Chapter 8
It uncovered more than we expected.
CF Advisory had received payments for work that investigators could not fully substantiate.
Several Northstar valuation assumptions had been inflated.
My digital signature had been reproduced on two internal authorizations without my consent.
The evidence was turned over to counsel and the appropriate authorities.
The civil litigation took longer.
It always does.
But the ending Reid feared happened slowly instead of dramatically.
His board position disappeared.
Then his executive title.
Then several industry relationships.
Then the mythology he had built around himself.
For years, Reid had introduced himself as a self-made founder.
Without my family’s money, apparently, people became much more interested in the “self-made” part.
Camille cooperated with the investigation.
Her lawyers eventually reached a settlement concerning disputed consulting payments.
I never spoke to her again.
Six months after the wedding, she sent me a letter.
Not an email.
A real letter.
Eleven pages.
I read the first paragraph.
Then I put it back in the envelope.
I didn’t burn it.
I didn’t answer it.
Forgiveness, I learned, does not require reopening the door.
Sometimes forgiveness is simply deciding you no longer want revenge.
My divorce from Reid was finalized fourteen months after our wedding.
We had been married for less than one day before separating.
The judge asked whether reconciliation was possible.
“No,” I said.
Reid looked at me from across the courtroom.
For once, he didn’t argue.
Outside, Dad was waiting.
He had offered to come inside.
I told him I wanted to finish it myself.
When I stepped onto the courthouse stairs, he handed me a coffee.
“How does it feel?”
I thought about it.
“Quiet.”
He nodded.
“That’s not always bad.”
“No.”
We walked half a block before I stopped.
“There’s something I never asked you.”
“What?”
“The wedding night. When you found the first payment request, did you already suspect Reid?”
Dad took a moment before answering.
“I suspected something was wrong.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because suspicion isn’t evidence. And because you were my daughter, not my employee.”
I looked at him.
“I thought you didn’t trust Reid.”
“I didn’t.”
“Why did you invest?”
He smiled faintly.
“Because I trusted you.”
That hurt in a completely different way.
“I was wrong.”
“No.”
He stopped walking.
“You trusted your husband and your best friend. They betrayed that trust. Don’t rewrite the story until their dishonesty becomes your stupidity.”