“He also told me something else.”
“What?”
“He said Clara would understand.”
The room suddenly felt cold.
Because that was the one thing Ethan should never have said.
Using my wife’s name.
Using her memory.
Using the trust she had left behind.
“What was in the envelope?”
June slid it toward me.
Inside was a flash drive.
And a photograph.
I picked it up.
And my entire body went still.
The photograph showed Clara.
Standing beside Ethan.
But that wasn’t what shocked me.
It was the person standing beside them.
A young woman.
A woman I recognized.
Because I had seen her every day.
Inside my own home.
The woman who cleaned my kitchen.
The woman who ate leftovers in the pantry.
June.
But the photograph was dated five years earlier.
Before she worked for me.
Before anyone knew her.
I looked at June.
“Why are you in this picture?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Because Clara wasn’t just helping me.”
She swallowed.
“She was protecting me.”
I spent the next three hours examining everything on that flash drive.
Emails.
Financial documents.
Recordings.
Evidence.
Clara had discovered Ethan’s theft years before I ever did.
And it wasn’t only money taken from employees.
Millions had disappeared from the company through hidden accounts.
But Ethan had been careful.
He didn’t steal openly.
He created confusion.
Fake vendors.
Fake contracts.
Small transfers that nobody noticed.
Except Clara.
She noticed everything.
