Chapter 2 - THE NIGHT GRANDPA DIED
I didn't sleep.
At 2:13 in the morning, I opened the file.
Inside was a photograph.
My grandfather sitting behind his desk.
A newspaper beside him.
The headline was dated three days before his death.
Underneath the photograph was a handwritten note.
He knows about the money.
I turned the page.
Bank records.
Property deeds.
Investment statements.
Everything connected to the original family fortune.
But the strangest document was a letter.
It was addressed to me.
Not my father.
Not my mother.
Me.
The date was three weeks before Grandpa died.
I read it slowly.
My dearest granddaughter,
If you are reading this, then I was unable to protect you myself.
My heart began pounding.
I continued.
Your father believes he is entitled to everything I built.
He is wrong.
I created a trust because I discovered that he has been stealing from the family for years.
I stopped reading.
My father had stolen from Grandpa?
The letter continued.
He has borrowed against properties without my knowledge.
He has created companies in other people's names.
And worst of all, he has begun moving money through accounts connected to your brother.
I looked at the Northstar documents.
It was all there.
Grandpa knew.
He had known for years.
But there was one sentence that terrified me.
Your father is not acting alone.
I turned the page.
There was a name.
Victoria Crane.
My mother.
I stared at it.
Mom had always seemed like the quiet one.
She rarely argued.
She never defended me.
At Christmas, she had stared at her plate while Dad called me a disgrace.
I had assumed she was afraid of him.
Maybe she wasn't.
Maybe she was part of it.
The letter explained that Grandpa had discovered millions being transferred through shell companies controlled by my parents.
He planned to expose them.
Three days later, he died.
Officially, it had been a heart attack.
But the letter said something different.
If they tell you I died peacefully, don't believe them.
My hands shook.
Rebecca called at 6:00 a.m.
“Did you open it?”
“Yes.”
“Then we need to meet.”
“Why?”
“Because the bank found another record.”
She arrived forty minutes later.
She looked exhausted.
“What happened?”
“The original trust contains a clause.”
“What clause?”
She handed me a copy.
“If the primary beneficiary creates a successful company using the protected assets, control of the entire estate transfers to that beneficiary.”
I stared.
“Primary beneficiary.”
“That's you.”
“But the company was mine.”
“Legally, yes.”
“Then why was my father managing everything?”
“Because your grandfather appointed him temporary trustee.”
“Temporary?”
“Until you turned thirty-five.”
I froze.
“My thirty-fifth birthday was two months ago.”
Rebecca nodded.
“That means control should have transferred to you.”
“But it didn't.”
“No.”
“Why?”
She handed me another document.
“A fraudulent amendment was filed eight years ago.”
I read it.
The amendment extended my father's control indefinitely.
And beside my name was a signature.
My signature.
Forged.
I whispered:
“They stole my company from me.”
Rebecca shook her head.
“Not exactly.”
“What?”
“They didn't steal your company.”
She pointed to another document.
“They stole the company your grandfather built before you were born.”
I stared at the paperwork.
Suddenly, my entire life felt like a carefully constructed lie.
My father hadn't merely been paying our family's bills with my money.
He had been siphoning money from an empire that legally belonged to me.
And my company?
It had been built on technology that Grandpa had intentionally protected for me.
My father had known.
My mother had known.
My brother had benefited.
Then Rebecca said:
“There is one more beneficiary.”
I looked at her.
“Who?”
She slid a birth certificate across the table.
The name made my heart stop.
Evelyn Bennett.
My aunt.
May you like
She had died twenty years ago.
Or at least, that's what our family had always told me.
