She removed it.
Daniel turned it over.
Nothing on the case.
He opened the clasp.
Inside the band, almost too small to see, were three engraved numbers.
Evelyn stared at them.
"I've never noticed that."
Daniel looked at the recovery partition.
"Someone expected you to."
He entered 814 as the seed value for the recovery key.
The system opened another authentication layer.
A file appeared.
Daniel selected it.
The encryption unlocked.
Folders filled the screen.
Contracts.
Emails.
Payment records.
Corporate registrations.
Acquisition documents.
And one directory titled NORTHSTAR.
Daniel opened it.
The first records appeared ordinary.
Grant Meridian had been purchasing smaller logistics companies.
That was normal.
The prices were not.
One company worth perhaps twelve million dollars had been acquired for thirty-eight million.
Another had been purchased for almost four times the value listed in its own audited financial statements.
Daniel scrolled.
"Why would anyone overpay like this?"
Evelyn leaned closer.
"To create losses."
Daniel opened the approval histories.
Every acquisition had been approved by the same three names.
Victor Hail.
Grant Meridian's general counsel.
And Evelyn Grant.
Evelyn stared at her digital signature.
"I didn't approve these."
Daniel checked the timestamps.
2:14 a.m.
1:47 a.m.
3:08 a.m.
"Where were you on these nights?"
"Asleep."
"Can you prove it?"
"No."
"That's why they chose the times."
He opened the certificate data.
The signatures were technically valid.
But the login sessions had been generated remotely.
Daniel kept scrolling.
The purpose slowly became clear.
The false shipments created operating losses.
The inflated acquisitions created debt.
Manipulated contracts made those losses appear legitimate.
Grant Meridian was not being robbed in the conventional sense.
It was being made sick.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
Its financial statements were being poisoned until lenders, investors, and the board would conclude the company was collapsing.
Daniel whispered, "They're lowering the value."
Evelyn understood at the same moment.
"Someone wants to buy us."
"For almost nothing."
He opened another file.
Northstar Acquisition Partners.
A private holding company created through layers of shell corporations.
Daniel followed the registrations.
Eventually one name appeared.
Marcus Vale.
Evelyn went silent.
Daniel looked at her.
"You know him."
She did not answer immediately.
"Marcus Vale was my father's business partner."
"Was?"
"He died six years ago."
Daniel looked back at the screen.
"How?"
"Private plane accident over the Atlantic."
"Body recovered?"
Evelyn slowly shook her head.
"No."
Daniel leaned back.
The answer was suddenly obvious.
"Then either somebody is using a dead man's identity..."