Chapter 10 - The Contract I Signed Without Reading
The document that could destroy Adeline's life had been waiting in her personnel file for three years.
She remembered signing it.
A stack of onboarding paperwork.
Tax forms.
Emergency contact information.
Confidentiality agreements.
And one extra page Marlene had told her was a standard employee authorization.
Adeline had barely glanced at it.
She'd been twenty-five.
Desperate for work.
And terrified of losing the only job offer she'd received since her father's conviction.
Now that signature appeared beneath a document authorizing financial access and responsibility for records she'd never been allowed to see.
"This is fraud," she whispered.
Gio examined the paper.
"Most likely. But we need to establish how it was altered."
Emmett turned toward him.
"Can the original be recovered?"
"We're checking."
Adeline stared at the signature.
Her hand had formed every letter.
Even the small loop in the D.
Sterling hadn't forged her name this time.
He'd made her sign something he could later weaponize.
"I was so stupid," she whispered.
Emmett looked at her.
"No."
"I signed it without reading."
"You trusted an employer who deliberately deceived you."
She looked down.
"That doesn't change what's written here."
"No," Emmett admitted. "But the surrounding evidence matters."
His phone rang.
Gio answered.
A moment later, his expression changed.
"Interesting."
Emmett frowned.
"What?"
"The original onboarding documents were scanned and stored automatically."
Adeline looked up.
"Does that help?"
"Potentially."
Gio opened the archive.
The original authorization appeared on the screen.
It contained only general administrative permissions.
Nothing about pension accounts.
Nothing about financial responsibility.
The version Sterling had submitted included three additional paragraphs.
The font was nearly identical.
But the page margins were different.
Gio leaned closer.
"The document was altered after Adeline signed."
For the first time that morning, she breathed.
But the relief didn't last.
A new message appeared on Emmett's phone.
An anonymous photograph.
It showed Ruthanne sitting beside a window at the nursing home.
The photograph had been taken less than an hour earlier.
Beneath it was a message.
Withdraw the allegations, or the old woman loses her room tonight.
Adeline went cold.
"They're threatening Grandma again."
Emmett's face hardened.
He immediately contacted the nursing home, legal counsel, and the investigators already handling the intimidation complaints.
Then he looked at Adeline.
"We're going to make sure she's safe."
She shook her head.
"You can't promise that."
He stopped.
"You're right."
His voice softened.
"But I can promise I won't ignore the threat."
That evening, Ruthanne was moved temporarily to another licensed care facility with her consent and the appropriate arrangements.
Adeline stayed beside her until she fell asleep.
At 10:17 p.m., her phone vibrated.
A message from an unknown number.
Your father was alive when Sterling told you he'd died.
Adeline stared at the screen.
A second message arrived.
The prison infirmary report was falsified.
And attached was a photograph taken on the night Samuel Caruso supposedly died.
He was standing.
May you like
Fully dressed.
Beside a black sedan.
