Chapter 6: Everything Sylvia Kept Waiting to Say
Sylvia Marsh's office was on the fourth floor of a building that smelled like old paper and central heating, and she was already standing when Claire walked in at eight o'clock with a folder under one arm and dark circles she hadn't tried to cover.
"Sit down," Sylvia said.
Claire sat.
Sylvia set a manila envelope on the desk between them.
She didn't open it immediately.
"Before I show you this," Sylvia said, "I need you to understand why I didn't bring it to you sooner.
I made a judgment call.
I believed I was protecting you while you were still in the acute grief period.
I may have been wrong."
"Show me," Claire said.
Sylvia opened the envelope and laid out three documents.
The first was a letter.
Daniel's handwriting.
Claire recognized it before she read a single word — the particular slant of his lowercase letters, the way he pressed harder on the pen at the end of a sentence.
She read it.
Then she read it again.
"He knew," she said.
"Yes."
"He knew what Kevin was doing."
"He discovered it approximately four months before he died," Sylvia said.
"He came to me privately.
He didn't want you involved until he had a clearer picture of the full extent."
Claire set the letter down carefully.
"What's the second document?"
"A revised trust deed.
Daniel drafted it with me.
It removes Kevin and Richard from any possible claim on the operating account, tightens the beneficiary structure, and adds a specific clause naming you as sole trustee with no co-access provision under any circumstances." Sylvia paused.
"He signed it.
I witnessed it.
It was filed with the court eleven days before he died."
Claire looked at the filing stamp on the second document.
The date.
Eleven days.
"Kevin's document," she said.
"The one he showed me yesterday."
"Cannot exist," Sylvia said.
"Any document purporting to grant Kevin co-access would postdate this filing and directly contradict a court-registered deed.
It would be legally void even if the signature were genuine." She paused again.
"Which it isn't."
"How do you know?"
"Because Daniel told me Kevin had already tried once before.
Eighteen months prior to his death, Kevin approached Daniel with a draft amendment to the trust — one that would add Kevin as co-trustee.
Daniel refused to sign it." Sylvia looked at her steadily.
"Kevin has the draft.
He has Daniel's name on it from the original proposal stage, before Daniel refused.
It is possible he has used that to construct something that looks, at a glance, like a signed final document."
Claire was quiet for a moment.
"He showed it to me on a phone screen," she said.
"From a distance."
"Yes," Sylvia said.
"I imagine he did."
"And the third document?"
Sylvia's hand rested on the third document without lifting it.
"Daniel wrote a second letter.
This one is personal.
It's addressed to you." She slid it across the desk.
"He asked me to give it to you when you were ready.
I've been trying to decide when that was for almost two years."
Claire looked at the envelope.
Her name in Daniel's handwriting.
She didn't open it.
Not here.
"He also told me something else," Sylvia said quietly.
"About the weeks before he died.
He had begun to notice irregularities — not just in the financial records, but in other things.
His calendar.
His medications.
He mentioned it once and then he didn't mention it again, and then he was gone."
The room was very still.
"His medications," Claire said.
"He had been prescribed a new blood pressure medication six weeks before his death.
He told me the prescription had come through Kevin.
Kevin had recommended the doctor."
Claire set her hands flat on the desk.
"I'm not making an accusation," Sylvia said carefully.
"I am telling you what Daniel told me.
I am telling you because Kevin said what he said to you yesterday, and because you have a right to every piece of information I have."
"I want the name of the doctor," Claire said.
"I have it."
"And I want to know if that prescription was ever verified by Daniel's regular physician."
Sylvia opened a second folder.
"I had the same question.
I made some inquiries last year, quietly.
Daniel's regular physician, Dr.
Okafor, has no record of the new prescription in Daniel's file.
It was not issued through his practice and he was not consulted."
Claire looked at the window.
The city outside was going about its morning.
"I'm going to need a referral," she said.
"To someone who handles fraud.
And possibly something more serious than fraud."
"I already have a name," Sylvia said.
"I've had it for eight months.
I was waiting for you to be ready."
Claire picked up Daniel's letter.
May you like
She put it in her bag without opening it.
"I'm ready," she said.
