Chapter 22 - The Ghost Signature
The front door closed, shutting out the dust kicked up by Richard’s departing town car. Inside the farmhouse, the silence was suffocating.
Clara immediately cleared the dining room table, sweeping aside our architectural blueprints and spreading out the legal photocopies Richard had left behind. Arthur sat in the corner armchair, his head buried in his rough, calloused hands, his breathing shallow and ragged. Kendra paced the length of the kitchen floor like a caged animal, chewing on her fingernails until they bled.
"Look at this date," Clara commanded, pointing her pen at the first disbursement sheet. "August 14th, 2012. Julian, where were you on August 14th, 2012?"
"I was at football camp," I said automatically, leaning over the table. "I broke my collarbone that week."
"Then who was in the office of the notary public in Providence, Rhode Island?" Clara muttered. "Look at the notary stamp. It’s registered to an Evelyn Cross. Arthur, do you know that name?"
Arthur didn't raise his head, but his shoulders gave an involuntary twitch. "Evelyn Cross was Eleanor’s sister."
"Aunt Evelyn?" Kendra paused mid-stride, staring wide-eyed. "Aunt Evelyn died ten years ago! Mom said she died penniless in a hospice care facility!"
"Evelyn wasn't penniless," Arthur said, his voice muffled by his hands before he finally looked up, his eyes rimmed with bloodshot misery. "Eleanor and Evelyn were identical twins. They used each other's IDs since they were teenagers. When Evelyn got sick with pancreatic cancer, Eleanor moved into her apartment. She took Evelyn's driver’s license. She took her notary commission. When Evelyn slipped into a coma, Eleanor was the one who signed the hospital papers, the death certificate... and every probate document that came through that house."
A cold sweat broke out across my ribs. "She impersonated her dead twin sister to notarize forged documents in my name?"
"She would do anything," Arthur whispered. "Anything to feel like she was the patrician lady she always believed she was born to be. When Richard's father cut me out of the family business for marrying her, Eleanor swore she would make the Sterlings bleed for every penny they denied her. She didn't care about the money. She cared about the victory."
"And she used Julian as the target dummy," Clara said coldly. She looked up at Kendra. "Kendra. Stop pacing and come here."
Kendra swallowed hard, her haughty defense mechanism completely gone, replaced by the terror of a child who had realized the monster under the bed was real. "What?"
"You lived with her for the last four years," Clara said, her tone clinical, brooking no evasion. "You opened her mail when she was out of town. You helped her move her boxes when she got evicted from the townhouse. Where did she keep the green metal filing cabinet?"
Kendra blanched. "She... she told me never to touch that cabinet. She said it contained her medical records and my deceased grandmother's jewelry."
"Where is it now?" I asked, gripping the back of Clara’s chair.
"It’s not in the motel," Kendra said, her voice shaking violently. "She didn't take it to the motel with her. When the sheriff showed up to evict us, she paid a neighbor fifty dollars to haul two heavy crates and that green metal cabinet to a self-storage unit out on Route 9. Under a fake name."
May you like
I met Clara’s eyes. "We need to go. Right now."
***
