Merchant’s Son Humiliated an Apprentice — But Her Father Owned the Trading House
Chapter 3
The next morning, a carriage stopped outside Hawthorne & Sons.
A man stepped down.
He wore a black coat, carried a silver-headed walking cane, and moved with the confidence of someone who had never needed permission to enter a building.
The doorman approached.
“May I ask your business?”
The man handed him a card.
The doorman read it.
His face changed.
“Mr. Whitmore?”
“Yes.”
The doorman hurried inside.
Within minutes, Jonathan Hawthorne appeared.
He stopped halfway down the stairs.
For the first time in twenty years, the two men looked at each other.
“Samuel.”
“Jonathan.”
Neither offered a hand.
Anna had been carrying documents through the hallway when she saw them.
She froze.
Her father had come.
Jonathan looked toward her.
Then back at Samuel.
“You brought her here.”
Samuel’s jaw tightened.
“I didn’t bring her here.”
Anna stepped closer.
“I applied for the position myself.”
Jonathan stared at her.
“You knew?”
Samuel looked at his daughter.
“I suspected.”
Anna felt something cold settle in her stomach.
“What is happening?”
Neither man answered.
Samuel finally said, “We need to talk somewhere private.”
Jonathan led them upstairs.
Elias, who had just entered the hall, watched the three disappear behind a closed door.
He approached an older clerk.
“Who is that?”
The clerk whispered:
“Samuel Whitmore.”
Elias frowned.
The name meant nothing to him.
But it meant everything to his father.
Inside the office, Samuel placed a folded document on Jonathan’s desk.
“You know why I’m here.”
Jonathan stared at the paper.
“I hoped you would never find it.”
“You knew it existed.”
“I knew what your father believed.”
Samuel’s voice hardened.
“My father didn’t believe. He knew.”
Anna stepped forward.
“Would someone please tell me what this is about?”
Her father looked at her.
“Twenty years ago, your grandfather owned a shipping business.”
Anna knew that.
“He was cheated.”
She knew that too.
“He accused several merchants of falsifying cargo records and stealing from smaller traders.”
Jonathan said nothing.
Samuel continued.
“One of those merchants was Jonathan Hawthorne.”
Anna turned toward him.
Jonathan finally spoke.
“Your father was wrong.”
Samuel laughed bitterly.
“Then why did you hide the records?”
Jonathan’s face went pale.
Elias appeared at the doorway.
“Father?”
Jonathan turned.
“Get out.”
But Elias had already seen the document.
And Anna had already noticed something else.
The seal pressed into the corner of the paper.
It was identical to the seal on the ledger she had found.
Someone had been falsifying the Hawthorne accounts.
And whoever had done it had been doing so for years.
