Chapter 2 - THE DEBT THAT WAS NEVER OURS
I had paid Paragon Ventures $38,600 in two years.
Every tip.
Every tax refund.
Every extra shift.
My father’s old watch.
My mother’s jewelry.
All of it.
Ravi’s financial team checked the accounts while I sat in a private office behind the ballroom.
I insisted on my own attorney too.
He agreed.
That surprised me.
By midnight, we had the answer.
The debt was fake.
Not all of it.
Some hospital bills were real.
The rent arrears were real.
But the largest account—the one claiming my parents owed $62,000 on a business loan—had been created eleven days after they died.
I stared at the statement.
“That loan didn’t exist.”
The attorney shook her head.
“No.”
“Then why create it?”
“To keep you financially distressed.”
My throat tightened.
“Why would anyone care whether I was broke?”
Ravi answered:
“Because desperate people make predictable choices.”
I looked at him.
“Like kissing a stranger for ten thousand dollars.”
“Yes.”
I hated how perfectly it fit.
Catherine had not chosen me randomly.
Someone knew I needed money.
Someone knew Sadi needed dental treatment.
Someone knew exactly how much pressure to apply.
I turned toward Catherine.
She sat across the room with her lawyer.
“What did they tell you?”
She cried harder.
“That you were just some waitress.”
“Who?”
“My father.”
There.
Patrick Voss.
Catherine’s father.
Billionaire developer.
Longtime donor to the children’s foundation.
Ravi’s business ally.
“He told me you were desperate and harmless.”
My hands shook.
“And he told you to make me kiss Ravi?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He said he needed photographs.”
“For what?”
She looked at Ravi.
“To prove Diane Harper had contact with him.”
Ravi went still.
I frowned.
“Why would that matter?”
His attorney answered.
“Because your father’s original fraud investigation disappeared after his death.”
My blood chilled.
“If someone wanted to argue that Michael Harper’s daughters were secretly connected to Ravi, they could claim any evidence resurfacing now was fabricated by Ravi’s organization.”
I stared.
“So they wanted to discredit me before I even knew I had anything.”
“Yes.”
That was worse.
Then Ravi opened an old file.
My father’s handwriting.
Numbers.
Shipping accounts.
Charity transfers.
At the bottom:
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, DIANE HAS THE KEY.
I laughed once.
“I don’t have any key.”
Ravi looked at me.
“Your father thought you would.”
“I was twenty-two when he died.”
“What did he leave you?”
“Bills.”
“Anything else?”
I thought.
A watch.
Photo albums.
One old brass key on my father’s ring.
I had thrown the ring into a kitchen drawer because I could not stand looking at it.
My stomach dropped.
“I have a key.”
Ravi’s eyes sharpened.
“To what?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Sadi called me.
I answered immediately.
“Diane?”
Her voice sounded frightened.
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s a man outside.”
I stood.
“What man?”
“He keeps looking at our apartment.”
My blood turned cold.
“Lock the door.”
“It is.”
“Call the police.”
“I did.”
May you like
Then Sadi whispered:
“He asked me if Dad’s key still works.”
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