Chapter 7 - MY SISTER HAD BEEN WAITING FOR THE MONEY
I called Chloe.
She answered immediately.
“Ivan, thank God.”
Not angry.
Scared.
“Did you form Crown Harbor Holdings?”
Silence.
Then:
“Where are you?”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Is Grandma with you?”
“Yes.”
Chloe started crying.
That surprised me.
“Don’t let Dad know where she is.”
I looked at Grandma.
She heard.
“Why?”
“Because he’s losing it.”
“What did you do, Chloe?”
“I didn’t know.”
“Know what?”
“What Crown Harbor was for.”
Samuel motioned for me to put the call on speaker.
Chloe continued.
“Dad asked me to create an LLC last year. He said Mom needed it for tax planning.”
“In Mom’s name?”
“Yes.”
“Did Mom know?”
“I thought she did.”
“Did you sign documents?”
“A few.”
“What documents?”
“I don’t remember.”
Grandma muttered, “Convenient disease in this family.”
Chloe heard.
“Grandma?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Grandma said nothing.
That silence hurt Chloe more than yelling would have.
She continued.
“Dad told me you were forgetting things. He said you accused Mom of stealing. He said Ivan was manipulating you.”
I closed my eyes.
Dad had built different stories for each person.
To Grandma, I was apparently irrelevant until today.
To Chloe, I was manipulating an elderly woman.
To the nursing home, Grandma was confused.
To the court, she was incapable.
Every lie created isolation.
Classic.
Samuel asked, “Chloe, did you receive money from Crown Harbor?”
“No.”
“Check.”
“What?”
“Your bank accounts.”
“I know my bank accounts.”
“Check anyway.”
We heard typing.
Then silence.
“Oh my God.”
“How much?”
“Two hundred thousand.”
Grandma’s face hardened.
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
The same day our parents abandoned Grandma.
“What does the transfer say?”
“Wedding gift.”
Chloe was engaged to be married in four months.
Dad had just transferred her $200,000 through an entity involved in a fraudulent corporate sale.
“I didn’t know,” she whispered.
I believed her.
Mostly.
Then Grandma asked:
“Chloe, what did your father ask you to sign yesterday?”
Silence.
“Nothing.”
“Think.”
Another pause.
“A witness statement.”
Samuel leaned forward.
“About what?”
“Grandma’s memory.”
The room went cold.
Chloe began talking faster.
“Dad said the court might need family statements so Grandma could get help. He asked me to confirm she had been confused.”
“Were you truthful?”
“I…”
Grandma’s face changed.
Not anger.
Pain.
“Were you?”
Chloe started crying harder.
“I exaggerated.”
Grandma looked away.
“What did you say?”
“That you forgot my engagement dinner.”
“I was hospitalized with pneumonia.”
“I know.”
“Now.”
“Yes.”
Grandma’s voice trembled for the first time.
“What else?”
“That you repeated stories.”
“I am seventy-nine. Repeating stories is not dementia.”
“I know.”
“Now.”
Chloe whispered:
“I’m sorry.”
Then she said something else.
“Dad had another statement.”
“Whose?”
“Mom’s.”
“What did it say?”
“That Grandma wandered outside at night and police brought her home.”
Grandma stared at us.
“That never happened.”
Samuel said, “Chloe, do you have a copy?”
“Yes.”
“Send it.”
It arrived thirty seconds later.
The statement was notarized.
Signed Wendy Sterling.
Grandma studied the signature.
“That isn’t Wendy’s.”
I looked at her.
“You’re sure?”
“I watched that woman sign Christmas cards for thirty-four years.”
Mom’s statement was forged too.
Dad wasn’t merely stealing from Grandma.
He was manufacturing evidence in his own wife’s name.
Then Chloe whispered:
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Dad has been seeing someone.”
Nobody spoke.
Grandma closed her eyes.
“How long?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who?”
“I only saw her once.”
Chloe sent a photograph.
Taken from across a restaurant.
Dad sat beside a woman maybe forty-five.
Dark hair.
Elegant.
He was holding her hand.
Samuel zoomed in.
Then looked at Grandma.
“Do you know her?”
Grandma did.
Her face became white.
“That’s Dr. Rebecca Rowan.”
The surname hit me immediately.
Rowan.
The fake dementia prescription had been written by Dr. Michael Rowan.
May you like
Grandma stared at the photograph.
“Rebecca is his wife.”
