Chapter 4 - THE COMPANY CELESTE SAID HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH HERMichael Chen arrived at 7:10 the next morning.
CFO.
Fifty-six.
Twenty years with Cross Meridian.
He looked at Amelia’s bruised knee and said:
“You should have called me.”
“I did. Six weeks ago.”
Michael winced.
Fair.
They reviewed Ward Coastal Procurement.
It was not owned by Celeste.
That would have been too simple.
Its majority owner was a man named Nathan Ward.
Celeste’s older brother.
The company supplied luxury bedding accessories, specialty amenities and seasonal floral installations to five properties along the coast.
Crown Meridian began using it nine months earlier.
Total spend:
$1.3 million.
“Competitive bids?” Amelia asked.
Michael showed her.
Three bids.
Ward Coastal was not always lowest.
But Celeste justified selection based on “brand alignment” and rapid-delivery guarantees.
“Who approved?”
“Procurement committee.”
“Who chaired it?”
“Celeste temporarily.”
“Conflict disclosed?”
Michael hesitated.
“No formal disclosure I can find.”
That was serious.
Not necessarily criminal.
Certainly governance failure.
Then Amelia examined invoices.
Some looked normal.
Others were strange.
$94,000 for Easter floral installations.
$62,000 for custom scent diffusers.
$118,000 for imported pool cabana textiles.
Luxury resorts spent absurd amounts on things ordinary people considered ridiculous.
That did not make the invoices wrong.
Amelia knew better than to gasp at numbers without context.
She requested comparisons from similar properties.
Michael brought in internal audit.
Then another pattern emerged.
Emergency procurement exceptions.
Ward Coastal repeatedly received work without full bidding because orders were labeled urgent.
Why so many emergencies?
Celeste had reduced warehouse inventory aggressively.
Lower inventory improved short-term working capital.
Then urgent replacements were required.
Ward Coastal supplied them at premium rates.
A clever cycle.
Not necessarily illegal.
Potentially self-serving.
Amelia asked:
“Did Celeste receive anything?”
“No evidence yet.”
“Then we do not call it corruption.”
Michael nodded.
Amelia hated how badly she wanted a villain simple enough to fire before lunch.
She had learned from disaster work that simple stories were usually incomplete.
Then internal audit found another connection.
Nathan Ward had loaned Celeste $180,000 three years earlier when she bought a condo.
The loan remained outstanding.
Again:
Family relationship.
Financial relationship.
Vendor relationship.
Undisclosed.
Enough to require investigation.
Not enough for theatrical conclusions.
Everett Sloan arrived from Miami that afternoon.
Board chair.
Seventy-one.
Expensive tan.
Excellent manners.
He hugged Amelia.
Then said:
“This has become unnecessarily dramatic.”
She stepped back.
“I was physically removed from my own lobby.”
“Celeste did not know who you were.”
“That is not a defense.”
“No. But context matters.”
Amelia looked at him.
“She thought I was poor.”
Everett sighed.
“She thought you were trespassing.”
“I said I was checking in.”
“Without reservation.”
“To a private suite.”
“Which would sound absurd to anyone who didn’t know you.”
That was also true.
Amelia disliked it.
Then Everett added:
“You created this problem by refusing to be visible.”
The sentence landed harder than Amelia expected.
He was not excusing Celeste’s conduct.
May you like
He was accusing Amelia of absentee ownership.
And that accusation had evidence.
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