Page 57 of The Gathered Fragments of Us
"I get it Caden, just go on. I know where we were, and let's just focus, okay? It's about Macy right now."
"Yeah, okay. Thank you," he responded, and reached out his hand to lay over mine on the table." So, it was in that conversation where I learned I'd been giving Jessica pretty extravagant gifts in Macy's name over the years. So I asked Lauren to do a full accounting, lo and behold, around the same time she got an email from my personal email address asking her to send a new card to Jessica's house since the existing one had expired. Said I wanted to ensure Jessica had it for anything Macy needed."
What the hell? "That's freaking weird."
"Tell me about it. Regardless, Lauren asked me about it, since she figured I would have just asked her to do it rather than email her. That's when we figured out that, over the years, shehad been email in falsified bills. Where the company would send payment to the credit card, but the bills we had on file were being routed through Lauren over to Accounts Payable. That's all I knew though since it was in the infancy stages of research. All this Lauren is sharing is new to me too."
I sat back in my chair. "Holy shit. That's like—diabolical."
"And criminal!" Lauren called out. "So—picking up there, Jackson had done some forensic mojo in technical terms and stuff that I couldn’t even begin to explain. Essentially he traced something like an I.P. address back to Jessica instead of to you, Caden."
"I'm completely blown away by this. How could she do something like this? What was she doing with the money?"
"That I don’t know, but I do know that the police are very interested in it! All told it's a significant sum—we're talking six figures."
My mouth dropped open, "no way."
"Yes, way."
Caden was staring at the phone like it might explode. "Six figures," he repeated quietly. "She's been stealing from my company for years. How is that even possible?"
"Seems she is quite creative—shaving small amounts at a time so they easily fell into the 'expected loss' and vendor costs without ringing any bells. There may be other means of stealing she took outside of the email address. To that end, do not go into your email. The police want to meet with you both as soon as possible," Lauren continued. "Let me see—here it is. I have information for a—Detective Morrison with BPD. I guess he is the lead handling the case. But Caden, they specifically said notto confront Jessica directly. If she realizes we've discovered the scheme..."
"She could try to destroy evidence or—shit what if she tried to run?" I said, the pieces suddenly clicking into place. Caden jumped up from his chair. "Macy. I need to get to Macy. Fuck the financial shit. What if she tried to take Macy away."
I jumped up with him. "We need to go. We have to go get her."
"Breathe, we don't know anything that for sure," Lauren said quickly. "She has no idea that you know anything. I'm no expert, but my guess is that right now, status quo is best."
Just then, Caden's phone buzzed with a text. He glanced at it, and his face went white.
"What is it?" I asked.
"It's from Macy." He showed me the screen: Dad, I'm fine. Don't come over today. Need space to think about everything. Will call you tomorrow.
I read it twice, my heart sinking. "Bullshit. No emojis or abbreviations? Full sentences, periods included? That's definitely not from her."
"Jessica sent this," Caden said, his voice deadly quiet. "She's using Macy's phone to keep me away."
"Shit. Listen, this is bigger than just one thing—you need to talk to the Detective before you do anything." Lauren said through the speaker. A buzz from Caden's phone showed another text, this time from Lauren. "I just sent you all his contact information. Call him now."
"Okay. She already thought I was on my way anyways. I'll call him and see what he says. But I'm telling you right now, nothingis keeping me away from Macy. I'll get his guidance on 'how' to approach it, but he's not going to get me to back away from getting to Macy."
"I'm with Caden on this. I don't think we should take a chance with Macy's safety."
"Call him. See what he says."
As we hung up with Lauren, I couldn't shake the image of Macy—this young and unassuming girl—potentially caught in the middle of her mother's desperation.
"She's going to be okay," I said, reaching for Caden's hand.
"She has to be," he replied. But I could hear the fear underneath his certainty, and I knew we were both thinking the same thing: what if something happened before we could get there?
Chapter 24: Wellness Check
~Caden~
I stared at Detective Morrison's contact information on my phone screen. My thumb hovered over the call button—trembling. Every instinct inside me screamedFuck this!Get in the car and go get your daughter! The fear though of what could happen if Jess knows we know—that fear kept me from driving over there immediately.
