บททั้งหมดของ Too late, I am no longer your wife: บทที่ 21 - บทที่ 30

I did not tell Adrian about the call I just received. The weight of the possibilities of the call sat with me all through the day as I went on with my activities, and when Adrian sat across me talking about the budget projections, I listened but could not help but think about the call that just entered. what if I was wrong about Adrian? That evening, I called Margaret Ellis back from my car in the hospital parking lot where no one could walk past my open office door and overhear and she answered on the first ring We arranged to meet on Saturday morning. She named a park on the quiet side of the city. I wrote down the name and told her I would be there. Saturday morning came. I arrived at the park a few minutes early and found a bench near the far end of the main path where I could see the entrance clearly. I sat down and waited, watching the dog walkers pass, a woman with a pram, and an elderly man moving slowly with his hands behind his back. I saw her before she saw me; she wa

I stayed up late that night, made myself a cup of coffee, and sat down at my desk. I began to open the foundation's document archive.I had been planning to do a routine review of the older partnership files, specifically the ones that dated back to before I had taken over full oversight of the foundation's administration. I had meant to review the early documents for weeks because I didn't know them well.I worked through the files, funding agreements, partnership correspondence, and legal filings from the Wesley Corp. dispute, and I carefully read through the document and took notes on any areas that required updates or clarification.I was already two hours in when I saw a footnote. It was in one of the early Wesley Corp. filings from the dispute, a background document that Charles's legal team had submitted as part of their initial claim. The document listed historical business relationships that Wesley Corp had maintained, and it was a long list, mostly institutional.Halfway dow

Dr. Warren listened to everything I said without interrupting.I told him about Felix Adu and the documentary series and the two minutes and fourteen seconds of Natasha sitting in soft lighting raising careful questions about my professional conduct. I told him about how she had woven the broadcast timeline, the platform reach, and the licensing board complaint into it, and I said how I needed something that would get ahead of everything.He was quiet for a moment after I finished."How long do we have?" he asked."Adrian thinks the editing process takes Felix a minimum of two to three weeks," I said. "Which means we have a window, but not a comfortable one.""There is a production company," he said finally. "Independent. They do long-form documentary journalism, medical, scientific, and institutional. They have approached us before about doing something on the foundation's research, but the timing was never right." He paused. "I think the timing is right now."I sat forward slightly.

I arrived before anyone else when the hospital was still in the early morning, in between the cleaners finishing the last of the corridors and the night shift handing over. I went to my office, took off my coat, and made two cups of coffee. One for Adrian, black coffee with no sugar, and one for me, one sugar, and a little milk. I set them on the desk across from each other and waited; at exactly seven-thirty, my door opened. Adrian stepped in; his eyes went straight to the two cups, placed opposite each other. He closed the door behind him and took his seat; he looked at me. “You found something,” he said. “Yes,” I replied. I kept my hands around my cup and told him what I had found and the way everything had come together. His father’s company name buried in the background documentation. The date his father’s company entered preliminary partnership discussions and the date it folded. I mentioned Margaret Ellis and what she had told me at the pack I also mentioned Dr. Warren

Charles's POVMy phone kept buzzing during the budget presentation; I put it on silent and kept my eyes on the screen while the CFO walked through Q3 numbers. I made two notes and waited for the slide to change before angling my phone just enough to read it under the table. It was a text; I read the message Found. I put the phone back in my pocket.“Go back to slide fourteen,” I said to the CFO. He clicked it back; I asked my questions and listened to the answer. We stayed another forty minutes, said what needed to be said, and ended the meeting.I called the investigator on my way out; he answered immediately. “Talk,” I said.He began saying everything he has found from his investigation: the names, timelines, and the supplier story that broke three days ago. “Send everything,” I said, replying to everything he had said as I ended the call.The files arrived and I spread them across the desk in order of earliest to the most recent I read through the damage column by column; two boar