Chapter 4: The Person Who Sent Her
Ethan's attorney picked up on the second ring.
"Richard.
I need you here tonight." A pause.
"Yes, tonight.
Bring the original will and anything related to the Hale estate amendment filed in the last three years." Another pause.
"I'll explain when you arrive."
He ended the call and stood in the foyer for a moment with the envelope in his hand.
Clara was seated on the bottom stair.
Noah had fallen asleep against her shoulder, his head tilted at the angle children manage when exhaustion simply takes them.
She stroked his hair slowly and didn't look up.
"You should have told me," Ethan said.
"I tried." Her voice was steady.
"The week after the funeral.
You were handling the estate.
You had people around you constantly.
I asked to speak with you privately and your assistant told me you weren't available for household staff."
The words landed without drama.
That made them worse.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"You didn't know." She shifted Noah slightly.
"Your father trusted me with it because he said the people closest to you might not want you to see it.
He didn't tell me why.
I think he was trying to protect you from knowing that."
"What does it say?
The part you know."
Clara looked up.
"He told me it corrected something in the original will.
Something that had been changed without his knowledge." She paused.
"He said someone had altered a document after he signed it.
He found out three weeks before he died."
Ethan sat down on the stair beside her.
"Who?" he said.
"He didn't tell me a name.
He said the less I knew, the safer I'd be." Her jaw tightened.
"I didn't understand what that meant until Madison arrived."
"She came with a letter of introduction from the foundation.
References.
Everything checked."
"I know.
I was the one who let her in." Clara's voice didn't waver, but her hands stilled in Noah's hair.
"The first week she was here, she asked me which room you used as a study.
I told her.
The second week, she asked about the locked room upstairs.
I told her I didn't know what was in it.
She didn't believe me."
"Is that when it started?"
Clara didn't answer immediately.
"The first time she hjt me," she said, "she told me it was a warning.
She said if I told you, she would say I had stolen from the household accounts.
She had already moved money to make it look that way."
Ethan stood up.
He walked to the sitting room doorway and looked in.
Madison was seated with her back straight and her hands folded in her lap, composed in the way people are when they are running through options.
"Who sent you?" he said.
She looked at him calmly.
"I came through the foundation.
You know that."
"The foundation is a vehicle.
Someone directed you here.
Someone who knew about the codicil and needed it destroyed before I found it." He leaned against the doorframe.
"That person knew my father's estate well enough to alter a signed document.
That narrows the list considerably."
Madison said nothing.
"Was it Victor?" Ethan asked.
A single flicker.
Gone in under a second.
But he had seen it.
Victor Hale.
His father's younger brother.
The man who had managed the estate accounts for eleven years and had stood at the funeral with his hand on Ethan's shoulder and said, *Whatever you need, I'm here.*
Ethan straightened.
"Richard will be here in an hour," he said.
"You can speak to me now or you can speak to the police later.
I'd recommend the first option.
It will go better for you."
Madison looked at the window.
"I want a lawyer," she said.
"That's your right." Ethan turned to leave.
"Ethan."
He stopped.
"Victor told me the document was forged," Madison said.
"He told me your father had been manipulated into signing it by a household employee who wanted money.
He said he was protecting the estate." She paused.
"He said you would thank him."
Ethan looked at her for a long moment.
"And the four times you hjt Clara?"
Madison's composure held.
But her eyes moved to the floor.
"He said she wouldn't talk," she said quietly.
"He said she never had before."
Ethan walked back to the foyer without another word.
Clara was still on the stairs.
Noah slept on.
"It's Victor," Ethan said.
Clara closed her eyes briefly.
When she opened them, they were dry.
May you like
"Your father was afraid of that," she said.
"That's why he came to me."
