“So Dad fired Milford just before the apartment fire that took down the business.”
She shrugged, but her eyes slid away. “I suppose that’s right.”
Cassidy set her cup and saucer down on the gilded table in front of the settee. “Which brings us to why we’re here. The fire was arson. There’s a good chance the building was destroyed so that you and the senator could claim the insurance money.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
Beau leaned over and set down his tea. “Charlotte, you and I both know Dad was responsible for that fire. The rental market tanked and the project was going to fail. My father wanted out. He hired someone to make that happen. There’s no use lying about it.”
Charlotte’s lips trembled and her hand shook, rattling the cup in her saucer. He could see she was about to cave.
“Come on, Charlotte. Tell me the truth. If you don’t, I’ll just keep digging until I find out.”
She took a shaky breath, slowly released it. “I didn’t know Stewart was involved until later. I thought it was vandalism, just like the police said. I suppose I should have suspected. I knew he had borrowed a large sum of money from someone. But we were divorced. I didn’t put the pieces together until after we’d sold the company and he’d paid me my share.”
Her mouth thinned. “Well, slightly less than my share. You know how he could always manipulate things in his favor.”
Cassidy spoke to Charlotte. “Senator Reese hired me because he thought someone was following him, asking questions about him. He believed you might have had something to do with it. If you were no longer interested in a relationship, why did you hire those men?”
Charlotte’s spine went stiff. “For heaven’s sake! What makes you think—”
“This is all going to get worse before it gets better,” Beau said. “I’ll do my best to keep you out of it if you’ll just tell us the truth.”
Charlotte sat there for several long moments. She took a deep breath. “All right, fine. I hired a man to follow Stewart because I wanted to make him nervous. I wanted him to know I meant business.”
“In what way?” Cassidy asked.
“I needed money. I told him I knew he was involved in that fire. I told him if he would just give me a little more of the profit he made from the sale of the property, I’d keep quiet about it. Stewart only laughed. He said if his reputation was ruined, mine would be, too. He knew how I felt about that. He wasn’t the least bit afraid I would pursue it.”
Cassidy leaned forward. “You said the senator borrowed a large sum of money. Do you know who made him the loan?”
“No. I’m sorry. He was always borrowing money from someone, always robbing Peter to pay Paul. He was never good with money.”
“Thank you, Charlotte.” Beau rose from the settee. “As I said, I’ll keep you out of this if I can.”
Cassidy rose and Charlotte led them out of the salon, but it was the butler who showed them to the door.
“Well, we got answers,” Beau said as the door closed firmly behind them. “But not enough.”
Cassidy tugged on his arm, leading him down the wide front steps. “We need to talk to Malcolm Vaughn.” She smiled. “And I know where to find him.”
* * *
Cassidy buckled her seat belt as Beau drove the BMW around the circular drive, then out through the ornate gates of Chateau Durant.
“So tell me about Malcolm Vaughn,” Beau said.
Cassidy leaned back in the passenger seat. It started raining again, spotting the windshield, and Beau turned on the wipers. She loved the way his hands looked, wrapped around the steering wheel, the confident, almost arrogant way he handled the car.
“Vaughn owns a company called Equity Advance,” she said, settling back in her seat. The swish of the blades seemed somehow soothing. “They make nothing but commercial loans so they don’t fall under the same regulations as residential mortgage brokers.”
“Vaughn’s the sole owner?”
“That’s right. The company specializes in big-money loans to people who have credit problems or the project is something out of the norm. He charges eighteen-and-a-half percent interest, in some cases possibly more. The loans areusually secured by some sort of real estate, but from what I could find out, the notes aren’t always recorded. If the borrower falls behind in his payments, the company doesn’t hesitate to foreclose.”
“Sounds like Dooley Tate was right. He’s not a guy you want to piss off.”
“Of course we don’t know for sure the senator borrowed money from Vaughn since there was no construction loan recorded on the property. Even if Vaughn made the loan, he might not be willing to tell us.”
