Chapter 7 - THE MOTHER WHO NEVER DIED
Larkin did not believe me.
Not at first.
He watched my father’s video twice.
Then a third time.
No expression.
“Impossible.”
“Apparently not.”
“My mother died when I was eleven.”
“Did you see her body?”
His eyes snapped toward me.
“No.”
Closed casket.
Car accident.
Family handled everything.
Pattern.
He called no one immediately.
Good.
Then asked:
“What else?”
My father’s video explained that Evelyn Steves had discovered Anthony stealing money from Stephen.
She threatened to expose him.
Then she “died.”
Joseph later saw her alive at a private medical facility under another name.
He believed Anthony had hidden her after a serious crash left her with neurological injuries.
Why not kill her?
Maybe he could not.
Maybe family loyalty.
Maybe leverage.
Joseph never knew.
But Thomas knew.
After Anthony died, Thomas inherited payments to the facility.
Larkin stared at the transfer records.
Monthly.
For four years.
From WDS.
His mother’s survival had been funded with stolen money.
“Where?”
The current facility had changed names twice.
Located in Vermont.
Larkin wanted to leave immediately.
I said:
“No.”
He stared.
“No?”
“Thomas expects you to.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should.”
I pointed toward the records.
“If Thomas kept her alive this long, why?”
Silence.
“Leverage.”
Larkin understood.
Thomas had one secret capable of controlling him.
Maybe that was why Thomas remained untouchable despite reckless behavior.
Then another possibility.
“What if she chose not to come back?”
Larkin flinched.
Important.
Do not assume hostage.
We verified.
Through Sarah.
Legally.
The facility existed.
Patient under alias:
Evelyn Hart.
Age matched.
Long-term neurological rehabilitation and assisted living.
No prisoner.
No locked mafia dungeon.
A patient.
Sarah contacted her court-appointed medical advocate.
That surprised us.
Evelyn had one.
Why?
Because years ago, someone challenged financial control over her care.
Name:
Joseph Woods.
My father.
He had tried to free Larkin’s mother legally.
Before dying.
The advocate agreed to ask Evelyn whether she wanted contact with Larkin.
Not the other way around.
Larkin hated waiting.
Good practice.
Two days later:
She did.
Video call.
Larkin sat alone.
I stayed outside.
Forty minutes.
When he emerged, he looked destroyed.
“She remembers me.”
I said nothing.
“She thought I was dead.”
“What?”
Anthony told her Stephen and Larkin died in separate incidents.
Kept her disconnected.
Thomas later learned the truth but continued paying for care without revealing anything.
Why?
Evelyn said Thomas visited once.
He told her:
If Larkin finds you, everything your husband built collapses.
That was not true.
But fear works.
Then she gave Larkin one piece of information.
Anthony kept a second financial archive.
Not WDS.
A company called Solstice Holdings.
I laughed bitterly.
The gala.
Same name.
Larkin frowned.
“The gala belongs to Solstice Foundation.”
Exactly.
Every year, the most dangerous men in New York gathered at an event funded by a shell structure created by Anthony Steves.
Thomas had invited me into the center of his father’s old machine.
Why?
Maybe arrogance.
Maybe ritual.
Then Sarah found the ownership.
Solstice Holdings controlled the hotel ballroom through an investment company.
And the current beneficial owner was not Thomas.
May you like
It was Penelope Woods.
Me.
