***Hart Industries***
Jennifer pulled in and parked, and got out. She was walking quickly and with purpose, as she always did when she was upset. She took the elevator upstairs to Jonathan's floor and headed to his office.
"Hi Deanne. Thanks for keeping him here. Listen, this is important, so please hold all his calls, ok?"
"Yes, ma'am".
Jennifer opened the door and stormed towards his desk.
"Hi darling. This is a nice surprise".
"Won't be for long. Why, Jonathan? Why would you do this?"
"Do what? What are you talking about?"
"Jonathan, our bank cards don't work".
"Did you buy something frivolous?"
"Since when is gas for the car frivolous? And since when do you get to tell me what I can and cannot spend money on?" Her eyes were blazing.
He sighed. "Just tell me what happened".
"I was upset, so I went for a drive to clear my head. I heard my gas light ding, stopped to get gas. Only, I couldn't, because my credit card didn't work".
She grabbed her wallet and pulled it out.
"And then this one didn't work, and then this one didn't work. Spoiler alert- none of them worked. Thankfully, I had enough cash to cover it, but did you think that you withdrawing all of our money for God knows what reason wouldn't affect me?"
"Jennifer, I didn't withdraw any money".
"Well, the bank says you did".
She handed him the statements.
"I called the bank after I paid for gas. Lindsay, at our local branch, said that out of our 6 accounts, 5 were closed. By you. And the 6th, had $950,000 in it. Now it has $4000. None of our credit cards or bank cards are connected to that one, so that wouldn't help me at the gas station".
"I am calling our accountant Bob right now. I didn't make these withdrawals. He would be the only one who could have authorized this, besides me or you".
She was quiet while he was on the phone.
He hung up.
"No answer".
Just then, Stanley Friesen came in the office.
"Mr. Hart, I think I may have found something".
"Stanley, don't you know how to knock?"
"Jennifer, I asked Stanley to dig into something, it's alright".
She walked over and sat down on his couch.
Jonathan sighed, as he always did when she was pissed.
"What is it Stanley?"
"I checked into why the company credit card that you gave me today didn't work, but I didn't stop there. I checked all the company credit cards. The reason is the same for all of them. The bills for the credit cards haven't been paid in 2 months".
"That's ludicrous! Bob Stanton has always paid our bills on time, every month, like clockwork".
"Here is the paperwork".
"Thanks Stanley".
"Sure". He left without saying anything to Jennifer.
He pulled up the attendance records of the employees, and saw that Bob hadn't been to work in a month, having taken an extended vacation. He called down to HR.
"Hello Melanie, can you please pull the vacation request for Bob Stanton in Accounting and bring it up to my office? Thank you".
Jennifer stood up and walked over to his desk.
"I'm going to go, I will see you tonight, if you get home before midnight".
He stood up and came over to her.
He didn't say anything and just pulled her into an embrace.
"What are you doing?"
"Babe, we haven't spent any time together the last few days, and I know that I am to blame for that. But, I do still want to hug and kiss you every chance I get".
"Do you? We've drifted Jonathan, don't you see that?"
"Yes, and I hate it. I know I've been working a lot lately, and I know that I have had some emergencies, but you are still the most important thing in my life, darling".
"Jonathan, I have eaten the last 4 dinners alone. I have gone to bed alone the past 5 nights. This morning, I got up and took a shower in the guest bath and you didn't even notice. I called here to talk to you yesterday, and you told Deanne that you didn't want to speak to me. You used to wake me up when you got home, and now you don't even try. So, don't tell me I am important to you when you can't even exert the effort to make me feel like you even notice my presence".
"Come here". He led her to the couch and they sat down.
He grabbed her hands and just looked at her.
"I'm sorry. I guess it all just got out of hand".
"All what just got out of hand?"
"We had a merger that I was trying to complete. That was last week. And then as soon as I completed it, there was another one that I had to act fast on because otherwise, someone else would snap it up. And then one of the board members was demanding a meeting, so we had to call it the other night, and I tried, I really, really tried to get out of here as quickly as possible, but it didn't happen. But I did come straight home when it was over".
She looked at him, without saying anything.
He continued.
"I got home last night, you were sleeping, and I climbed into bed and held you. I was hoping we could get a few minutes together this morning, but when I woke up, you weren't in the bed. I found you downstairs in the study, and you were on the phone. I waited as long as I could, but I had a meeting this morning I couldn't miss".
She spoke quietly.
"I was still hurt that you said no yesterday to talking to me".
"I didn't say no. I said "not right now". We had an emergency that we were trying to work through. It wasn't that I didn't want to speak to you, it was that I didn't have time".
"We used to make time, right then, no matter what, for each other".
"We did. You are right".
"I hate this feeling".
"What feeling?"
"Feeling like you and I lost our spark. Feeling like we are slipping away and can't fix it".
Her eyes welled with tears, and she looked away, towards the window.
"I tell you what. Let me figure out this accountant thing, and I will put Stanley in charge of the mergers for a while, and you and I can go somewhere, just the two of us, and take some time together".
"Jonathan, we can't fix this with a vacation. We have real problems".
"Ok, so tell me what you want to do. I will do whatever it is".
"I want you to put forth the effort. I want to see, and feel that you care".
"Jennifer, I just made a suggestion that we go away and spend time just the two of us, and you shot it down without even thinking about it".
"I shot it down because when you and I go away, we don't 'fix' anything. We just shove the issues under the rug, and hope that we don't find them when we get home".
He was quiet, and didn't know what to say.
"I miss you, Jonathan. I miss us. I miss spending time with you, I miss waking up with you. And I'm scared. I am terrified that we won't get it back".
"Babe, we will get it back. We will. You just have to have faith in what we have".
"I'm trying. Being alone all the time isn't very fun, Jonathan. I make dinner for the both of us, and eat in front of the tv. I go to bed in our bed, and fall asleep by myself. This has been going on for weeks, Jonathan. Either you aren't in town, or you aren't at home. I caught myself smelling your clothes yesterday just because I missed you. But after Deanne said you said no to talking, I'd be damned if I came down here and told you so".
"Where did you sleep last night?"
"In our bed, till the middle of the night, and then I woke up to go to the bathroom, and realized that I had a headache, and went downstairs to get meds. I slept on the couch the rest of the night".
"Ok. So, what do we do? I want to get to the bottom of this accounting thing, and then I want us to spend some real time together, just us, no interruptions. What do you want?"
"I want it to be like it used to be. I want us to want to be together".
"Are you saying you don't want to be with me?"
"No, I'm not saying that. I am saying-I have been saying- that I feel like we are slipping away".
"And I am saying that I will do whatever it takes to stop that, and get us back to where we used to be".
"And I appreciate that. I do. It's just that we are in this cycle that we can't seem to break".
"What cycle?"
"We make plans, you call and break them. We make new plans, you call and break those too. And I end up doing everything that I used to do with you, without you. And then when you try and make it up to me, I am resentful and hurt still, so I push you away. I hate feeling like this, you hate feeling like this, but how do we stop feeling like this?"
He put his arm around her, and pulled her closer. He grabbed her hand with his other hand.
"We make a genuine effort to spend quality time together, and we commit to fixing this, whatever it takes".
She nodded.
"I'm sorry I pushed you away, this morning. And I'm sorry I came in here yelling at you".
"Babe, we are going to figure this out, together".
She nodded.
He leaned forward and kissed her.
Just then, there was a knock at his office door.
"Come in".
Melanie from HR came in and walked over to him.
"Here is the file you requested, Mr. Hart".
"Thank you, Melanie".
She left and Jonathan opened the file.
"This is ridiculous".
"What does it say?"
"It says that I authorized him to take more than a month off, and I swear I didn't".
"Does it say where he was going?"
"No, it just says that he was approved, by me, to go on vacation from Monday, two weeks ago, till a month from tomorrow. I would have never approved anyone to take a vacation for that long".
"Maybe it was a misprint, like he wrote the wrong date on the form."
"Maybe…"
He thought a moment, and then looked at her.
"Take a drive with me?"
She nodded.
They headed to the elevator, and then to his car.
***Bob Stanton's***
Jonathan and Jennifer were quiet on the way to Bob's house.
He reached over while he was driving and took her hand.
A few minutes later, they pulled up to Bob's house. Lots of papers lined the driveway.
They pulled up to the front door and parked.
Jonathan came around to Jennifer's side of the car, and opened the door for her.
"Thank you".
They walked up to the front door, and knocked.
Nothing. They walked around the entire house, and didn't find an open window, or open door.
They were at the back door, trying to figure out what to do.
"We could call the police and have them come do a well check".
"We could. Or we could look for a key and see if we can get in".
"Jonathan, that's not ethical".
"Jennifer, he could be in there, hurt or worse…".
"Which is why we should call the police".
"If we do that, we cannot handle this ourselves".
"Why do we always have to handle it ourselves?"
He sighed.
He leaned up against the window and peered in.
"Babe….there's no furniture in here. I think he has taken off".
"With our money?"
"And everything he owns".
He grabbed her hand and they went back to the car, and he called Lt. Grey.
"Herschel, can you meet me at 8745 Steeplegate Cove? I need you to do a well check on an employee of mine".
"Sure Jonathan, I will be right there".
Jennifer and Jonathan sat in the car and waited for Lt. Grey.
It was a little awkward, only because Jennifer wasn't saying much.
Lt. Grey got there a few moments later, and officially started an investigation into the disappearance of Bob Stanton.
After looking around the house and realizing that he had basically left without telling anyone, Lt. Grey looked at Jonathan and Jennifer.
"We are going to need your statements, and you both need to understand, he might not ever be found. But we are going to try".
Jonathan drove Jennifer back to the office, and Lt. Grey followed them.
They came inside to Jonathan's office, and gave Lt. Grey their statements. He left, and Jonathan looked at Jennifer.
"I am going to have the accounting department go over our finances so that we can figure out exactly what we have and what we don't".
"Jonathan, they work for you. That's not wise".
He let out a deep breath.
"Maybe you are right. We should call someone else".
He called one of the best accounting firms in town, and they said someone would be over within the hour.
Jennifer settled on to his couch and picked up a magazine that was on his side table and started reading.
Jonathan came and sat at the other end of the couch, and pulled her feet onto his lap.
He started giving her a foot massage, and he looked over and could see she was getting a headache. She always squinted her eyes when her head hurt.
She put the magazine down and leaned forward and got a legal pad and a pen.
"Jonathan, can we talk a minute?"
"Sure".
"What do we own that we are still paying on?"
"The house is paid off. Most of the cars are paid off, we still owe about a year's worth of payments on your Porsche, assuming that he was paying that bill. The boat is paid off, Hart Industries signed the beach house over to us, so we don't owe on that. The cabin, the ranch, all paid for. Our new plane still has several payments. If he stole from Hart Industries, then that might be an issue, as will payroll. Gosh, I can't believe this is happening".
She sat up and moved closer to him. She didn't know what to say, she never thought they would be dealing with this either.
"Lindsay at the bank said that my personal account is fluid. Last time I looked was 2 weeks ago when I deposited my last paycheck, and it had several hundred thousand dollars. We can live off that for a while if we need to. I suppose we can start downsizing, and selling things that we have, like our art collection, maybe."
"Hopefully it won't come to that."
"Jonathan, I am not asking you this because I don't trust you, I want you to know that up front. I have never asked you this because I figured it was your business, but under what circumstances does this company pay you?"
"I get a salary of somewhere around $8-10 billion a year, depending on bonuses. Payday is next Friday. Typically, Bob would deposit anywhere around 10 to 12 million in our personal accounts, and then the rest in savings."
"So, we could technically fix this in a few days."
"We? Don't you mean me?"
"There you go, pushing me away again".
"Jennifer, I didn't mean that the way it sounded".
"Enlighten me on what possible other meaning you had in mind".
"Why are you being so snarky?"
"Why are you being so distant? I didn't cause this, Jonathan. Your accountant did. I am not the enemy here".
"I am not saying that you are. Look, this isn't any fun for me either. But the reality is, he stole our money, and as soon as the accountant gets here, they can figure out if he stole from Hart Industries also".
He got up and called the accounting department.
"Yes, I need a statement of all of Hart Industries accounts, right away. Bank statements, including withdrawals and deposits, and highlight the balances please".
The accountant that Jonathan had hired walked in just then.
"Hello, I am Morgan Alexander, from Weston, Douglas and Todd."
"Hi, I am Jonathan Hart, this is my wife Jennifer, thanks for coming". He explained the basics to her, and that their former accountant worked for the company as well as handled his and Jennifer's personal finances as well.
"He had the power to handle our accounts as he saw fit, he could move money around, deposit, withdraw, everything. All of our accounts except Jennifer's personal one, and our savings account he was only allowed to deposit only. We just need to know where we stand and how much he took".
"Ok, can you have the accounting firm send over statements of the company's accounts?"
"Already did. They should be here anytime now".
"Perfect, I will start with your personal accounts. Just so you know, this might take several hours".
Jennifer grabbed her purse and touched Jonathan's arm.
"I'm going home. I will see you…well, I guess whenever you get home".
He walked her to the elevator.
"Jennifer, I promise you I will be home as soon as I can be".
She nodded, and leaned forward and kissed him.
The doors closed, and she headed home.
***Willow Pond***
Jennifer was in bed when Jonathan came in. She came out to the top of the stairs, and saw him coming through the door.
She walked down to meet him on the third stair.
"So, what did we lose?"
He gave her the saddest look.
"Everything".
