Chapter 8 - The Payment Vincent Carried
Vincent said the envelope contained $100,000.
Helena told him it was payment to a security informant.
Someone who would identify a threat against Roman.
Vincent did not question it.
At least not then.
He delivered the envelope to a man named Caleb Ross.
Ross had once worked private security.
Later he became a fixer.
The kind of man wealthy clients hired when they did not want questions.
After Roman was attacked, Caleb disappeared.
Vincent asked Helena whether the payment was connected.
She threatened him.
He stayed silent for three years.
Now investigators searched records.
Caleb Ross was alive.
Living in Nevada under his own name.
He had never been charged in connection with Roman’s attack.
Federal authorities interviewed him.
Caleb denied arranging violence.
He admitted accepting Helena’s money.
For information.
What information?
Nora.
Helena paid him to investigate Nora’s family background, finances, relationships, and pregnancy.
The payment occurred the day before Roman’s attack by coincidence.
At least according to Caleb.
Records supported much of his story.
His files contained surveillance of Nora.
No evidence linked him to the shooters.
Roman felt something unexpected.
Relief.
He did not want the truth stretched simply because he hated what Helena had already done.
If she did not order the attack, she should not be accused of it.
The Bellweather route leak remained suspicious.
But prosecutors found no proof connecting Helena to the men who ambushed Roman.
The original attack investigation stayed open separately.
Roman focused on what evidence actually established.
Fraud.
Financial theft.
Forged documents.
Interference with communications.
False paternity records.
Systematic harassment of Nora.
And Sophie’s treatment inside the gala.
That was enough.
Then Caleb’s old investigative file produced another surprise.
Helena had ordered surveillance on Nora before Sophie was born.
Not to prove infidelity.
To identify Nora’s relatives.
Particularly her father.
Nora rarely spoke about him.
He had left when she was young.
His name was Thomas Vale.
Roman did not recognize it.
Vincent did.
He went pale.
Thomas Vale had once owned a company that merged with D’Angelo Holdings twenty-five years earlier.
The deal made Antonio D’Angelo extremely wealthy.
It ruined Thomas.
There had been lawsuits.
Accusations.
Eventually Thomas disappeared from business.
Nora had never known the details.
Helena did.
That was the origin of her hatred.
To Helena, Nora was not merely an outsider.
She was the daughter of a man she believed once threatened the D’Angelo fortune.
Sophie represented both bloodlines.
D’Angelo.
Vale.
Then Roman’s attorney found the original merger agreement.
Thomas Vale had not been ruined by Antonio.
He had been cheated by someone else inside the transaction.
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Someone who diverted shares before closing.
The signature authorizing the diversion belonged to Helena.
