Chapter 4 - Warren Voss Comes to the FarmWarren Voss arrived at my farm at 7:10 the next morning.
He didn’t call.
Men like Warren rarely ask permission when they believe money has already purchased the answer.
His Bentley rolled through the gravel driveway and stopped beside my workshop.
I was splitting firewood.
Rebecca had told me not to contact Warren.
She hadn’t told me I had to hide if he came to me.
I rested the ax against the chopping block.
Warren stepped out wearing a charcoal suit that probably cost more than my tractor.
He looked around at the barn, the rusted pickup, the stacked hay.
Then he smiled.
“Samuel.”
“Warren.”
“We need to talk.”
“Usually people call first.”
“This couldn’t wait.”
He opened the passenger door and removed a leather folder.
“Where’s Claire?”
“Safe.”
“You’ve turned a marital disagreement into a circus.”
I stared at him.
“Is that what Daniel told you?”
“You know how young couples are.”
“Do young couples normally delete security footage?”
For the first time, Warren’s smile weakened.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Your login credentials were used.”
“That proves nothing.”
“It proves you have terrible luck.”
He stepped closer.
“Samuel, I came here to resolve this privately.”
“What are you offering?”
Warren seemed relieved.
That told me everything.
He opened the folder.
Inside was a check.
Five hundred thousand dollars.
I laughed.
His expression hardened.
“You think this is amusing?”
“I think you misunderstood the situation.”
“Claire can start over anywhere she wants.”
“With half a million?”
“That’s more money than most people see in a lifetime.”
I looked around at my property.
“I suppose.”
His eyes followed mine.
He still believed what Daniel believed.
Quiet farmer.
Small house.
Old truck.
Limited resources.
Warren held out the check.
“In exchange, she signs a confidentiality agreement, retracts any accusations, and neither of you participates in further legal action.”
I took the check.
He smiled.
Then I tore it in half.
The smile disappeared.
“You’re making a mistake.”
“No. I made my mistake three years ago.”
“What mistake?”
“Trusting you.”
Warren’s voice dropped.
“You need to think about your daughter.”
“That’s exactly what I’m doing.”
“You think Daniel going to jail helps Claire?”
“I think Daniel deciding whether he goes to jail isn’t my job.”
“You have no idea what you’re up against.”
I looked at him.
“You keep saying things like that.”
“Because you don’t.”
He glanced toward the farmhouse.
“I know about Elizabeth’s trust.”
There it was.
My wife’s name.
A line he shouldn’t have crossed.
“You used Claire to get information about my wife’s estate.”
“Don’t be dramatic.”
“You forged my signature.”
Warren said nothing.
That silence was almost a confession.
“I don’t know who signed what.”
“Interesting answer.”
“You’ll never prove anything.”
“Maybe.”
His jaw tightened.
He had expected shouting.
Threats.
Fear.
Instead, he got uncertainty.
Powerful men hate uncertainty because they usually spend money eliminating it.
Warren stepped closer.
“Samuel, your family trust has assets exposed through multiple guarantees. If certain loans default, everything you own could become vulnerable.”
I nodded.
“Could.”
“You could lose this farm.”
“Could.”
“The accounts.”
“Could.”
“Elizabeth’s remaining property.”
I smiled.
“What?”
He stared.
“You said Elizabeth’s remaining property.”
“So?”
“That information wasn’t in the folder Claire had.”
Warren realized his mistake.
Too late.
“Where did you get it?”
“I don’t remember.”
“I bet Rebecca will help refresh your memory.”
His expression froze.
“You hired Sloan?”
“She’s already hired.”
For the first time, Warren looked genuinely worried.
He closed the leather folder.
“Whatever Rebecca Sloan is charging you, I’ll pay double.”
I laughed.
He didn’t.
“You still think this is about what I can afford.”
Warren studied me.
Then something clicked.
“How much are you worth, Samuel?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“It became my business when you financed Daniel’s house.”
“No, it became your obsession.”
He took a step backward.
His phone rang.
He checked the screen.
Ignored it.
It rang again.
This time he answered.
“What?”
I watched the color leave his face.
“When?”
A pause.
“No, do not speak to anyone. I’m coming.”
He hung up.
“Problem?”
Warren looked at me.
“What did you do?”
“Split firewood.”
“The bank froze our operating line.”
“Sounds inconvenient.”
“You called them.”
“No.”
Technically true.
Rebecca had.
“What did you tell them?”
“The truth.”
His composure cracked.
“You arrogant son of a—”
I pointed toward the driveway.
“Careful.”
He stopped.
“Your son beat my daughter, threw her outside barefoot, and called me a nobody. You came here forty-eight hours later with a check and a threat.”
“It wasn’t a threat.”
“It sounded like one.”
“You don’t get to destroy my company because of a private family matter.”
I stared at him.
“Your company tried to take $2.7 million from my trust yesterday using forged documents.”
Silence.
“That stopped being private the moment your people submitted my name to a bank.”
Warren looked toward his Bentley.
“You’re making assumptions.”
“Then help me understand.”
“I don’t owe you an explanation.”
“Then you should probably leave.”
He turned.
Then stopped.
“Daniel loves Claire.”
I had heard many lies from powerful men.
That one was the ugliest.
“No,” I said. “Daniel loves ownership.”
Warren faced me again.
“You think you know my son?”
“I know what my daughter looks like after spending three years married to him.”
He walked toward the car.
Before getting inside, he said, “This will hurt Claire more than you understand.”
“No.”
I picked up the ax.
“It’ll hurt the people who counted on her staying scared.”
He drove away.
Twenty minutes later, Rebecca arrived.
“You talked to him.”
“He came here.”
“You should have called me.”
“He brought a check.”
“How much?”
“Five hundred thousand.”
“And?”
“Tore it up.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“Of course you did.”
“He threatened the trust.”
“That part matters.”
“He also mentioned Elizabeth’s remaining property.”
Her eyes opened.
“What exactly did he say?”
I repeated it.
Rebecca became very still.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
“The documents Claire gave Daniel did not include the Tennessee parcels.”
“I know.”
“Only four people had complete records.”
“Me. You. My accountant.”
“And the former trustee.”
I nodded.
Gerald Pike.
A man I hadn’t spoken to in nearly six years.
Rebecca opened her phone.
“I’m calling him.”
No answer.
She called again.
Nothing.
Then her associate called from Nashville.
Gerald Pike had died eight months earlier.
Heart attack.
But during the final year of his life, he had received consulting payments from a company.
Voss Development Group.
Total payments:
$284,000.
Rebecca put the phone down.
“Warren bought access.”
“To what?”
“Possibly everything.”
We drove to her office.
By noon, her forensic accountant had discovered that Warren’s companies had spent two years constructing loans around assets they did not own.
Not just my assets.
Other people’s.
Properties belonging to elderly investors.
Trust accounts.
Partnership interests.
Land rights.
The Reed trust wasn’t the only target.
It might simply have been the largest.
Then the county clerk called Rebecca with another discovery.
A deed had been filed six months earlier transferring one of my Tennessee parcels into a Voss-controlled entity.
My signature appeared at the bottom.
So did Claire’s.
Neither of us had signed it.
Rebecca stared at the document.
“This is fraud.”
I looked at Claire.
Her face had gone white.
Daniel hadn’t only hurt my daughter.
His family had been using her identity as a bridge into my estate.
Then Claire noticed something.
“Wait.”
She pointed toward the notary line.
“That woman.”
“What woman?” Rebecca asked.
Claire tapped the name.
Madison Cole.
The blonde woman from Daniel’s house.
The witness.
The woman wearing his shirt.
She hadn’t simply been Daniel’s mistress.
She had notarized the forged deed transferring millions of dollars of property.
May you like
And suddenly, the woman who could prove Daniel dragged Claire into the rain had become the most dangerous witness in Hartwell County.
We needed to find her before Warren did.
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