Chapter 5
Vale Strategic Transport had once been legitimate.
That surprised Cassian.
He expected to find fraud immediately.
Instead, accountants found a real company.
Real employees.
Real trucks.
Real contracts.
Adrian had built it in his early thirties after their father died leaving significant business debt.
Sabine handled client events and administrative work during the company’s first years.
The siblings had worked hard.
That mattered because motives usually became clearer when you understood what somebody originally believed they were protecting.
Problems began during a severe downturn.
Vale lost two major contracts.
A lender threatened foreclosure.
Adrian responded by inflating invoices on several remaining accounts.
At first, the amounts were relatively small.
A freight inspection billed twice.
A security surcharge that had never been incurred.
Equipment rental marked up far beyond contract terms.
The company survived.
Then Adrian kept doing it.
Sabine’s event-consulting company became one of the pass-through vendors.
Money paid for services that were difficult to verify.
Rebecca’s forensic accountants found more than three million dollars in questionable payments over five years.
A significant amount came from Rinaldo Marine Logistics.
Cassian looked at Daniel Mercer, the accountant leading the review.
“How did my people miss it?”
“Your people trusted vendors with longstanding approval.”
“Who approved Vale?”
Daniel opened the historical procurement record.
Claire Rinaldo.
Cassian stared at her name.
That explained why she took the problem personally.
Claire had apparently recommended Adrian’s company after meeting him through a port-community initiative.
When she discovered suspicious billing years later, she probably felt responsible.
Maria confirmed it.
“Mrs. Rinaldo kept saying, ‘I brought them in.’”
“Them?”
Maria frowned.
“That’s what she said.”
Cassian looked toward Rebecca.
Adrian alone would have been “him.”
Them suggested Claire knew Sabine was involved too.
Another document surfaced from Claire’s laptop backup.
Not a recording.
Not a confession.
A simple spreadsheet.
Vendor names.
Invoice numbers.
Dates.
Questions.
Beside Vale Strategic Transport:
Ask A why S.L. vendor appears on both sides.
S.L.
Sabine Lane.
Cassian leaned back.
Claire had identified Sabine by name before she died.
Yet when Sabine entered Cassian’s life almost two years later, she behaved as though Claire had been someone she knew only from photographs.
That evening Cassian remembered something uncomfortable.
On Sabine’s first visit to the estate, she had paused outside Claire’s old office.
“Was this hers?” she asked.
May you like
Cassian assumed somebody told her.
Now he could not remember anyone doing so.
