Chapter 3 - The Woman Who Was Still My Brother-in-Law's WifeBy eight o'clock, I understood three things.
My sister had lied about our father's death.
Her husband had apparently been married to another woman for the entire duration of their ten-year marriage.
And somebody had stolen nearly a million dollars while preparing to take Dad's house.
What I didn't understand was why Vanessa had warned me that things would get worse.
That answer arrived with Rebecca Shaw.
Rebecca was fifty-nine, tall, silver-haired, and wore a charcoal suit that made her look like she was arriving to fire half the room.
She carried two legal folders, a laptop, and the expression of a woman who had already lost patience with everyone involved.
She walked into the kitchen, kissed Dad on the cheek, and said, "Richard, I told you not to answer your daughter's calls."
Dad lifted his coffee.
"She told me I was dead. I felt compelled to disagree."
Rebecca didn't smile.
"Natalie, I assume you've heard some of this."
"Enough to know we're in trouble."
"We're in a fight," Rebecca corrected. "That's different."
She opened her laptop.
On the screen was a copy of a document titled Durable Financial Power of Attorney.
Dad's name appeared across the top.
Vanessa was listed as his agent.
The signature looked remarkably convincing.
But Dad immediately pointed at it.
"That's not mine."
"How can you tell?" I asked.
He tapped the screen.
"I never sign my middle initial that way. Haven't since I was twenty."
Rebecca nodded.
"The bank's forensic examiner noticed the same discrepancy."
She opened another document.
A physician's letter claimed that Dad suffered from progressive cognitive impairment and could no longer reliably manage his financial affairs.
It was dated six weeks earlier.
Dad read the letter.
Then he laughed once.
"Interesting. I spent that morning at the dentist."
Rebecca's eyes sharpened.
"We have the dental records."
I almost smiled.
For the first time since Vanessa's call, we had something tangible.
Evidence.
But Rebecca continued.
"The fabricated incapacity claim is only part of the problem."
She showed us an organizational chart.
At the center was Holloway Asset Management.
Connected to it were three smaller companies.
One of them was Lawson Residential Holdings.
Brent's company.
"What exactly does Brent do?" Rebecca asked me.
I hesitated.
"Property investments. Or that's what he says."
"How much do you know about his business?"
"Almost nothing. He talks about opportunities and private investors."
Rebecca turned the computer toward Dad.
"Holloway issued a seven-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar loan to Lawson Residential Holdings four months ago."
Dad frowned.
"That doesn't involve me."
"It does now."
Rebecca opened another file.
The loan was allegedly secured by Dad's house.
His home was being used as collateral for money he'd never borrowed.
My stomach sank.
"Can they take the house?"
"Not lawfully on these documents," Rebecca said. "But an aggressive lender can create expensive complications before a court resolves the fraud."
She explained that Holloway had recently purchased the note from a private financing company.
Whoever arranged the loan had apparently provided documents showing that Dad consented to the collateral.
The signatures appeared falsified.
The notarization was suspicious.
And Brent had stopped making payments.
"Why would he borrow that much?" I asked.
Rebecca met my eyes.
"That's the question."
Dad sat back.
"Maybe because his business is failing."
Rebecca shook her head.
"There's more."
She displayed a bank ledger.
For months, money had moved from an old business account connected to Dad's former construction company into a consulting firm named Voss Strategic Partners.
Claudia's company.
There were twelve transfers.
Some were small.
Others exceeded a hundred thousand dollars.
The total was $824,600.
Dad stared at the figures.
His face seemed to age ten years in as many seconds.
"That money was supposed to fund scholarships."
I turned toward him.
"What?"
He looked at me.
"Your mother and I started a program before she died. College grants for children of our employees. We kept the account separate because the first scholarships were supposed to go out this fall."
My throat tightened.
Mom had died of ovarian cancer seven years earlier.
She'd spent her last months worrying about whether the children of Dad's workers would get the same educational opportunities she'd fought to give us.
Dad had promised to honor her dream.
Now someone had stolen the money.
Not from a rich man who wouldn't miss it.
From children who hadn't even been told the scholarships existed yet.
Rebecca closed the ledger.
"I've referred the suspicious transactions to the bank's fraud team. We've also preserved the records for investigators."
Dad's hands curled around his coffee mug.
"Bring them down."
Rebecca studied him.
"Richard, I intend to pursue every lawful remedy available. But I need you to understand that Vanessa may be in deeper trouble than she realizes."
I gave a bitter laugh.
"She told people Dad was dead so she could steal his house. How could she not realize?"
Rebecca turned her screen toward me.
"Because I don't think Vanessa designed this."
A photograph appeared.
Claudia Voss.
She was forty-three, elegant, dark-haired, and dressed in a cream business suit.
Rebecca continued.
"Claudia has worked with Brent for years. The divorce records from their first marriage don't exist because, as far as the county records currently show, they never divorced."
"Does Vanessa know?" I asked.
"Unknown."
"Then she's being used."
Rebecca nodded.
"Possibly. But being manipulated doesn't excuse participating in fraud."
Dad looked at the photograph.
"Where did you get that picture?"
"Public records."
"No," he said sharply. "The photograph outside the bank."
Rebecca hesitated.
"From an investigator."
Dad pressed his lips together.
"Someone has been watching Brent?"
"At my request."
I stared at Rebecca.
"When did you hire an investigator?"
"Two weeks ago."
"And what did he discover?"
She looked toward Dad.
For the first time that morning, Rebecca appeared uncertain.
"Richard, we should discuss that privately."
Dad shook his head.
"Natalie deserves to know."
Rebecca exhaled.
"Very well."
She opened another folder.
Inside was a photograph of Brent entering a storage facility.
Behind him stood a man wearing a baseball cap.
The man's face was partially turned away.
But I recognized him immediately.
I felt the blood leave my face.
"No."
Rebecca watched me.
"Natalie?"
"That can't be."
The man in the photograph was my ex-husband.
Michael Brooks.
The man who'd emptied our joint savings account during our divorce and disappeared to Arizona five years earlier.
The man I'd spent almost two years recovering from.
"What is Michael doing with Brent?"
Rebecca's expression grew grim.
"That's what we hoped you could tell us."
I could barely breathe.
Michael had been charming when we met.
Funny.
Generous.
Attentive.
He'd proposed after eight months and convinced me that marriage meant never needing to question each other's decisions.
Then, slowly, he began controlling everything.
Our bank accounts.
Our vacations.
My friendships.
Even how much I spent on groceries.
By the time I left, he'd taken nearly seventy thousand dollars from our savings.
I had rebuilt my life from scratch.
And now he was back.
Standing beside the man trying to steal Dad's fortune.
I stared at the photograph.
Then I noticed something.
Michael held a brown envelope.
On its side was a blue logo.
A logo I recognized from my own filing cabinet.
"Rebecca," I whispered, "can you enlarge that?"
She zoomed in.
There it was.
Brooks Financial Planning.
Michael's old business.
The company he'd supposedly closed before our divorce.
My stomach twisted.
"That's his firm."
Rebecca frowned.
"Are you certain?"
"Absolutely."
She exchanged a look with Dad.
Then she opened a third folder.
Inside was a list of accounts.
Six belonged to businesses.
One was an investment account in Dad's name.
And one—
I stopped breathing.
One was mine.
My retirement account.
The account I'd spent seventeen years building on a teacher's salary.
Beside it was a note.
Pending liquidation.
I looked at Rebecca.
"What does that mean?"
She leaned forward.
"Natalie, when you divorced Michael, did you ever revoke the financial authorization you signed while you were married?"
I stared at her.
I remembered Michael sliding papers across our kitchen counter years earlier.
He'd told me they were standard investment-management forms.
I had signed them without reading every line.
My hands began to shake.
"I don't know."
Rebecca closed the laptop.
"Then we need to find out immediately."
Before I could answer, Dad's landline rang.
He looked at the caller ID.
Vanessa.
Rebecca held up a finger.
"Answer it. Speakerphone."
Dad picked up.
"Hello?"
Vanessa was sobbing.
Real sobbing this time.
"Dad, please don't hang up."
He said nothing.
"Brent took my phone. He's threatening me."
I glanced at Rebecca.
She was already taking notes.
"Where are you?" Dad asked.
"At home."
"Is Brent there?"
"No. He left."
A door slammed somewhere in the background.
Vanessa gasped.
Then Brent's voice came through.
"Who are you talking to?"
There was a scuffle.
Something crashed.
I stood.
"Vanessa?"
No answer.
Then Brent spoke directly into the phone.
"Richard, you should have stayed out of this."
Dad gripped the receiver.
"If you hurt my daughter—"
Brent laughed.
"You still don't understand, do you?"
A second man's voice sounded behind him.
Familiar.
Painfully familiar.
"Tell the old man about the insurance policy."
My knees nearly buckled.
Michael.
My ex-husband.
Brent spoke slowly.
"Your precious Natalie signed some very interesting paperwork years ago."
I grabbed the edge of the table.
Dad went pale.
Then Michael said the words that turned a family fraud into something far more terrifying.
"Richard, if you don't cooperate, your daughter is going to lose a lot more than her retirement."
The line went dead.
Rebecca immediately dialed 911.
And I realized the people trying to rob my father had already found a way into my life.
They hadn't just targeted his money.
May you like
They had targeted both of his daughters.
And one of the men involved knew every weakness I'd ever trusted him with.
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