Chapter 3 - HIS INITIALS ON MY AUDIT
Daniel stared at me.
“Tell her no.”
I kept the phone against my ear.
Meredith Sloan waited.
“Mrs. Bellamy?”
“The initials correspond to my husband’s name.”
Daniel stood.
“That does not mean I authorized anything.”
I held up one finger.
“Can you send me the records?”
“Not directly while you’re hospitalized and not in your personal legal capacity. We’ll route them through independent counsel once appointed.”
“Do the transfers have signatures?”
“Some have digital trustee authorizations. Others contain secondary acknowledgment codes.”
“DMB-02.”
“Yes.”
Daniel shook his head.
“That’s not my signature.”
Meredith heard him.
“Mr. Bellamy?”
“Yes.”
“We will contact you formally.”
“Fine.”
She continued.
“Until the review is complete, Keystone is assuming the administrative co-trustee role provided by Section Twelve.”
“What does that mean tonight?”
“Large discretionary principal distributions require dual approval. We’re also requesting full records from Mrs. Bellamy.”
Daniel leaned against the wall.
“And Bellamy House?”
“If it receives trust funds, those transfers will be reviewed.”
He looked at me.
There it was.
The fear.
Not just for his mother.
For the building.
Bellamy House occupied a restored 1840s townhouse two blocks from Washington Square.
Thomas Bellamy had bought it in the nineties and turned it into a private dining club and event venue.
Daniel and Elise had grown up treating it like an extra room in their house.
Thanksgiving dinners.
Graduation parties.
Thomas’s memorial.
Our wedding rehearsal dinner.
Vivian called it the heart of the family.
The balance sheet called it something else.
A property with maintenance costs, debt, aging systems, and sentimental owners unwilling to price events high enough to cover what they spent.
Meredith ended the call.
Daniel looked at the floor.
“I did not approve one point eight million dollars.”
“I didn’t say you did.”
“You’re looking at me like I did.”
“I’m looking at you like you asked me not to start the review ten minutes before we discovered your initials.”
“That code could mean anything.”
“Then why are you scared?”
“Because my mother is going to lose Bellamy House.”
“She may lose control of it.”
“To her, that’s the same thing.”
“Is it the same thing to you?”
He did not answer.
A nurse came in to check my blood pressure.
Daniel moved to the window.
I watched him reflected in the glass.
For five years, he had been the person who translated his mother for me.
She didn’t mean it that way.
She’s under pressure.
The house is all she has left of Dad.
Elise needs her right now.
It had always sounded compassionate.
In the hospital, it sounded rehearsed.
The next morning, Elise asked to see me.
Daniel was downstairs getting coffee.
I said yes.
She entered carrying my purse and coat.
“I got these from Bellamy House.”
“Thank you.”
She put them on the chair.
Her eyes were swollen.
“Mom spent the night at a lawyer’s office.”
“Not jail?”
“No.”
“Did the police charge her?”
“They said the detective has to review everything first.”
I nodded.
Elise looked at my stomach.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what part?”
Her face tightened.
“All of it.”
“You saw her kick me.”
“Yes.”
“Did she lose her balance?”
“No.”
“Thank you.”
She sat carefully.
“I told them that.”
I had expected loyalty to Vivian.
Her answer softened something.
Not much.
“Did you know what she meant about the trust?”
Elise looked at the door.
“I knew a baby changed something.”
“What?”
“Dad used to say, ‘The minute there’s another generation, the bank comes in.’”
“Why?”
“I thought he was being dramatic.”
“Did Daniel know?”
“Probably.”
“Probably?”
“He was older. Dad involved him in more business things.”
My throat tightened.
“How much older?”
“Four years.”
“Did you ever see DMB-02 on anything?”
Her expression changed.
“What?”
I repeated the code.
She sat back.
“Oh.”
“What?”
“That isn’t an authorization code.”
“You know it?”
“I think so.”
“How?”
“Dad labeled internal project folders like that.”
“What does DMB mean?”
“Daniel Michael Bellamy.”
My patience snapped.
“I know what his initials are.”
“No. I mean Dad used our initials for beneficiary advances.”
I stared at her.
“What kind of advances?”
“Money he intended to count against our future shares.”
“Daniel took advances from the trust?”
“I don’t know.”
“You just said—”
“Dad did it when he was alive. If Daniel needed money for graduate school, it would get logged DMB. Mine were EAB.”
“Elise Anne Bellamy.”
She nodded.
“After Dad died, Mom said she kept the same system.”
“How much did you receive?”
Her eyes dropped.
“More than I should have.”
“For what?”
“Treatment.”
I knew about one rehab stay.
What I did not know was that there had been three.
A car accident when Elise was twenty-eight had led to surgery.
Prescription painkillers became doctor shopping.
Then pills bought from friends.
Vivian paid for treatment in Connecticut, then Arizona.
Daniel told me his sister was at wellness retreats.
“Elise.”
“I didn’t know it was trust money.”
“Did you ask?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because when you’re thirty-one and your mother offers to keep your name out of collections while you’re trying not to buy oxy from a bartender, you don’t ask enough questions.”
The honesty stopped me.
“How much?”
“Maybe four hundred thousand over several years.”
“Four hundred thousand?”
“Treatment, credit cards, rent, the car I wrecked. I was a disaster.”
“Why didn’t Daniel tell me?”
“He was embarrassed.”
“That isn’t his secret to be embarrassed about.”
“I know.”
I looked at her.
“Were Daniel’s advances for his company?”
“I think one was.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
Daniel entered carrying coffee.
He stopped when he saw Elise.
“What are you doing here?”
“She brought my things.”
Elise stood.
“And I told her about the advance codes.”
Daniel’s face hardened.
“Elise.”
“She asked.”
He put the coffee down.
I looked at him.
“How much did you take?”
“I did not take one point eight million dollars.”
“How much?”
He glanced at his sister.
She left.
The door closed.
Daniel lowered his voice.
“My firm had a cash-flow problem two years ago.”
“How much?”
“Two hundred fifty.”
“Thousand.”
“Yes.”
“From the trust?”
“My mother said it was an advance against my eventual share.”
“Did you sign anything?”
“A note.”
“Did you repay it?”
“Some.”
“How much?”
He looked away.
“About forty.”
I stared at him.
“You borrowed two hundred fifty thousand dollars from a trust your mother controls, repaid forty, and never told your wife who happens to be the notice counsel?”
“It was my family money.”
“No. It was trust principal.”
“I’m a beneficiary.”
“That does not make it your checking account.”
He flinched.
Good.
A secure email arrived from independent counsel appointed by Keystone.
One scanned document was attached.
SECONDARY BENEFICIARY CONSENT.
Principal distribution: $250,000.
Purpose: Bellamy Restoration Studio operating stabilization.
Family trustee: Vivian Bellamy.
Secondary acknowledgment:
Daniel Michael Bellamy.
Daniel stared at his signature.
“That’s the note.”
I scrolled lower.
There was another paragraph.
I read it once.
Then again.
“What?”
He stepped closer.
I turned the screen toward him.
The note did not say the money would be charged against Daniel’s future share.
It said:
THIS ADVANCE SHALL BE REPAID TO THE TRUST WITHIN TWENTY-FOUR MONTHS.
The due date had passed eight months ago.
Below it was a handwritten notation from Vivian.
ROLLED INTO PRESERVATION EXPENSES.
Daniel whispered, “I’ve never seen that sentence.”
Then my phone chimed again.
Keystone had found three more DMB-coded transfers.
Not $250,000.
May you like
$730,000.
And one of them had been approved six months after Daniel claimed his company no longer needed help.
