CHAPTER SEVEN

      DISALVO, HIS FATHER’S FRIEND, was being investigated for tax fraud. Criminal charges were expected to be filed soon. He wasn’t only looking at having all his assets frozen, but could be facing prison time, as well. Like most in his income bracket, DiSalvo had a myriad of interests, not all related. Businesses he’d purchased as a silent investor, some he hadn’t purchased outright but invested in. And as Cedar had, the man had someone prepare his taxes every year.

      Alvin Hines, tax specialist to the rich and famous, was the first person Cedar looked at once he had a more complete picture of the situation. Not because he was certain the man was guilty of fraud—he wasn’t sure of that at all. He’d found some numbers in the files that had been provided to the preparer by DiSalvo’s people, numbers that didn’t add up. Deductions taken without evidence to prove they were legitimate. Purchases made with no proof of goods having existed. Services paid for, with no accounting of those services having been received. Like the landscaping that was done for a property DiSalvo had bought and sold. The property was wooded, with forty-year-old trees. It didn’t need landscaping.

      Didn’t mean Hines had done anything wrong. He reported what his clients gave him.

      In any case, the fraud of which DiSalvo was being accused was on a grander scale. Companies in which he’d invested once, a relatively small amount of money each time, were included in the list of everything that was being investigated and named in the criminal charge. And the money that had been invested had come from another source he’d never really owned. All of which gave wiggle room for getting him off. And gave doubt to his innocence, too.

      Cedar spent all of Monday night following paper trails—and coming up with dead ends. Investments were tied to other investments, and yet DiSalvo wasn’t tied to most of them. Or an investment that was named was tied to one that wasn’t.

      After almost ten hours of work, he’d come up with two key points. First, the timeline—threads had started to connect three years before, during the summer. Ties between investors started there. Like a massive family tree filled with branches, and that was when the trunk came into sight. Almost as though the people had met in person. Concocted a plan.

      Or an event had happened that triggered the events that followed. Or fostered the financial relationships that grew out of it.

      Second point—an entity, HHC, had shown up in some emails, and he’d found no reference to what the acronym stood for.