Her office overlooked a parking garage and contained no decorations except a framed drawing from her daughter.
She read the letters slowly before asking whether the competing investor knew the building’s insurance history.
I told her Daniel had been handling that paperwork.
She pointed to a confidentiality provision in the draft offer.
If someone had acquired internal information through unauthorized surveillance, the negotiations might already be compromised.
We called Daniel on speakerphone.
He said Wesley Pike had asked unusually detailed questions about an old claim involving a roof collapse.
The claim had been settled before our father died.
Only the insurer, our family, and the original contractor had complete files.
Pike’s questions implied knowledge of an internal reserve account discussed in our living room.
Leah asked Daniel to pause communication with the partnership until she could review it.
She did not advise him to accuse Pike or threaten litigation immediately.
She wanted a clean record of what had been asked, what had been disclosed, and what remained confidential.
After the call she studied me for a moment.
“Your neighbor may have been gathering information for someone else, or she may have used it for her own reasons,” she said.
“We cannot know which until the evidence shows us.”
I asked why someone would go to such trouble over a small machine shop.
Leah said a person did not need to own a large company to possess information worth stealing.
Sometimes a valuable piece of property was valuable because its owner did not know who wanted it.
I left her office with a thicker folder and a worse headache.
Daniel called that evening to say he had found another email from Pike.
The message referred to the shop’s employees as an obstacle to be removed.
My brother read those words aloud and then went quiet.
Our father would have hated them.
Chapter 19: Fallon’s Risk
Fallon Rusk asked to speak with me through Jasmine Ortiz.
She said the camera investigation had made her afraid of losing her job.
Some clients had seen Patricia’s messages and wondered whether the cleaning company planted cameras.
BrightDay had begun receiving cancellations.
I met Fallon and Jasmine in a public café with Elena beside me.
Fallon was twenty-six and worked two cleaning jobs while studying for a medical assistant certificate.
She had saved enough for tuition before the rumors started.
Now she feared that fewer shifts would force her to postpone school.
I told her plainly that I did not believe she placed the device.
