Chapter 10 - Evan Had Found the Same Fraud
The major twist came from one spreadsheet on Evan Price’s failing laptop.
Until then, we believed Evan had discovered early irregularities three years ago and I had independently uncovered a newer version of the same scheme.
We were wrong.
It was one continuous scheme.
Evan’s spreadsheet contained product codes, unit values, and quarterly adjustment totals.
When Stanton’s forensic accountants compared them to the current audit, several product categories matched exactly.
The phantom inventory had not started two years ago.
It had started more than four years earlier.
Martin did not face two unrelated employees asking similar questions.
He faced the same question twice.
Evan had discovered the system at its beginning.
I had discovered what it had grown into.
Three earlier clues suddenly locked together.
Evan’s email warning that bank inventory was wrong.
The 7:30 a.m. meeting labeled E.P. COUNT ISSUE.
Martin’s immediate attempt after my collapse to portray my audit work as obsessive and unstable.
Then came the darkest piece.
Laura Finch provided investigators with handwritten notes from the morning after Evan died.
According to her, Martin told her:
“The Price problem resolved itself. Do not create another one.”
Martin denied saying it.
Laura had written it down three years earlier next to the date.
That alone was not enough.
Then an email surfaced from Martin to Laura two weeks before my quarterly presentation:
Claire is becoming another Price. I’ll handle her.
My hands went cold when Monica showed it to me.
“Handle me how?”
Nobody could answer.
There was no evidence Martin caused either medical event.
The truth was almost more disturbing because he had not needed to.
Chance had handed him the same opportunity twice.
An employee threatening to expose a financial problem collapsed in front of him.
With Evan, Martin delayed emergency care while telling coworkers to wait.
Evan died.
Three years later, he was required to undergo CPR/AED training partly because of that failure.
Then I collapsed while demanding an audit.
This time he did not merely freeze.
He physically blocked Nathan.
He grabbed Jenna’s wrist when she reached toward the AED.
He said not to call 911 yet.
He knew the procedure.
He knew what delay could do.
He had seen the outcome before.
And he did it again.
Martin’s scheme was never murder by design.
It was something colder:
when a medical emergency threatened to remove a person who threatened him, he chose the company numbers over the human heartbeat.
May you like
Evan’s death had taught him the cost.
My collapse revealed he was willing to pay it twice.
