAT?
Brielle responded immediately.
MOM’S TRUST.
Kendra closed her eyes.
There it was.
The wound Adrian had apparently learned how to use.
When Evelyn died, the trust documents had made Kendra trustee until Brielle turned thirty.
At twenty-one, Brielle had been furious.
She called it proof that their mother trusted Kendra more.
Kendra had called it temporary protection.
Neither had spoken honestly about it since.
Her phone buzzed again.
Adrian finally sent a file.
LINDEN CONSULTING AGREEMENT.
Kendra opened it.
The agreement was dated nine months earlier.
The scope of work was vague: brand development, market positioning, acquisition research.
The signature for Mercer Beauty LLC was Adrian’s.
The signature for Linden Advisory Group was simply:
B. Dawson.
Kendra felt the air leave her lungs.
Brielle Dawson.
She called her sister.
Brielle answered on the first ring.
“Kendra—”
“Do you own Linden Advisory?”
Silence.
“Kendra, please listen.”
“Yes or no?”
“Yes.”
Kendra gripped the steering wheel.
“Did Mercer Beauty pay your company two hundred eighty-seven thousand dollars?”
“Yes, but—”
“Where is the money?”
“It isn’t mine.”
“What does that mean?”
Brielle began crying.
“Adrian told me it was temporary. He said there were tax reasons.”
Kendra almost laughed.
“Tax reasons?”
“He said the money had to move through another entity before he could close on something.”
“On Dawson Row?”
Brielle went silent.
Kendra’s heartbeat slowed.
A dangerous calm settled over her.
“Brielle.”
“I thought you were going to sell it.”
“What?”
“He said you had already decided.”
Kendra sat straighter.
“Who told you that?”
“Adrian.”
“I never decided to sell Dawson Row.”
Brielle’s breathing stopped.
Kendra continued.
“I have never even listed it.”
“No.”
“I have never authorized an offer.”
“No, he showed me paperwork.”
“What paperwork?”
Silence.
Then Brielle whispered something that transformed Kendra’s anger into fear.
“A consent form.”
Kendra’s fingers went cold.
May you like
“What consent form?”
“The one with your signature.”
