Chapter 12 - JENNA
Jenna Rowe could not walk.
Her speech was slow.
Her memory was not.
When I entered her room, she stared at my bruised face.
“Preston?” she asked.
“Yes.”
She gave a sad smile.
“Same hand?”
I sat beside her.
“What happened seven years ago?”
Jenna had been a compliance attorney at Vale Meridian.
She discovered settlements being paid through fake consulting contracts.
She confronted Martin.
He told her to resign.
She refused.
Then Preston assaulted her at a private event.
She filed a police report.
Two days later, a car hit her in a crosswalk and never stopped.
“Do you know who drove?” I asked.
“No.”
“Do you think the Vales ordered it?”
“I think I became inconvenient.”
That was not proof.
Then Jenna gave us something better.
A voicemail recorded the night before the crash.
Celeste’s voice.
“You are taking this too far. Walk away while you still can.”
Again, not proof of attempted murder.
But enough to reopen questions.
Police pulled archived traffic evidence.
A partial plate from a bus camera had never been fully processed.
Modern enhancement produced a match.
The car belonged to a security subcontractor used by Vale Meridian.
The driver was dead.
But payroll records showed he received a fifty-thousand-dollar bonus one week after the collision.
Authorized by Martin.
The federal case expanded.
Then Preston did something desperate.
He violated his bail conditions and came to my office.
Security stopped him in the lobby.
“I need to talk to Claire.”
“No.”
He shouted until I came downstairs.
“What do you want?”
His face looked wrecked.
“You think my parents are protecting me?”
“They have been.”
“No.”
He laughed bitterly.
“They’re going to bury me.”
I stared at him.
“Good.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand enough.”
“My father kept files on me too.”
That stopped me.
“What?”
“Every incident. Every woman. Every payment.”
“Why?”
“Leverage.”
His voice broke.
“He never protected me because he loved me. He protected the name until I became useful to sacrifice.”
I felt no sympathy for his violence.
But I believed him.
“Where are the files?”
He looked at the cameras.
“I’ll tell prosecutors.”
“Then do it.”
He nodded.
Before security removed him, he said one more thing.
“My mother ordered Naomi brought into that library.”
I went still.
“And you?”
“I was supposed to scare you away from the door.”
“You slammed me into a wall.”
“I know.”
His eyes dropped.
May you like
“I made that choice.”
For once, he did not blame anyone else.
