“What’s going on?” he asked.
I laid it out. The fraudulent vendors. The inflated invoices. The missing deposit. The seventy-two thousand dollars that had been siphoned through shell companies registered with his credentials.
Taylor’s face went through stages. Confusion. Then comprehension. Then a slow, dawning horror. The best acting I’d ever seen.
“Rose, I didn’t—” He stood up. “Those companies— I didn’t set those up. I processed the payments because Denise told me they were approved vendors. She gave me the account numbers. She told me you’d signed off on?—”
“Don’t.” Denise’s voice cut through like a blade. She was trembling, hands shaking, jaw tight, eyes bright with fury. “Don’t you dare try to put this on me.”
“Denise, just tell her.” Taylor turned to her, and desperation poured off him in waves. Not rage. Fear. “Tell her you gave me those accounts. Tell her you set up the payment schedules and told me to process them. Tell her?—”
“I can’t believe I ever loved you,” Denise said, her voice cracking. “I vouched for you. And now you’re trying to blame me for whatyoudid?”
Taylor looked at her for a long moment. Then his expression collapsed.
“Rose,” he said, turning to me. “I know how this looks. But I swear to you— I was just doing what I was told. I thought these were legitimate payments. I thought?—”
“Your name is on everything, Taylor.” My voice was steady, even though my hands weren’t. “Every transaction. Every shell company. Your digital signature. Your login credentials.”
“Because she set it up that way!” His voice rose, cracking. “She had me sign everything. Said it was for accountability. Said you wanted a clear chain of—” He stopped. Looked at Denise again. Then back at me. “You’re not going to believe me. Are you.”
It wasn’t a question.
“I’d like you to leave the property,” I said. “Today.”
Taylor stood there for another moment. Then he nodded slowly, like a man accepting a verdict he’d known was coming.
He walked to the door. Stopped. Looked back, not at me. At Denise.
“You know what you fucking did,” he said quietly.
Denise met his stare with tears rolling down her cheeks. “Get the fuck out, Taylor.”
He left.
I watched him through the window, crossing the yard with his shoulders hunched, hands shoved in his pockets, not looking back. Graham was watching too. When I glanced at him, his expression was unreadable.
“You okay?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “But it’s done.”
Denise wiped her eyes and squeezed my arm. “I’ll go change his access codes right now. Every system, every lock, everything. He won’t be able to touch a thing again.”
“Thank you.”
She left. Graham and I stood alone in the office.
“I know what you’re thinking,” I said before he could speak.
“I wasn’t going to say anything.”
“You were thinking it.”
He was quiet for a moment. “He was scared, Rose. Not angry. Scared.”
“He was caught. People act all kinds of ways when they’re caught.”
Graham nodded slowly. But the look on his face said he wasn’t done thinking about it.
