Chapter 3 - HE CAME BACK FOR THE LAPTOP
“Naomi!”
Javier hammered the door again.
“Open this damn door.”
Wyatt moved toward me.
I put out my arm.
“Stay back.”
“I’m not letting you deal with him alone.”
“You’re eighteen.”
“I know.”
“You’re also my little brother.”
“And you’re five-three.”
“I’m five-five.”
“Not the point.”
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
I opened the security app and activated recording.
“Javier, leave.”
His face moved toward the camera.
“My computer is inside.”
“Yes.”
“You have no right to keep it.”
“You left it in my home.”
“My home.”
I actually laughed.
“Still confused about that?”
Lydia shoved herself closer to the camera.
“That apartment belongs to my son because you’re married!”
“No, Lydia.”
“You stole his belongings!”
“You hit my brother.”
“He needed discipline!”
Wyatt went rigid.
I felt something inside me become very calm.
“Say that again.”
“What?”
“That you hit him.”
Lydia realized too late.
Javier grabbed her arm.
“Mom, stop.”
But I had recorded enough.
Javier stared directly into the camera.
“Naomi, we need to talk.”
“No.”
“There are things on that computer you don’t understand.”
“I understand the $150,000 transfer.”
His face changed.
Only slightly.
But I saw it.
“So you went through my private files.”
“You stole from my company.”
“It wasn’t stealing.”
“What would you call transferring one hundred fifty thousand dollars to an escrow account for a house you’re buying with another woman?”
Lydia looked at Javier.
Interesting.
Apparently she knew about some of the plan.
Maybe not Camila.
“Another woman?” she said.
Javier’s jaw tightened.
“Naomi, open the door.”
“Is Camila your girlfriend?”
Silence.
Lydia turned toward him.
“Who is Camila?”
That answered one question.
Javier lowered his voice.
“You are making a scene.”
“You came pounding on my door after midnight.”
“You don’t know what that money was for.”
“A house.”
“It was an investment.”
“With your girlfriend?”
“Business partner.”
“Do you tell all your business partners you love them?”
Lydia stared at him.
“You said love?”
Javier snapped, “Mom, please.”
I nearly applauded.
He had spent years letting Lydia humiliate me.
Now I watched his two lies collide directly in front of him.
He switched tactics.
“Naomi, the business benefited from my work for years.”
“No.”
“I helped you build Solara.”
“You joined my life after Solara had twenty-eight employees.”
“I introduced you to clients.”
“You brought three clients. Two never paid on time.”
His nostrils flared.
“We are married. That money is ours.”
“My attorney can explain the difference between marriage and secretly inventing vendors.”
His face went pale.
“You called a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Naomi, think very carefully.”
“I have.”
“You’re emotional because of what happened tonight.”
“No. I was emotional when your mother hit Wyatt.”
I looked directly at the camera.
“Now I’m organized.”
That scared him.
I saw it.
He stepped away.
“Give me my laptop.”
“My attorney will arrange its return after the evidence is preserved.”
“Evidence?”
“Yes.”
Lydia hissed, “You would call the police on your own husband?”
“I’m considering every option.”
“For money?”
“For fraud.”
“He’s your family!”
I looked past her at Javier.
“No. Wyatt is my family.”
That landed.
Javier’s face hardened.
“You’re going to destroy everything over your freeloading brother?”
Wyatt flinched.
I opened the front door.
Not completely.
The security chain remained locked.
Javier took one step forward.
I held up my phone.
“If you ever call him that again, you will wish the financial investigation was your biggest problem.”
He stared at me.
For four years, I had compromised.
Apologized.
Smoothed things over.
Paid bills.
Hosted Lydia.
Smiled through insults.
That woman no longer existed.
Javier seemed to realize it.
He stepped back.
“You think you’re powerful because you have a little company?”
“Seventy-three employees.”
“You’ll lose half of it in the divorce.”
“Maybe.”
That answer surprised him.
I continued.
“But even if I lose half, you will still know I would rather give half away than remain married to you.”
He had no response.
Lydia did.
“You ungrateful witch.”
I closed the door.
The next morning, Rachel arrived before eight.
She reviewed the documents.
Her expression became worse with every page.
“This is not messy-divorce bad.”
“What kind is it?”
“Potential criminal-fraud bad.”
Wyatt sat at the kitchen counter eating cereal.
Rachel pointed toward him.
“And the assault?”
“I have video of Lydia admitting it.”
Wyatt groaned.
“Can we not make this bigger?”
I turned.
“She hit you.”
“She’s old.”
“She’s fifty-eight.”
“That’s old to me.”
Rachel suppressed a smile.
Then she became serious.
“Wyatt, whether you pursue anything is ultimately a legal decision you should discuss independently. But at minimum, document the injury.”
He nodded.
Rachel returned to the laptop.
“We need to know whether Javier acted alone.”
“Camila knew about the mortgage.”
“Yes.”
“But maybe not the fake transfer.”
“She asked whether the money came from your company.”
“True.”
Rachel scrolled.
Then she stopped.
“What?”
She opened a spreadsheet.
Payments.
Not one.
Many.
$8,700.
$12,400.
$6,200.
$19,800.
Every few months.
All disguised as consulting or logistics expenses.
“How far back does this go?” I whispered.
Rachel checked.
“Almost two years.”
The total reached $93,600.
Then came the $150,000 transfer.
Nearly a quarter of a million dollars.
My stomach turned.
“Where did the earlier money go?”
Rachel followed the vendor names.
Two were inactive companies.
One shared a mailing address with Lydia.
I stared.
“No.”
Rachel looked at me.
“You recognize it?”
“That’s Lydia’s townhouse.”
We searched Arizona corporate records.
A company called Desert Rose Lifestyle LLC had been registered eighteen months earlier.
Owner:
Lydia Alvarez.
The fake invoices from my cosmetics company had paid Desert Rose almost $64,000.
“What does Desert Rose do?” Wyatt asked.
I searched online.
An Instagram page appeared.
Designer handbags.
Luxury skincare.
Imported candles.
Expensive gift boxes.
Then I saw one of my own products.
Solara Renewal Serum.
Retail price: $89.
Desert Rose was selling it for $110.
My mother-in-law had apparently been taking money from my company and reselling my products through her own boutique.
I felt physically sick.
“She called you a freeloader,” Wyatt said quietly.
I looked at him.
He continued.
“She was stealing from you while calling me a freeloader.”
That was exactly it.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
“Naomi?”
A woman.
“Who is this?”
A pause.
“Camila.”
Rachel immediately motioned for speakerphone.
Camila’s voice trembled.
“Javier says you misunderstood everything.”
“Did I misunderstand the house you were buying together?”
Silence.
“No.”
“Did I misunderstand the messages where you call my husband ‘my love’?”
Another silence.
“No.”
“Then what exactly am I misunderstanding?”
“He told me you two had been separated for months.”
I laughed.
“We had dinner together last night.”
“He said you were pretending publicly because of the business.”
“Did he also tell you the $150,000 belonged to him?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know it came from Solara?”
Camila didn’t answer.
“Camila?”
“I knew the company name was on the transfer.”
Rachel wrote something on a legal pad.
I asked, “Did you know he didn’t own the company?”
“Yes.”
There it was.
Camila began crying.
“I told him it sounded wrong.”
“But you were still going to use it to buy a house.”
“He said you owed him.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
Javier had apparently convinced everyone that I owed him for my own success.
Then Camila said something unexpected.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“The house wasn’t supposed to be only for us.”
“What does that mean?”
“Javier wanted to use the property as collateral.”
“For what?”
“A company.”
“What company?”
She hesitated.
“An import business he and his mother were starting.”
Rachel leaned forward.
“What was it called?”
Camila answered.
Alvarez Pacific Trading.
I had never heard the name.
Rachel searched.
The company had been formed four months earlier.
And listed beside Javier as a founding investor was someone I knew very well.
Someone who had access to every financial account at Solara.
May you like
My own controller.
Martin Hale.
