Chapter 6: The Woman on the Camera
The bank manager, Helen Doyle, compared the signature card with my driver’s license.
“They are close,” she said, “but the camera will tell us who came in.”
“Raymond will try to stop you,” Grace warned.
Helen closed the office door.
“Elias helped my husband keep our home thirty years ago.
Raymond can send me a letter.”
She pulled up the archived video.
A woman wearing my coat and carrying a copy of my identification approached the locker desk.
When she turned toward the camera, Chloe gripped my arm.
“Mother.”
I called her before Father could prepare her.
“You wore my coat to the bank.”
Mother said nothing.
“You used my identification and signed my name.”
“Your father said it was necessary.”
“What did you remove?”
“An envelope.”
“What was inside?”
“I didn’t look.”
Chloe leaned toward the phone.
“You always look.”
Mother’s breath caught.
“Chloe?”
“Yes.
I’m with Genevieve.”
“You ungrateful child.
After everything we gave you—”
“You gave me Grandfather’s jewelry before he was even laid to rest.”
“Your father will take your house.”
“Then he can take it.”
Grace placed Grandfather’s memory card on the desk.
“Ask where the envelope went.”
“Raymond took it,” Mother said quickly.
“I gave it to him in the parking lot.”
The office door opened.
Raymond walked in with Father behind him.
“This meeting is over,” Raymond said.
Helen rose.
“Not in my bank.”
Father pointed at Chloe.
“Come outside.”
“No.”
“I pay your mortgage.”
“I called the lender this morning.
Your payments came from Grandfather’s trust account.”
His face tightened.
I held up the access record.
“You bought Chloe’s obedience with his money.”
“I supported my daughter.”
“You charged every payment to a man she refused to visit.”
Raymond placed a document before Helen.
“This is a preservation notice.
Delete nothing, release nothing.”
“Then why does it also demand that I surrender the original video to you?” Helen asked.
“It is evidence.”
“So is your client standing behind you.”
Raymond turned to me.
“Give this up.
Your employer will receive an allegation that you misused restricted databases.”
“Is that your second threat or your third?”
“It is a forecast.”
Grace smiled.
“Good.
We recorded it.”
Raymond reached for her phone.
Helen stepped between them.
“Leave my office.”
Father looked at Chloe.
“If you stay with her, you lose everything.”
Chloe removed a velvet pouch from her handbag.
Grandfather’s watch and rings spilled onto the desk.
“I never owned any of this,” she said.
“Neither did you.”
Father’s jaw moved, but no words came.
That evening, Chloe asked our parents to meet us at the old house.
She placed her phone face down beneath a folded scarf.
Father entered first.
“Where are the drives?”
“With the court,” I said.
“Then why are we here?”
“To discuss the envelope Mother took from the bank.”
Mother sat beside him.
“I told you, I never opened it.”
Father glared at her.
“Stop talking.”
Chloe folded her arms.
“Did Raymond create the false will?”
“No.”
“Did you pay him with Grandfather’s check?”
“That money covered legitimate work.”
“What work?”
“Protecting this family from Genevieve.”
I leaned across the table.
“You began moving money three years before he became ill.”
“He was wasting it.”
“On what?”
“Caregivers.
Charities.
People who weren’t family.”
“He spent it on people who showed up.”
Father struck the table with his palm.
“I was his son.
It belonged to me.”
Chloe’s hidden phone vibrated beneath the scarf.
Father heard it.
He tore the scarf away, saw the recording screen, and threw the phone against the wall.
The screen cracked, but the recording continued.
Then Raymond rushed through the front door.
“The house was transferred to Vance Holdings this morning,” he said.
May you like
“Movers arrive at eight.
By tomorrow night, every document left here will be gone.”
