Chapter 3 - CLAIRE'S NAME ON THE PAGE
Claire went white.
“I never signed that.”
Ryan turned toward his wife.
“Your name is right there.”
“I can see that.”
“You witnessed Mom and Dad signing it?”
“No!”
Megan looked at Claire with open suspicion.
“Then somebody forged your signature too.”
Claire hesitated.
Only for a fraction of a second.
But I saw it.
So did Megan.
“Claire?” I asked.
She looked at me.
“I remember signing something for Thomas.”
Ryan stopped pacing.
“What?”
“It was years ago.”
“What did you sign?”
“I don’t know. He asked me to witness his signature on some paperwork.”
My chest tightened.
“When?”
She shook her head.
“I don’t remember.”
“Try.”
“Eleanor, it was almost a decade ago.”
Megan stepped forward.
“Was Mom there?”
Claire’s eyes moved toward the laptop.
“No.”
That answer mattered.
If Thomas had signed something in Claire’s presence without me, then whoever later placed my forged signature beside his might have used a legitimate witnessed page to create a fraudulent guarantee.
Ryan dragged both hands down his face.
“This is insane.”
“No,” Megan said.
“This is paperwork. Paperwork has dates.”
She was right.
By noon, we had requested copies of every document attached to the old account.
Charles warned it could take time.
I called my estate attorney, Patricia Sloan, whom I had not spoken to in years.
She remembered Thomas.
More importantly, she remembered his habits.
“Thomas never pledged major assets without discussing them with you.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“He was cautious to the point of irritation.”
I smiled despite myself.
“That sounds like him.”
Patricia asked me to send the document.
Ten minutes later, she called back.
“Eleanor, there is a problem.”
“What?”
“The notary stamp.”
“What about it?”
“It belongs to a notary named Dennis Hale.”
The name meant nothing to me.
Patricia continued.
“He lost his commission twelve days before this document was supposedly notarized.”
My pulse quickened.
“So the document is fraudulent?”
“It strongly suggests something is wrong.”
Ryan sat across from me, listening.
Claire remained near the window.
Very quiet.
Too quiet.
Patricia told us not to confront anyone else until she reviewed the estate file.
Then she asked a question I had not expected.
“Who handled Thomas’s probate?”
I answered automatically.
“Martin Cole.”
Patricia went silent.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Martin had been recommended by Ryan.
A friend of a business associate.
He had handled everything because I could barely function after Thomas died.
Patricia exhaled.
“Eleanor, Martin Cole was sanctioned by the state bar three years ago.”
“For what?”
“Mishandling client funds.”
My stomach dropped.
Ryan stared at me.
“I didn’t know.”
I believed him less than I wanted to.
Patricia continued.
“There’s another thing.”
She had searched the county filing system.
The collateral document had never been recorded when Thomas was alive.
It was filed six weeks after his death.
And the person who submitted it was not Martin Cole.
May you like
It was someone from Ryan’s company.
A woman named Claire Bennett.
