Chapter 48
Sexually frustrated and grumpy, Colette rose from her bed extra early after a long night of tossing and turning.
What was the point of working from home and flexible hours if her body didn’t cooperate and let her sleep in?
Maybe she had gotten used to those early hours on the ranch, rising as the sun filtered through her lacy curtains, beckoning her to watch and savor the beauty of the sunrise each morning.
Marshall had promised to call her and fill her in on his meeting, which wasn’t for a little while.
A heavy pit of dread resided where her stomach used to be.
She hoped he had arrived and was staying safe.
They knew someone at Rosebud Ranch was capable of murder and, through her financial analysis, fraud.
Marshall had left so fast, she hadn’t been able to fill him in on the latest, but that didn’t bother her.
She wanted to be able to paint a complete picture before presenting him with the facts.
The perpetrator was very savvy and covered up all digital traces that would link the shady finances and maybe even the homicide to anyone.
Shuffling to the kitchen, she turned on the coffee maker and texted Simone.
Colette: Hey, I need to pick your brain
Simone: If this is about men, I don’t understand them. They are on earth to drive us crazy. That is all I know
Colette: No, this is about the stuff I’m working on. The ranch finances
Simone: I’m a law girlie, not a finance girlie [sad face emoji]
Colette: Yeah, maybe I can ask some of my accounting friends
Simone: The idea of accounting friends is sad
Colette: Shut up. We’re a hoot
Simone: Wait… I have an accounting friend. And she is a hoot. Not you
Colette: Rude
Simone: I’ll send her a message and get back to you. Could we meet tonight?
Colette: Yeah, I’m just sitting around wishing I was someplace else. And working… stop in whenever
She dropped the phone on the counter. There.
That was enough work for now. The reality was, she was stumped.
Looking forward to another day of scouring the old files for new information, Colette made herself breakfast and turned on reruns of The Golden Girls.
There was something soothing about all that sass that was comforting during these fraught times.
She and Marshall were working so hard toward something, but she wasn’t exactly sure what.
There were too many intersecting mysteries, and it was hard to imagine they were related, but maybe they were?
If someone was stealing from the Kings, maybe they hurt Jack because he discovered something.
Jack was the kind of man whose loyalty could be trusted. Or could it?
It was hard to know who to trust.
She choked down a bowl of oatmeal topped with apples and cinnamon, standing in her kitchen and staring at her computer sitting on the dining room table. Her nemesis.
Perhaps it was time to take a step back from the screen and whip out her damn files again. Lay out the papers, read through her notes and highlights. Start fresh, line by line.
Her job was to organize and locate the errors. Fix the mistakes. Clean up the mess left behind by the former accountant. Rather than fixating on a problem that didn’t have a clear solution, she would start over. With any luck, that would give her some clarity.
The discrepancies between revenues and cash flow were subtle but evident. She needed to focus on finding where the unexplained transactions were going.
Dropping her bowl in the sink, she went to her room and pulled out the boxes of files and organized the papers, stacks of receipts, and financial statements on the table.
Starting with statements from a year ago, she compared each line to the ones she had manually entered online.
Things seemed stable until six months ago, then a small amount of money was transferred to Lorimer Fertilizers.
This seemed consistent with what would be necessary for running a ranch, harvesting crops, farm-y type things that seemed legit.
However, every one of those lines missed recording shipments, receivals.
They were paying bills to this company every month, but not getting anything for it.
No one would have known it was happening, since Agnes kept mostly to herself, did the work from her home, as had been explained to her when she was hired.
Marshall had no cause to double-check anything.
The only reason things had come to a point was because Agnes had left, leaving a mess of finances for Marshall’s grandfather to dump on a new hire.
Colette tapped her chin as she looked over the files.
Seating herself at the table, she woke up her laptop and searched for Lorimer Fertilizers through a search engine. Nothing relevant came up.
They were sending money to a ghost company that didn’t exist.
This she already knew.
So, someone must be skimming money from Rosebud Ranch.
The thought made her want to run away, just like Agnes. How could she explain to Clarence King—or Marshall—that someone they trusted was stealing from them? It made her sick, almost as though she had taken the funds herself.
Money was as good a motive for revenge as she had ever seen.
Colette raked her fingers through her messy curls and leaned back in her chair.
If the previous accountant was the only one to know of the skimming of funds, Colette was made even more curious to know what Marshall’s meeting with her daughter would reveal.
Was she working with someone, or taking them all for herself to pay for her retirement in the tropics? Colette shook her head.
A knock sounded at the door, and she almost jumped out of her seat, unaware of any visitors coming.
She certainly hadn’t buzzed anyone up. Glancing at the time on her phone, she realized it was already evening.
Somehow, she had kept her head down and worked through most of the day, stopping only for bathroom breaks and snacks.
She checked for any text messages and saw that Simone had blown up her phone.
Oops.
Padding over to the door, she peeked through the ancient peephole and saw Simone, as well as a few more people.
“How did you get in here?” Colette asked as she opened the door. “I don’t know if I want to let you in here, that’s fucking shady.”
Simone pushed her way in, and Colette recognized Anika Bernard and another woman following behind. They looked as though they were coming straight from work.
“Colette, meet Daphne. I’m assuming you remember Anika, Daphne’s sister?” Simone kicked off her three-inch heels and gave a sigh of relief. “We brought takeout. I hope you’re hungry.”
Nodding, Colette looked down at her disheveled appearance, embarrassed that she hadn’t taken the time to divest herself of her pajamas at any time that day.
“I wasn’t exactly expecting a party and I kind of lost track of time,” she said. “I’m going to go get dressed.”
“Don’t you dare! We brought booze and food. I also brought another accounting whiz to look over your boring paperwork with you. Let’s get cracking. Time is of the essence.”
A renewed sense of hope filled her chest; she blinked away tears that threatened.
She would not cry in front of her friends, but damn, they were the best.
After a day of drowning in her frustration, this was the life preserver she needed.
Simone walked over to the dining room table and scanned the files, clucking her tongue. “You ladies do the finance-y stuff, Anika and I will get some glasses and plates.”
Colette gave Daphne a tour through the paperwork, desperate for a second opinion.
She was good at cleaning up messes and an efficient bookkeeper.
Someone like Daphne, who had revealed she specialized in audits and had expertise in the area of fraud, might have a good take for her.
Or maybe explaining it to someone else would give her a new perspective.
Fresh eyes and all that.
“And please keep in mind, while you’re looking, that we are missing some crucial information on the Lorimer Fertilizers account, the only one I can’t justify.
Most of the other expenses I can verify, but these transactions don’t add up.
It’s money going out and nothing coming in.
” Digging her teeth into her bottom lip, she watched as her new friend sat at the table.
Daphne nodded and began to sift through the files. “Everything you’ve done here makes sense. It sucks that you’re missing information that is vital to this case. Someone is hiding something.”
Behind them, Simone made a humming sound as she poured the wine into four glasses. Her brows drew together as she looked at Anika.
“Ani, didn’t we have a Lorimer account when we worked together at Braithwaite and Abernathy? What was that case again?” Simone asked, passing a glass to each woman. Pressing the glass against her lips, Simone pulled up her phone and began searching.
Anika’s eyes widened as she stared at Simone, nodding slowly.
“The Lorimer file,” Anika tilted her head to the side and looked up at the ceiling.
“Yes, that was a different fraud case. Some kind of construction supplier issues. Taking funds and double-dipping. Like charging them for double the supplies and only delivering half what was sold. They got off because they settled out of court. I never saw the aftermath of it all because once we finished our work, we passed it off to the lawyers. Lorimer Industries. I think they went bankrupt because of the case. The guy running the company was so slippery, he kept sending people in his stead. We never met him.”
“Do you have any information on who runs the company? Maybe there’s a connection,” Colette asked, hope rising in her chest. This would be great if she could find a place where all these funds were going.
Maybe it would explain why Agnes had left so suddenly.
If they went bankrupt, it could explain the suspect’s sudden need for cash, or a new swindle to refill their coffers.
“I can investigate it and send you what I have tomorrow morning when I go to work. Just keep it to yourself, it’s protected information and shouldn’t be shared with any outside sources,” Anika said. “Hopefully, I can get you a name or something.”
Colette nodded and took a sip of her wine. Good.
This was progress. How lucky was she? She wondered why she hadn’t reached out for help earlier.
Simone squished into the small, apartment-size sofa next to Anika and regaled them with the scandalous stories from The Blossom Gala.
Apparently, hookups abounded. With the amount of alcohol that had been consumed, it was no surprise.
The Stanhopes had a huge blowout because Mr. Stanhope was seen getting close to a certain Lucinda.
Mrs. Stanhope had spent a good part of the evening crying in the bathroom and yelling at her husband through the bathroom door.
Mr. Stanhope ended up tossing his wife over his shoulder and carrying the distraught woman out to the limo, so there was hope their relationship would survive.
Colette had trouble keeping her mouth closed for the entire duration of the story.
She liked drama, but this was over the top.
Anika complained about the new construction in Marda Loop and how suddenly, it seemed like every road had a detour. Traffic and construction were one of the things she did not miss from the city.
In truth, the only thing she had spent time missing lately was the ranch.
And Marshall. It was hard to feel at home in her apartment now that she had returned.
It was like putting on an outfit that no longer fit.
It could work if she squeezed into it, but she never felt comfortable or like herself when she wore it. The realization was terrifying.
If she no longer felt at home in the city, what did that mean for her future goals?
Life in the country had had a calming effect on her mind and the feverish pace of her daily routine.
It was just one more reason why she had to get to the bottom of this mystery.
Find the missing pieces of the puzzle so that she could return to Rosebud.
Whatever was going on with Marshall, she had to see it through to its end.
More and more, she got the sensation that parts of her had been left behind at the ranch.
She had started something that she needed to finish.
Unless it wasn’t meant to end. Her heart was an open wound that had begun to bleed the minute she had sent Marshall out the door the night before.
The only way to stem the blood was to put all those parts of herself back together.
She had a sinking feeling the pieces would never fit the same. Something in her had shifted.
Being with Marshall again was the only way she would feel whole.
She wasn’t only working to save the ranch; she was trying to save herself.
And the thought scared her to death.