Chapter 4 - THE COMPANY DANIEL WAS TRYING TO LEAVE
The next morning I called Daniel’s former accountant.
Her name was Melissa Grant.
She had handled Mercer & Cole Construction until six months before Daniel’s death.
Adrian had replaced her afterward.
I had never questioned why.
Melissa remembered me immediately.
When I mentioned Daniel, her voice softened.
Then I said Adrian’s name.
Silence.
“Laura, what happened?”
I told her only that I had questions about Daniel’s last months.
She asked whether Adrian knew I was calling.
“No.”
“Good.”
That word chilled me.
We met at a coffee shop in Cary.
Melissa brought nothing dramatic.
No secret folder.
No hidden recording.
She simply remembered the business differently than Adrian had described it.
Mercer & Cole was not merely under pressure.
Daniel wanted out.
“Why?”
“Purchasing.”
Melissa explained that subcontractor invoices had begun coming in higher than expected.
Not enormously.
Three percent here.
Seven percent there.
Enough to damage margins without immediately looking absurd.
Daniel suspected Adrian was steering work toward suppliers with personal connections.
“Kickbacks?”
“I never found proof.”
“Did Daniel?”
“He was trying.”
Three months before the crash, Daniel asked Melissa to prepare numbers for a potential separation of the partnership.
Adrian apparently discovered it.
Their relationship deteriorated quickly.
“Did Daniel tell you what he planned?”
“He wanted to finish two projects, settle debts, and dissolve the company.”
My stomach tightened.
Adrian had told me Daniel planned to expand.
That after his death, Adrian had merely preserved Daniel’s dream.
Melissa took a sip of coffee.
“Laura, I assumed you knew.”
“Knew what?”
“Daniel planned to change the company name if Adrian wouldn’t agree to a clean exit.”
I stared.
“What name?”
“Mercer Construction Group.”
Without Cole.
That detail explained years of something I had never understood.
After Daniel died, Adrian fought fiercely to keep the original Mercer & Cole name.
He told me it honored Daniel.
Clients liked continuity.
The brand mattered.
I believed him.
Maybe the name had mattered for another reason.
Daniel’s reputation.
Daniel’s clients.
Daniel’s work.
Adrian had inherited trust he might otherwise have lost.
“Did they meet the night Daniel died?”
Melissa looked surprised.
“I thought so.”
My hand tightened around my coffee cup.
“Why?”
“Daniel called me around five.”
“What did he say?”
“He said, ‘I’m meeting Adrian tonight. If he won’t sign, I’m done.’”
The room blurred slightly.
“What time?”
“About seven-thirty, maybe eight.”
Daniel crashed shortly after nine.
Adrian had told police he spent that evening at home doing estimates.
At least that was what he told me.
I asked Melissa whether she spoke to investigators.
“No one contacted me.”
Of course.
Why would they?
A single-vehicle accident on a wet road did not automatically become a business investigation.
I drove home slowly.
Not because I believed Adrian killed Daniel.
I didn’t know that.
But I now knew three things.
Daniel met Adrian the night he died.
Adrian lied about that meeting.
And Daniel was planning to end the partnership Adrian spent the next five years claiming he had heroically preserved.
When I entered the house, Adrian was in the kitchen.
He smiled.
Normal.
Almost gentle.
“How’s Conrad?”
“School.”
“You didn’t answer my texts.”
“I was busy.”
His eyes narrowed.
“With what?”
There it was.
Not concern.
Inventory.
I put my purse down.
“I talked to Melissa Grant.”
Adrian’s face changed.
Only for an instant.
Then he sighed.
“You’re really doing this.”
“Doing what?”
“Digging up Daniel because you’re angry at me.”
“No.”
I looked at him.
“I’m digging up Daniel because you lied about the last night of his life.”
Adrian leaned against the counter.
“Melissa hated me.”
“She says Daniel wanted to dissolve the company.”
“That’s not news.”
“It was to me.”
“You didn’t need to know every business disagreement.”
“My husband died three hours after telling his accountant he was meeting you.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“He left alive.”
I stopped breathing.
I had not asked whether Daniel left.
Adrian seemed to realize it immediately.
May you like
I whispered:
“Left where?”
