CHAPTER 4 THE MESSAGE FROM SINGAPORE
I saw my babies for the first time twelve hours later.
A nurse pushed my wheelchair through the neonatal intensive care unit while every movement pulled against the fresh incision across my abdomen.
The room was quiet except for monitors, ventilators, and the soft footsteps of nurses moving between incubators.
Sophie lay beneath a transparent cover with tiny sensors attached to her chest.
She was impossibly small.
Her fingers were no larger than matchsticks.
A breathing tube rested beneath her nose, and one knitted yellow cap covered her dark hair.
My daughter.
Alive because strangers had rushed into an operating room and refused to let her go.
Lucas lay in the incubator beside hers.
His skin looked pale under the hospital lights. A ventilator helped his lungs expand. One tiny fist rested near his cheek.
I placed my hand through the opening in the side of the incubator and touched a single finger to his palm.
His fingers closed around mine.
I broke.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I should have protected you.”
The NICU nurse, Rebecca, stood behind me.
“You did protect them.”
“I couldn’t stop her.”
“You stayed conscious. You told the paramedics how far along you were. You got your children here alive.”
“They came too early because of me.”
“They came early because someone attacked you.”
The distinction mattered.
I had spent years analyzing fraud for corporations, finding the exact moment when victims began blaming themselves for someone else’s decisions.
Now I was doing the same thing.
Rebecca adjusted Sophie’s blanket.
“Your daughter is stubborn.”
I managed a weak smile.
“She gets that from me.”
“And your son has already surprised the doctors twice.”
“He gets that from his father.”
At the mention of Ryan, the warmth vanished.
There had been no confirmed sighting of him since he entered the Singapore hotel the previous evening.
His passport remained in the room.
His luggage had not been unpacked.
His laptop was gone.
Security footage showed him leaving through a side entrance at 11:18 p.m. with a man wearing a dark baseball cap.
The man’s face had been hidden.
Ryan had not appeared afraid.
That was the detail that terrified me most.
He had gone willingly because he knew the person.
Detective Harris arrived at the hospital shortly after noon with an FBI agent named Naomi Ward.
Agent Ward was composed, direct, and younger than I expected. She placed a slim folder on the table beside my hospital bed.
“We are coordinating with Singapore authorities,” she said. “At this time, your husband is officially considered missing.”
“Do you think he’s alive?”
“We do not have evidence of his death.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No,” she admitted. “But it is the most accurate answer I can give you.”
Detective Harris pulled a chair closer.
“We located Brianna’s rental car.”
“Where?”
“Near a private airport outside the city.”
My stomach tightened.
“Did she leave the country?”
“We don’t believe so. No matching passengers were recorded.”
“What about Patricia?”
“Her credit card was used at a gas station approximately seventy miles north.”
“By her?”
“We are reviewing the footage.”
Agent Ward opened the folder.
“The larger financial documents appear to involve Brooks Urban Development, specifically an emergency leadership transfer.”
I knew Ryan’s corporate structure well enough to understand the danger.
Ryan owned fifty-eight percent of the voting shares.
Patricia held eight percent from shares inherited after Ryan’s father died.
Brianna held two percent.
The remaining ownership belonged to investors and senior executives.
Under normal circumstances, Patricia had no control.
But the company’s emergency succession agreement allowed the board to appoint an interim executive if Ryan became incapacitated or disappeared during a critical negotiation period.
“Patricia wants the board to appoint her,” I said.
“She may want someone appointed who will follow her instructions,” Agent Ward replied.
“Who?”
“We are investigating several individuals.”
I thought of the unknown person on Patricia’s phone.
“Can you trace the call?”
“The number was masked through an encrypted internet service.”
“Then check Ryan’s board.”
“We are.”
A nurse entered holding my recovered phone inside a clear evidence bag.
“Mrs. Brooks, law enforcement said you were permitted to receive a copy of your personal communications.”
Agent Ward nodded.
“We created a secure image of the device. You may use the phone, but do not delete anything.”
The screen was cracked from Brianna’s attack, but it still worked.
The moment I turned it on, dozens of notifications appeared.
Missed calls from Ryan’s office.
Messages from friends.
News alerts.
Voicemails from reporters who had somehow learned that the CEO of Brooks Urban Development had vanished overseas.
Then I saw a new email.
No sender name.
No subject.
Received eleven minutes earlier.
I opened it.
There was no written message.
Only an audio attachment.
Agent Ward moved closer.
“Do not play that yet.”
She placed the phone on the bedside table, connected a small recording device, and signaled for me to begin.
Static filled the room.
Then Ryan’s voice came through the speaker.
“Evelyn, I don’t know when you’ll hear this.”
My breath stopped.
He sounded exhausted.
But alive.
“I made a mistake,” he continued. “I trusted someone I shouldn’t have trusted. Do not sign anything. Do not give Patricia access to the company or the trust.”
I looked at Agent Ward.
Ryan’s voice shook.
“If something happens to me, the answers are in the Harbor Street project. Look at invoice number 4471. You’ll understand what they did.”
A sound came from somewhere near him.
A door opening.
Ryan spoke faster.
“I love you. Tell Sophie and Lucas that their father—”
The recording ended.
I pressed both hands over my mouth.
Agent Ward immediately disconnected the phone.
“We need to trace the email.”
“He’s alive.”
“He was alive when that recording was made.”
“It was sent eleven minutes ago.”
“Not necessarily. The sender could have scheduled or delayed delivery.”
The possibility crushed the small hope rising inside me.
“What is the Harbor Street project?” Detective Harris asked.
“A waterfront development Ryan completed three years ago.”
“And invoice 4471?”
“I don’t know.”
Agent Ward studied me.
“You were a forensic accountant.”
“Yes.”
“Did you handle your husband’s company records?”
“Not officially. Ryan wanted our marriage separate from his business.”
“Could you access archived financial statements?”
“Possibly through his home office, but police sealed the house.”
“We can arrange supervised access.”
I looked toward the NICU hallway.
“I’m not leaving the hospital.”
“We can have the records brought here.”
“No. Ryan said the answers were in the project. He might have hidden something that only makes sense in context.”
My incision burned when I shifted upright.
Agent Ward frowned.
“You underwent emergency surgery less than a day ago.”
“My husband is missing. My children are in intensive care. His mother and sister tried to steal their trust and leave me bleeding on the floor.”
I held her gaze.
“I am not staying in this bed while everyone else decides what matters.”
Detective Harris leaned back.
“Your medical team will need to approve any movement.”
“They won’t.”
“Then we retrieve the files.”
I closed my eyes and pictured Ryan’s home office.
Walnut shelves.
A locked filing cabinet.
Blueprint tubes stacked behind his desk.
He kept digital archives on an encrypted server, but certain old construction documents remained on paper.
“Bring me everything marked Harbor Street,” I said. “Invoices, contractor lists, change orders, insurance claims, inspection reports.”
“That could be thousands of pages.”
“Then bring thousands.”
Agent Ward looked unconvinced.
“What are we searching for?”
“A pattern.”
“What kind?”
“The kind Ryan knew I would recognize.”
Four hours later, boxes began arriving.
Police officers transported sealed records from our home office and the company’s off-site archive. Brooks Urban Development provided access after Agent Ward obtained emergency legal authority.
I worked from my hospital bed with IV lines attached to my arm and pain spreading through my abdomen.
Dana sat beside me, sorting documents into piles.
“You should rest,” she said.
“I’ll rest when Ryan is home.”
We found invoice 4471 shortly after midnight.
It was issued by a subcontractor called Northline Structural Consulting.
Amount: $486,000.
Purpose: emergency reinforcement and soil stabilization.
But the original Harbor Street construction budget showed no structural emergency.
I compared the invoice date with inspection reports.
No failure.
No stabilization order.
No engineering amendment.
The payment had been approved anyway.
By Ryan’s former chief financial officer.
A man named Victor Hale.
Victor had left the company two years earlier, claiming health problems.
He had also been one of Ryan’s father’s closest friends.
I searched through subsequent invoices.
All from companies with different names.
All for services that never occurred.
Combined value: $8.7 million.
Dana stared at the totals.
“Who received the money?”
“That’s what we need to find.”
A corporate registration report showed Northline Structural Consulting had been dissolved six months after the Harbor Street project ended.
Its listed owner was a trust registered in Delaware.
The trust administrator was a law firm.
I recognized the name immediately.
Wexler, Vane and Cole.
Patricia’s personal attorneys.
My skin went cold.
The fraud had begun years before the twins’ trust existed.
The boutique story was a distraction.
Brianna did want money, but Patricia was covering something far larger.
I picked up my phone and called Agent Ward.
“I found the connection.”
She answered on the first ring.
“What connection?”
“Patricia and Ryan’s former CFO stole nearly nine million dollars through fake Harbor Street contractors.”
“Can you prove it?”
“I can prove the services weren’t performed. I can connect one shell company to Patricia’s law firm.”
“That may not establish ownership.”
“Then follow the money from the trust administrator.”
“We will.”
“There’s more.”
I examined the invoice approvals.
Victor Hale had authorized most of them.
But the final transfer carried a second signature.
Not Ryan’s.
His father’s.
Thomas Brooks had died eighteen months after the Harbor Street project.
Officially from a heart attack.
Ryan had always believed his father’s health declined suddenly.
“What is it?” Agent Ward asked.
“Ryan’s father signed one of the fake invoices.”
“Maybe he was involved.”
“Or maybe his signature was forged.”
“Can you tell?”
“Not from this copy.”
A notification appeared on my phone.
Another email.
Same blank sender.
This time, it contained a photograph.
Ryan sat tied to a chair in an unfamiliar room.
A bruise darkened one side of his face.
Behind him stood a man whose features were hidden in shadow.
Across the bottom of the image were six words.
STOP LOOKING INTO HARBOR STREET NOW.
Agent Ward heard my breathing change.
“Evelyn?”
“They sent a picture.”
“Forward it immediately.”
I stared at my husband’s face.
He looked directly at the camera.
His right hand was partly visible beside the chair.
Three fingers extended.
Two bent.
Then three extended again.
A sequence.
Not random.
Ryan and I had used simple number patterns while playing card games.
Three.
Two.
Three.
Room 323?
Highway 323?
I enlarged the image.
Behind Ryan, a faded metal sign hung on the wall.
Only the last letters were visible.
…RINE STORAGE.
Marine Storage.
Harbor Street sat near the old waterfront warehouses.
I grabbed the project map.
Unit numbers lined the dockside district.
Building 3.
Section 2.
Warehouse 3.
May you like
Three-two-three.
“Agent Ward,” I said, “I think Ryan is telling us where he is.”
