At first, she assumed it was a clerical issue. She raised the discrepancies with her supervisor, who assured her that the finance department was reconciling the accounts.
Then she received a revised schedule.
Several descriptions had changed, but the total amounts remained the same.
"When I asked why, they told me the details were immaterial," Laura said. "They said the contract was fixed-price and the paperwork was merely administrative."
"Did you sign it?"
"No."
"What happened?"
"I was removed from the project. A month later, my contract wasn't renewed."
Evelyn listened without interrupting.
"Why didn't you take the issue to the authorities?"
"I didn't know whether I'd misunderstood the documents. I was a project architect, not an accountant. And I had no proof that anyone had deliberately done anything wrong."
"Why keep the records?"
"Because I knew what I'd seen."
Laura opened her folder and took out a handwritten ledger. The pages contained dates, project codes, invoice references, and short notes in the margins.
"I kept copies of records that were lawfully given to me during the project," she explained. "I also kept my own notes. I didn't take confidential files from the company when I left."
Rachel, who had joined them, examined the ledger without touching the pages.
"These entries are not proof of misconduct," she said. "But they may help identify transactions for the independent reviewers to examine."
Laura nodded.
"That's all I want."
Evelyn turned to a page marked with a red line.
The entry referred to a consulting charge that had been allocated to a redevelopment project, even though the description appeared to relate to a separate property.
"Do you remember this?"
"Yes. I asked about it because the work description didn't match the project."
"Who answered?"
"Leonard Price. He said the allocation had been approved centrally."
"Did he give you a name?"
"No."
Evelyn looked up.
"Did he seem worried?"
Laura thought for a moment.
"He seemed irritated. Not frightened. More like someone who believed the question itself was inappropriate."
Rachel made a note.
They spent another hour reviewing dates and project references. Nothing established a crime. Some charges might have reflected legitimate shared services or internal accounting allocations. Others required further explanation.
But the ledger revealed something important: the questions had begun years before Evelyn's public removal.
When they finished, Laura closed the folder.
"I need you to understand something," she said to Evelyn. "I don't want to become the face of this story. I don't want my name in the newspapers. I have a family, and I have a life."
"I won't ask you to do anything you're uncomfortable with."
"If the investigators need to speak to me, I'll cooperate through the proper channels. But I'm not going to stand in front of a camera and call people criminals."
"Neither am I."
Laura studied her for a long moment.
"Then perhaps you'll do better than I did."
Evelyn almost asked what Laura meant.
Instead, she thanked her.
Outside the café, Rachel explained that the ledger would need to be reviewed for relevance, authenticity, and any restrictions on its use.
Evelyn agreed.
As they walked toward the street, she thought about Laura's words.
For years, Evelyn had believed that people left Hartwell because they couldn't keep up with its ambitions. Laura's story suggested another possibility: sometimes people left because they had asked questions the company did not want to answer.
That did not prove that the questions had been justified.
But it made the company's habit of dismissing them impossible to ignore.
The invitation arrived on Wednesday afternoon.
The chair of Hartwell Development's audit committee, Margaret Ellis, had requested a private meeting with Evelyn and her attorney.
Evelyn read the email twice.
"Is this a good sign?" she asked Rachel.
"It's a sign that the committee wants to hear from you."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer I can give before we know what they want."
They arrived at Hartwell's headquarters the following morning.
The building looked unchanged. The reception desk gleamed beneath the lights, and a digital screen displayed photographs of the company's completed developments. Evelyn recognized a waterfront complex she had helped negotiate, a residential tower she had defended against budget cuts, and a community center whose opening had been one of the proudest days of her career.
For a moment, she felt like a visitor in a museum devoted to her former life.
Margaret Ellis greeted them in a conference room on the twenty-third floor.