Chapter 4 - THE ARCHITECT'S COMPASS
The drive back to the house on Clover Mill Drive was a blur of sheer panic. Nathan’s phone was ringing constantly. His secretary. His junior partners. A number he didn't recognize that he assumed was federal agents.
He ignored them all.
He needed to talk to Olivia. He needed to beg.
He burst through the front doors of his home. The house was silent. The morning light streamed through the large windows, illuminating the pristine hardwood floors.
"Olivia!" he shouted, his voice cracking.
No answer.
He ran into the kitchen. The coffee maker was off. The legal pad was gone.
He ran upstairs to their bedroom. Her closet doors were open. Half her clothes were gone. Her jewelry box was empty.
She wasn't just divorcing him. She had physically erased herself from the house while he was sitting in a hotel room feeling sorry for himself.
Nathan stumbled backward, sitting on the edge of the unmade bed. The architect's compass Marcus had given him dug into his palm.
He opened his phone and called her number.
It went to voicemail.
He called again. On the third try, she answered.
"Nathan," Olivia's voice was calm, steady, and terrifyingly distant.
"Olivia, please. The feds. Madison. Why didn't you tell me?"
"Tell you that the woman you were sleeping with was building a federal indictment against you?" Olivia asked, her tone conversational. "Why would I interrupt you, Nathan? You were so proud of your secrets."
"I can fix this," he pleaded, the arrogance entirely stripped away. "I can pay the money back. I just need access to the Carter Holdings accounts. Just a bridge loan to cover the stolen funds before the raid."
A soft, genuine laugh came through the receiver. It chilled him to the bone.
"You think I'm going to fund your restitution with the money you tried to steal from me?"
"Olivia, they're going to arrest me!"
"I know," she said. "But that isn't the worst part of your day, Nathan."
"What do you mean?"
"The money you transferred to the offshore accounts," Olivia said. "The four million dollars. Madison thinks it's in the Cayman Islands. You think it's in the Cayman Islands."
Nathan stood up, his heart hammering in his throat. "It is in the Caymans. I transferred it myself."
"You transferred it to a routing number provided by your senior accountant," Olivia corrected him. "Marcus Vance."
Nathan froze.
"Marcus has been my father's oldest friend for forty years, Nathan," Olivia said softly. "Did you really think he would help you steal from my inheritance?"
Nathan couldn't breathe. "Where is the money, Olivia?"
"It's safe," she replied.
"Olivia, if the feds don't find that money, they won't just charge me with tax evasion. They'll charge me with wire fraud. I'll go to prison!"
"I know."
The line went dead.
Nathan dropped the phone. He looked at the architect's compass in his hand. He hadn't just lost his company. He had been outplayed by a woman he had called "dead weight" less than twenty-four hours ago.
He ran downstairs to his home office. He needed his passport. He needed cash. He needed to run.
He pulled open the bottom drawer of his mahogany desk. The secret compartment where he kept his emergency funds was unlocked.
He pulled the false bottom up.
The stacks of hundred-dollar bills were gone. His passport was gone.
In their place was a single, small object.
A sapphire cufflink.
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Nathan stared at it in horror.
It wasn't his cufflink. It belonged to a man Nathan owed a very different, much more dangerous kind of debt to. A man who didn't use the IRS to collect his money.
