Chapter 2 - THE SECRET INSIDE THE TRUST
By midnight, the Howard mansion had become a crime scene.
Officers moved quietly through the rooms.
Computers were sealed.
Documents were photographed.
Phones were placed inside evidence bags.
The family members who had spent years treating the mansion like their private kingdom now sat in the library under police supervision.
Vanessa was separated from everyone.
Daniel was questioned separately.
And Elena sat in the upstairs sitting room with Detective Ruiz.
For the first time that evening, she allowed herself to feel afraid.
Not for herself.
For her unborn child.
“What does ‘the baby was never part of the plan’ mean?” she asked.
Ruiz placed a folder on the table.
“We don't know yet.”
Elena frowned.
“You have the recordings.”
“We have evidence of financial fraud, conspiracy, falsified documents, and attempted assault.”
He paused.
“But there's something missing.”
“What?”
“The reason.”
Ruiz opened another file.
“This trust was created by your husband's grandfather twenty-six years ago.”
Elena nodded.
“I know.”
“It contains a succession clause.”
She looked at him.
“What kind?”
“If Daniel dies without a recognized biological heir, control passes to his sister.”
Elena frowned.
“Daniel doesn't have a sister.”
Ruiz looked at her.
“Exactly.”
Elena's face went blank.
“Then who is listed?”
Ruiz slid the document toward her.
A woman's name appeared.
Victoria Howard.
Elena had never heard it.
“Who is she?”
“We're trying to find out.”
Elena read the document again.
Then she noticed something.
The date.
Victoria had been named in the trust before Daniel was born.
“That makes no sense.”
Ruiz nodded.
“That's what caught our attention.”
He opened another page.
“Your husband's grandfather apparently had another child.”
Elena stared at him.
“An illegitimate daughter?”
“That's the theory.”
“Where is she?”
Ruiz shook his head.
“Officially? Dead.”
Elena looked up.
“Officially?”
“She supposedly died as an infant.”
The detective paused.
“But the financial records suggest someone has been receiving payments from a private account connected to the trust for seventeen years.”
Elena's heart began pounding.
“Who?”
“We don't know.”
A knock sounded at the door.
An officer entered.
“Detective, we've got something.”
He handed Ruiz a photograph.
Ruiz looked at it.
Then his expression changed.
“What?”
He turned the photograph toward Elena.
It showed a woman standing outside a courthouse.
She looked to be in her late forties.
Dark hair.
Gray coat.
Sharp eyes.
Elena recognized her.
She had seen that woman before.
At the grocery store.
At the hospital.
Outside her office.
Always at a distance.
Always watching.
“Who is she?” Elena whispered.
Ruiz answered.
“Victoria Howard.”
Elena's breath caught.
“But she's supposed to be dead.”
“Apparently,” Ruiz said, “someone has been pretending she was.”
The officer handed him another photograph.
This one showed Victoria entering the Howard mansion three weeks earlier.
Elena stared at it.
“She was inside this house?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Ruiz looked toward the hallway.
“That's what we're going to find out.”
Then Elena remembered something.
A conversation she had overheard months earlier.
Daniel had been arguing with Vanessa.
He had said:
“If she comes back, we're finished.”
At the time, Elena thought they were talking about a business partner.
Now she realized they had been talking about someone who had supposedly been dead for decades.
Suddenly, the lights in the mansion flickered.
Everyone looked up.
The power went out.
For three seconds, the house was completely dark.
Then the emergency lights came on.
An officer shouted from downstairs.
“Detective!”
Ruiz ran toward the staircase.
Elena followed despite his warning.
In the foyer, a window had been broken.
The evidence room door was open.
Someone had entered the house.
Someone had been searching for something.
And on the floor, directly beneath the broken window, was a handwritten note.
Ruiz picked it up.
It contained only one sentence.
STOP LOOKING FOR VICTORIA.
Elena stared at the words.
Then her phone vibrated.
A message had arrived from an unknown number.
One photograph appeared.
It showed her unborn child's nursery.
The crib.
The rocking chair.
The little wooden nameplate she had chosen.
And beneath the photograph were seven words:
SHE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE YOUR LAST WARNING.
Elena's hands began to shake.
May you like
Someone had been inside the nursery.
And whoever it was knew exactly what frightened her most.
