Part 6 – She Was Never After the Money
For several long seconds, I couldn't speak.
The house seemed unnaturally quiet.
Even the clock in the hallway had stopped ticking.
I looked at the man standing on my porch.
"You'd better come inside."
Thomas Greene nodded.
The two men accompanying him followed silently, carrying slim black cases instead of briefcases.
They weren't salesmen.
They were investigators.
Once everyone was seated in the dining room, Thomas placed a thick folder on the table.
"My firm represents Hawthorne Title & Escrow."
I frowned.
"The company handling my property records?"
"That's correct."
He slid a document toward me.
"Three weeks ago, we received an application requesting an emergency ownership transfer."
I looked at the first page.
There it was.
My address.
My name.
And a request to add Clara as the sole owner of the property.
My eyes slowly moved to the signature.
It looked almost identical to mine.
Almost.
"That's not my signature."
Thomas nodded.
"We know."
"It's a forgery."
Across the table, Clara's breathing became noticeably faster.
Thomas continued.
"Normally, the application would have gone through the standard verification process."
"But something caught our attention."
"What?"
"The notary stamp."
He pointed to the seal.
"The notary whose name appears here passed away eleven months ago."
Silence.
Complete silence.
One of the other investigators opened his case.
He removed several enlarged photographs.
"Mr. Brooks."
"We also compared your signature with employment records, tax filings, and your passport."
He laid them side by side.
"The differences are subtle."
"But they're there."
He looked directly at me.
"Someone spent considerable time practicing your handwriting."
I slowly turned toward Clara.
She was staring at the floor.
Her hands trembled in her lap.
"Did you do this?"
She didn't answer.
"Clara."
Nothing.
"Look at me."
Slowly...
She raised her eyes.
Tears rolled down her cheeks.
"I was desperate."
My mother gasped softly.
"You forged his name?"
"I never meant to hurt anyone."
I almost laughed.
"Hurt anyone?"
"You tried to steal our home."
"I wasn't stealing it!"
Her voice suddenly rose.
"I was protecting myself!"
"From what?"
"You were never here!"
She stood abruptly.
"I spent eight months alone!"
"I didn't know if you'd ever come back."
"I sacrificed everything too."
I stared at her.
"What exactly did you sacrifice?"
"My career."
"You worked for six months after we got married."
"I gave up my future."
"You chose to quit."
"Because you wanted a wife at home."
"I never asked you to."
The room fell silent again.
She knew it.
I knew it.
Everyone in the room knew it.
Thomas cleared his throat gently.
"I'm afraid there's more."
He opened another folder.
"The forged transfer wasn't the only document."
"What else?"
He handed me a photocopy.
A power of attorney.
Supposedly signed by me.
Granting Clara complete authority over my finances while I was overseas.
Again...
A forged signature.
"I never signed this."
"We know."
"It was rejected."
"Why?"
Thomas gave a faint smile.
"Because your bank contacted you for confirmation."
I remembered the email.
Six months ago.
I'd dismissed it as routine fraud and clicked "No."
At the time, I thought someone random had targeted my account.
I had no idea...
The request had come from inside my own home.
My phone buzzed.
It was the bank's fraud department.
Almost as if they knew.
I answered.
"This is Daniel."
"Mr. Brooks, we're glad we've reached you."
"We've frozen several suspicious transactions."
"What transactions?"
"The ones attempted this morning."
I looked directly at Clara.
"What transactions?"
The woman on the phone replied,
"Someone attempted to access your investment portfolio using incorrect verification credentials."
My blood ran cold.
"This morning?"
"Yes."
"Approximately one hour ago."
One hour ago.
While I was helping my mother stand from the kitchen floor...
Someone had been trying to empty my accounts.
I slowly lowered the phone.
"Clara..."
She burst into tears.
"I panicked."
"You tried again."
"I thought if I lost everything—"
"You thought what?"
She covered her face.
"I thought you'd leave me."
I couldn't believe what I was hearing.
"So your solution..."
"...was to steal everything before I could?"
Before she could answer, Thomas received a message on his tablet.
His expression changed immediately.
"What is it?" I asked.
He looked up.
"Our legal team just completed a background search on Blue Horizon Consulting."
"The investment company?"
He nodded once.
"It doesn't exist."
The room became deathly still.
"It was dissolved four years ago."
"So where did the money go?"
Thomas took a slow breath.
"It wasn't sent to an investment company."
He turned the tablet toward me.
The beneficiary account belonged to a private individual.
I read the name.
My heart stopped.
Melissa Carter.
Not Clara's cousin by marriage.
Her biological sister.
The investment had never existed.
The financial advisor had never existed.
It had all been a lie.
Every dollar had been transferred directly to her own family.
I looked at Clara one last time.
She didn't deny it.
She couldn't.
Her silence was the confession.
But before anyone could speak, another knock sounded at the front door.
This time it wasn't a neighbor.
Or an investigator.
It was two uniformed police officers.
The older officer removed his hat respectfully.
"Mr. Brooks?"
"Yes."
"We've received a report concerning suspected financial fraud and forgery involving this property."
He glanced past me...
Directly at Clara.
"Mrs. Brooks..."
"We're going to need you to come with us."
Clara's knees gave way beneath her.
For the first time since I had walked through that open front door...
May you like
She realized the life she'd built on lies wasn't just falling apart.
It was about to become a criminal case.
