Chapter 16 - The LeakOfficer Daniels was not the leak.
Neither was Elena.
But someone inside the federal investigation had been feeding information to the network.
Every time we moved, Richard seemed to know.
The list from my mother contained the name of an investigator.
Special Agent Thomas Reed.
Reed had access to the trust case.
He had been passing updates to Richard.
Worse, Reed knew where I lived.
He knew about Ethan.
And he knew everything about the evidence.
We couldn't confront him directly.
So Jonathan proposed a trap.
We would create fake information.
Three versions.
One for three different people.
Then we'd watch which version reached Richard.
I hated playing games.
But my father had been playing this game for years.
I chose the document stating that the final evidence was hidden in a bank vault.
Elena received one location.
Jonathan received another.
Reed received a third.
Within twelve hours, someone tried to access the third location.
Reed.
Federal agents arrested him.
Under questioning, he finally admitted the network extended beyond Richard.
There were bankers.
Accountants.
Lawyers.
Developers.
And one wealthy investor who had funded the operation for over a decade.
His name was Daniel Whitmore.
I knew him.
Everyone knew him.
He was a respected philanthropist.
A billionaire.
A man who had appeared on television countless times talking about family values and community.
He was also the person who had financed Richard's shell companies.
And he had one connection that destroyed me.
Daniel Whitmore had attended my father's funeral.
He had hugged me.
He had told me how sorry he was.
He had stood beside my mother.
And all along, he had known.
The final evidence was a financial transfer from Whitmore's private foundation to Richard.
But there was something else.
A photo.
Whitmore with my mother.
Three months before my father's death.
Then a second photo.
Whitmore with Richard.
Then a third.
Whitmore with...
My father.
The date was the night before the crash.
Why had they met?
The answer was in my father's final video.
He had been negotiating.
He had tried to buy our freedom.
Whitmore refused.
Instead, he demanded control of the trust.
My father refused.
Then he recorded everything.
At the bottom of the file was a final line.
If I die, the person who benefits most will be the person who ordered it.
Whitmore.
The billionaire who had built his reputation on charity.
The man everyone trusted.
We had finally found the top.
Or so I thought.
Because when federal agents raided Whitmore's offices, they found something that changed the case completely.
A photograph from twenty years earlier.
My father.
My mother.
Richard.
And Daniel Whitmore.
Standing together.
Smiling.
And in the center of the photo was another person.
A woman.
I recognized her immediately.
She was my mother's oldest friend.
And she had died five years ago.
May you like
Except the photograph had been taken...
Two months ago.
