“You WHAT?” Cindy reddened. “That’s illegal.”
“Cindy, I had to. The money would be gone forever.”
“Maybe not. Clara’s dead. And the Argentine police have Bryant locked up.”
“True, but I didn’t know that at the time. All I knew was she had disappeared, and so had the money. When I tracked it down, Clara had already been gone for hours. I had to transfer it somewhere safe. Is that such a bad thing?”
“It’s not what you did—it’s how you did it.” Cindy crossed her arms, her face reddening.
“Cindy, even if Bryant, Clara, and her father are out of commission, the money would’ve been frozen for months or even years while all the legal wrangling was going on. In the meantime, Liberty would go bankrupt.”
“True. But the optics, Kat. It’s going to be tough to explain.”
“Relax. It’s already taken care of.” Audrey had talked to the regulators and the bank. Harry’s account was temporarily frozen until Monday, when they would start to work on reversing the Liberty transactions and placing the remainder in an investor restitution fund.
“How? No one’s going to give you a chance to explain. You look like a criminal. How are you going to explain your way out of this?”
“Jace?”
Jace came into the office with a copy of the newspaper. He dropped it on the desk in front of Cindy. Harry’s mug smiled up at them on the front page.
“Morning edition. It’ll be out in a few hours. The story’s going to get Kat lots of clients. And Harry’s going to be a celebrity,” Jace said. “I’ve got another half-a-dozen stories out of this. The Ortega organization, the diamond laundering, and the Liberty takeover, for starters. It’s going to be a series. And a human interest story on our billionaire here.”
Kat watched Cindy as her mouth twitched, the way it always did when she was stressed about something.
“Cindy, I called Bancroft Richardson this afternoon. They’ve already transferred the money from Harry’s account into a trust account. I just need you to smooth things over so Harry doesn’t get charged with anything. The money’s come full circle. All that’s left is to transfer it back to Liberty.”
“Why are you always so unorthodox, Kat? You could have just called someone to freeze the money.”
“At two in the morning? Even if I did have someone to call, they never would have believed me. I couldn’t just leave the money and take the chance that it would still be there.”
“You got yourself into this dilemma. Why should I bail you out?”
“You owe me, Cindy. All those kicks? Leaving me on the McBarge with Nick? It’s the least you can do.”
“I suppose you did help me break into Ortega’s organization. Once I knew about the diamond laundering, I convinced Ortega I could do more and move the stones for him. Then Gus and Mitch incriminated themselves by bragging about Takahashi’s and Braithwaite’s murders. And Nick finally gave us enough evidence to incriminate himself as an accomplice. Clara might have pulled the trigger, but he was instrumental in arranging it. I just wish you were a bit more—normal in how you do things.”
“That reminds me,” Jace said. “Verna left another note.”
He passed an envelope to Kat. She slid her finger under the envelope flap and opened it.
Dear Caretaker,
I’ve decided to stay on tour. Prague is quite beautiful this time of year. Please take care of the garden. The lilacs could use a hard pruning this year. Let’s plant Calla lilies in the spring.
Verna
Did you love Exit Strategy? Then get Game Theory, the next book in the series, or Colleen’s other books here or sign up for her new release newsletter at her website: http://www.colleencross.com. You will only be notified of new releases (a few times per year at most).
Author’s Note
The places in Exit Strategy are real, although I have changed or embellished some minor details just to make things more interesting. Like the view from Kat’s office window, for example. While the places are real, the characters are not. They started in my imagination before taking on lives of their own and steering my plot into directions I never planned on going.
Conflict diamonds, money laundering, and fraud impact all of us. Dig below the surface and you will see that at a minimum, it impacts the prices we pay and our standard of living. At its extreme, fraud exploits and ruins entire countries and peoples’ lives, just to enrich a few. White collar crime is anything but victimless.
I hope you enjoyed reading Exit Strategy as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you liked it, please consider writing a short review or telling a friend. Word of mouth is an author’s best friend!
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Exit Strategy
Game Theory
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[Katerina Carter 01.0] Exit Strategy Page 26