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My question from a few weeks ago comes back to me: What does success look like for Meg? The answer is buried in one of these notebooks.
I dig around until I find the most recent one and read about her return to Los Angeles, positioning herself to meet Veronica. The killer deal she and David got on their house was nothing more than an illusion created and executed by Meg, her sole purpose to polish her reputation and be exactly who Ron needed her to be.
Canyon Drive was a legitimate sale, a setup for what would come next—Mandeville Canyon—and a DBA for a company called Orange Coast Escrow. I read a draft of an email to Ron’s business manager: Congratulations on your new home! Orange Coast Escrow is excited to work with you. Included in this email is your secure link to escrow and wiring instructions.
I pull out my phone and type in the web address jotted at the top of the page, pulling up a website for Orange Coast Escrow. It has all the usual links—Tools and Resources, Services, and one titled Wire Fraud Warning. Criminals often try to steal your money by pretending to be us. Please call before you wire any funds! Then it lists a phone number.
In a new window, I Google Orange Coast Escrow. Two links pop up: the one I just looked at and a second one. I toggle back and forth between them, but they’re identical, all the way down to the wire fraud warning. Then I see it—an extra underscore at the very end of the web address I entered from Meg’s notebook. And a different phone number. When I dial it, a woman’s voice says, “You’ve reached Orange Coast Escrow. Please press one to speak to an escrow officer.” When I press it, my call gets disconnected. I try again, with the same outcome.
Next, I look up the listing agent for the Mandeville Canyon property. “Hi,” I say when she answers her phone. “This is Kat, Meg Williams’s assistant at Apex Beverly Hills. We were wondering when the Mandeville property went into escrow.”
The woman on the other end laughs. “God, I wish it was in escrow. Do you guys have a buyer for me?”
I tell her I’ll get back to her and hang up, marveling at the level of skill and planning Meg used. She’d known she would never be able to steal a property from Ron, so she tricked him into believing he’d purchased one instead. One escrow successfully closed so the next one wouldn’t be questioned.
I return to Meg’s notebook, the pages turning faster and faster as Meg’s con finally becomes clear. The no-win situation Meg has created for Ron. An imaginary escrow with a fake escrow company. A DBA under the name of Orange Coast Escrow and a bank account with the same name, both of them opened by Meg back in September. The words campaign donations underlined three times. Seven million dollars wired into that account—there, and then gone again. And then I read a draft of a press release that, according to Meg’s notes, has supposedly just gone public.
“Oh my god,” I say into the empty house. Then I start to laugh.
