The Woman in the Cream Dress
Chapter 04 - The Woman in the Cream Dress
The message directed Nora to a twenty-four-hour diner near Union Station.
Lily insisted on coming. Nora refused, then compromised by allowing her to wait across the street in a parked rideshare.
Camille sat in the back booth wearing a gray coat over the cream dress from the penthouse. Her mascara had been washed away. Without the perfect makeup and controlled posture, she looked less like Julian’s glamorous partner and more like a woman who had not slept.
“You should hate me,” Camille said.
“I don’t have enough information yet.”
“That sounds like something your father would say.”
Camille placed the folded page on the table but kept two fingers over it.
It was not part of the share transfer. It was a side letter authorizing Julian to move two hundred million dollars from a housing fund into a private holding company.
Nora read the signature line.
Her name had already been forged.
“How long?” she asked.
“Eighteen months.”
“And you helped him.”
Camille’s eyes lifted. “At first, I thought the money was temporary financing. Then I found out he was using cheaper steel in three affordable-housing towers. When I challenged him, he reminded me that my name was on the press releases and the lender reports.”
“So you watched him hurt me because you were afraid for yourself.”
Camille flinched. “Yes.”
The honesty did not make the answer noble, but it made it useful.
“Why give me this now?” Nora asked.
“Because last night he told me that after you signed, he would marry me.” Camille’s mouth twisted. “Then I saw a message on his phone to another woman.”
Nora almost stood up.
Camille grabbed the page. “There’s more. Julian has been using Lily’s trust as collateral. If the board removes you tomorrow, he can sell the waterfront project and cover the missing money before anyone audits it.”
“Give me the page.”
“I want immunity.”
“I’m not a prosecutor.”
“You still know people.”
Nora thought of her father’s old lawyer, Daniel Price, and the ethics that had vanished whenever wealth entered the room.
“I can promise only this,” she said. “Tell the full truth, and I won’t lie about your part in it.”
Camille studied her, then released the paper.
A black SUV stopped outside the diner.
Camille went pale.
May you like
“He found me.”
The rear door opened, and Julian’s attorney stepped onto the sidewalk.
