Chapter 5 - THE PRICE OF STAYING
“Leo.”
Liam’s voice carried through the bedroom doors.
Thirty seconds later, Leo entered.
He saw the burned paper in Clara’s hand and stopped.
That was all she needed.
“You know what this is,” she said.
Leo closed the doors behind him.
Liam’s eyes narrowed.
“Talk.”
Leo looked at Clara first.
Then at the scrap.
“I put it there.”
The room went silent.
Liam’s voice dropped.
“When?”
“After Dock Nine.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t know what it meant.”
“So you hid it in my drawer?”
“I hid everything I pulled off you that night.”
Clara stepped forward.
“Everything?”
Leo nodded.
“Coat. Watch. Wallet. Broken rosary. Papers.”
Liam’s expression hardened.
“You never showed me papers.”
“You were barely alive.”
“That was seven weeks ago.”
Leo looked ashamed.
“I know.”
Clara held up the burned scrap.
“Harrow Clinical Research is running my brother’s leukemia trial.”
Leo stared at her.
“I didn’t know.”
“Vincent did.”
Liam’s jaw flexed.
“Of course he did.”
Clara looked between them.
“What does Harrow have to do with your organization?”
“Nothing,” Liam said.
Leo answered at the same moment.
“The foundation.”
They looked at each other.
Clara felt cold.
“What foundation?”
Liam rubbed a hand over his face.
“The Mercer Community Foundation.”
“You have a charity?”
“Try not to sound so surprised.”
“I’m deciding whether to laugh.”
“We fund hospitals, food programs, addiction treatment.”
“And Harrow?”
Leo answered.
“There was a grant.”
“How much?”
“Eight million.”
Clara’s mouth went dry.
“What happened to it?”
Leo said nothing.
Liam looked toward him.
“Leo.”
“It was delayed.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
Clara stared at the scrap.
Tommy’s doctor had explained exactly why the experimental trial required extraordinary private funding.
Research support had collapsed unexpectedly.
The hospital had lost a promised grant.
Families were being asked to cover costs once subsidized.
Eight million dollars.
She felt suddenly sick.
“My brother’s trial nearly died because money disappeared.”
Liam’s expression changed.
“Clara—”
“You knew there was a grant?”
“Yes.”
“You knew it was delayed?”
“No.”
She looked at Leo.
“You?”
“I knew money had been redirected.”
“Redirected where?”
Leo looked toward Liam.
“Tell her.”
Leo swallowed.
“Family support.”
Clara frowned.
“Whose family?”
“The men Liam put out of work.”
The answer settled heavily.
“Vincent created an emergency fund,” Leo continued. “Rent. Medical bills. Funeral expenses. Tuition.”
Liam stared at him.
“He diverted charitable medical funds?”
“He said it was temporary.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
“Leo.”
“I don’t know.”
Liam struck the mattress with his fist.
The monitor jumped.
Clara moved automatically.
“Stop.”
“Don’t tell me to stop.”
“You’re bleeding again.”
“I don’t care.”
“I do.”
He looked at her.
The anger in his face faltered.
Clara hated how much that small thing mattered.
Friday came with freezing rain.
At 11:58 p.m., Leo entered Liam’s bedroom carrying a thick brown envelope.
He placed it on the side table beside Clara.
“Your first week.”
She stared at it.
Ten thousand dollars.
More than she normally took home in two months.
Enough to keep Tommy in treatment a little longer.
Not enough to save him.
She picked it up.
The weight made her stomach twist.
Leo placed a second envelope beside it.
Much thicker.
“What is that?”
Leo looked uncomfortable.
“Fifty thousand.”
Clara’s eyes moved to Liam.
He was awake.
“Take it,” he said.
“No.”
“It isn’t charity.”
“What is it?”
“Advance.”
“On what?”
“Your contract.”
“I don’t have a contract.”
“Then consider it hazard pay.”
“No.”
“Clara.”
“No.”
Liam’s voice hardened.
“Your brother needs it.”
“And you don’t get to turn that into leverage.”
“I’m trying to help.”
“You investigated my family, dragged me into your private war, and now you want to hand me enough cash to make sure I feel guilty leaving.”
“That is not why.”
“Maybe not consciously.”
She pushed the larger envelope back.
“I earned ten thousand.”
She held up the smaller one.
“I’ll take ten thousand.”
Liam stared at her.
“And if Tommy loses the trial?”
The cruelty of the question hit because neither of them believed he meant it cruelly.
Clara’s voice shook anyway.
“Then I will live with the fact that I did not sell myself while trying to save him.”
Liam looked away.
Leo quietly removed the larger envelope.
Later that night, Clara could not sleep.
She went into the small sitting room connected to Liam’s suite.
His belongings from Dock Nine had been placed in a cedar chest.
Leo had finally brought them upstairs.
Clara should not have opened it without permission.
She knew that.
She opened it anyway.
Liam’s ruined coat lay on top.
Dark cashmere.
One side torn.
Smoke-stained.
There was dried blood near the collar.
Clara lifted it carefully.
Something heavy shifted inside the lining.
A seam had split near the inner pocket.
She reached in.
A silver object dropped into her palm.
A rosary.
Most of the beads were gone.
Only the crucifix and seven dark beads remained.
On the back of the crucifix were tiny engraved initials.
M.M.
Mara Mercer.
Clara carried it into the bedroom.
Liam looked at it and closed his eyes.
“She gave it to you?”
“She wore it after our mother died.”
“Why did you have it at Dock Nine?”
“I carried it whenever I had to make a decision she would have hated.”
Clara sat beside him.
“You were ending the organization.”
“The part that mattered.”
“What does that mean?”
Liam opened his eyes.
“I was giving up control.”
That surprised her.
“To Vincent?”
“No.”
“To whom?”
“No one.”
He explained.
The shipping companies would have independent management.
Construction businesses would remain legal corporations.
Restaurants would be sold or licensed.
Illegal debt collection would end.
Protection schemes would end.
Smuggling would end.
The Mercer organization, as men like Vincent understood it, would simply cease to exist.
Clara finally understood the scale of what he had planned.
“You weren’t changing the rules.”
“No.”
“You were destroying the game.”
“Yes.”
“And Vincent would lose everything.”
“Power.”
“Same thing to some men.”
Liam looked toward her.
“You think he did it.”
“I think he had motive.”
“He also pulled me from the building.”
“Both things can be true.”
That troubled him.
Clara returned to the cedar chest.
Beneath the coat was a thin accounting book, blackened along one side.
Several pages were unreadable.
Others survived.
Names.
Dates.
Transfers.
Clara turned pages slowly.
Then stopped.
MERCER COMMUNITY FOUNDATION.
HARROW CLINICAL RESEARCH — $8,000,000.
A red line crossed through the entry.
Beside it, handwritten in the margin:
TRANSFER — FAMILY CONTINUITY FUND.
Approved: V. Mercer.
Clara’s breath caught.
Below the notation was a date.
Two weeks before Tommy’s doctor called to say the trial had lost funding.
She carried the ledger to Liam.
His face became unreadable.
Clara pointed to the signature.
“Your cousin took eight million dollars from cancer patients.”
Liam stared at the page.
“No.”
“It’s right there.”
“No.”
His voice was strange.
Clara frowned.
“What?”
Liam looked up.
“That isn’t what bothers me.”
“What could possibly bother you more?”
He pointed to another notation beneath Vincent’s.
A second approval.
Two letters.
L.M.
Clara looked at him.
“You approved it?”
Liam’s face had gone white.
“No.”
The monitor accelerated.
Clara looked again.
The signature was unmistakable.
Liam Mercer.
He stared at his own name.
Then said the words that changed everything.
May you like
“Somebody forged my authorization.”
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