Chapter 19 - THE FILES AT TRAVIS’S HOUSE.
Megan Lowe was not having an affair with Travis Mercer.
That rumor appeared online within twelve hours anyway.
Emily hated it.
Nothing in the evidence established an affair.
A woman had been at a male executive’s house after business hours.
People supplied the rest because scandal was easier to understand than procurement systems.
Megan was married.
Travis was divorced.
The internet considered that sufficient.
Naomi publicly refused to discuss private speculation.
Emily did too.
“Why protect her?” Dana asked.
“Because we don’t know.”
Dana nodded.
“Fair.”
Megan had gone to Travis’s house with three acquisition files.
Ruth Holloway.
Parcel Seventeen.
Bellweather Community Church.
All tied to the corridor.
She said Travis asked for them after Daniel raised irregularities.
That aligned with part of Travis’s account.
She arrived around 7:40 p.m.
Worked at a dining table.
Left around 9:15.
Security gate logs at Travis’s neighborhood showed her car exiting at 9:17.
That established she was driving her own car.
Not the Mercer SUV.
The garage image at 8:31 therefore likely showed somebody else.
Good.
One suspect removed.
Megan said Travis remained home when she left.
His neighborhood gate did not record residents leaving automatically.
No help.
His personal car remained in the driveway according to a home-security camera across the street.
Also not conclusive.
He could have used another vehicle.
Or stayed home.
Again, no leap.
Megan gave investigators something more important than crash speculation.
She had copied the three files before taking them to Travis.
After the meeting, pages were different.
Naomi nearly dropped her pen when Detective Grant explained.
“Different how?”
“Megan says Travis kept the files overnight.”
“Then returned them?”
“Next morning.”
“What changed?”
“Ruth’s file contained an additional legal-review memo.”
Emily looked at Blake.
“From Shaw?”
“Yes.”
The memo stated the recorded deed was presumptively valid and recommended defending title unless contrary evidence emerged.
Dated two weeks before Megan brought the file to Travis.
Megan said the memo had not been in the file the night before.
That mattered.
If true, a document may have been inserted retroactively.
But memory could be wrong.
Investigators checked metadata.
The memo was created on the date shown.
No easy fraud.
Then they checked printing records.
The copy in Ruth’s file had been printed the morning after Megan’s meeting with Travis.
Not proof of improper backdating.
A real earlier memo could be printed later.
Naomi kept pulling.
“Did legal email it when it was created?”
No record yet.
“Was it stored in document management?”
Yes.
Uploaded the morning after the meeting.
Now dates conflicted.
Document dated earlier.
Digital upload later.
Could be ordinary delayed filing.
Could be reconstruction.
Need more.
Megan’s most disturbing statement concerned the edited Ruth recording.
She had heard the longer version before Colin died.
“I knew the forty-one-second clip wasn’t the whole conversation.”
“Did Travis?”
“I played him the clip and told him there had been more.”
“When?”
“The night I went to his house.”
“Before Emily’s crash?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Megan remembered:
“Can you prove it?”
Not “fix it.”
Not “that’s wrong.”
Can you prove it?
Emily sat silently when she learned that.
Blake knew why it hurt.
That question had governed the entire experience.
Ruth: Can you prove you did not sign?
Emily: Can you prove the SUV followed you?
Daniel: Can you prove you warned them?
Poor owners: Can you afford to prove anything?
Travis, by Megan’s account, had responded to the possibility of manipulated evidence with the same framework.
Can you prove it?
Naomi asked whether Megan believed Travis ordered the clip made.
Megan said no.
She had no evidence.
Did she believe he knew it was misleading before the crash?
“Yes.”
Belief.
Supported now by her claimed conversation.
Still contested.
Travis’s attorneys attacked her credibility immediately.
She had been terminated after refusing to sign a revised internal statement.
They said she was disgruntled.
Megan said she was fired because she would not say she had never raised concerns.
Employment records became evidence.
Her performance reviews before the dispute were excellent.
Her termination letter cited insubordination and confidentiality violations.
Could be legitimate.
Could be retaliation.
Again, evidence accumulated.
No magical document.
Convergence.
Meanwhile, Ruth’s deed challenge reached a critical hearing.
A handwriting expert testified the signature was probably not written naturally by Ruth.
Mercer’s expert disagreed.
Experts did that.
Then the notary became the focus.
The deed had been notarized by a contract closing agent named Susan Kell.
Susan testified she did not remember Ruth.
She had notarized hundreds of documents.
Her journal contained an entry.
Ruth Holloway.
Date.
Identification number.
Then Naomi compared the ID number to Ruth’s old driver’s license.
Match.
The expired license.
Susan looked confused.
“I would not accept an expired license.”
“But your journal lists it.”
“Yes.”
“Did Ruth appear before you?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Did you sometimes notarize documents where the signer was not present?”
“No.”
“Ever?”
“No.”
Then Naomi showed her an email from Colin.
Need Holloway acknowledgment today. Seller unavailable. Can your office clear?
Susan stared at the screen.
Her lawyer objected to interpretation.
The judge allowed questioning.
Susan read her reply:
Send packet.
Naomi asked, “What did that mean?”
“Send me the documents.”
“Did it mean you would notarize without Ruth?”
“No.”
“Then why is Ruth’s signature notarized that day?”
Susan began crying.
Not dramatically.
Quietly.
She looked embarrassed.
“I don’t know.”
The judge called a recess.
Outside, Ruth sat on a courthouse bench.
She looked tired.
Blake bought her coffee.
She tasted it.
“This is terrible.”
“It’s courthouse coffee.”
“They should include it in sentencing.”
Blake smiled.
Ruth looked toward the courtroom.
“That woman is scared.”
“Yes.”
“I wanted to hate her.”
“You still can.”
Ruth shook her head.
“No. I’m too tired.”
When court resumed, Susan changed one part of her testimony.
She remembered something.
Not Ruth.
Colin.
He had brought documents to her office frequently.
Sometimes pre-signed.
She insisted she required valid identification.
Then she said:
“Colin used to joke that C-17 meant nobody went home until the paper was done.”
Naomi asked, “Was that a joke?”
Susan looked at Ruth.
“I thought it was.”
That afternoon, the judge issued a temporary ruling.
Ruth could not be removed.
Mercer could not transfer or encumber the property.
Not final ownership.
Safety.
For the first time in months, Ruth slept without the eviction letter on her kitchen counter.
Then Detective Grant called Blake.
They had enhanced the Mercer garage footage.
The person entering the SUV still could not be identified by face.
But a second camera showed the person walking through the garage.
Male.
Approximately six-foot-three.
Travis Mercer was six-foot-two.
So were dozens of employees.
Blake asked the question anyway.
“Anything else?”
Grant hesitated.
“The person has a distinctive gait.”
“What does that mean?”
“Right leg turns outward slightly.”
Blake remembered Travis walking out of Emily’s hospital room.
Polished shoes.
Easy stride.
Nothing obvious.
Then Grant sent a second clip.
Travis leaving his deposition.
His right foot turned outward.
Slightly.
Emily stared at the two videos.
“This proves nothing.”
Blake looked at her.
May you like
“No.”
But for the first time, she sounded like she was trying to convince herself.
