Chapter 3 - The Lawyer Who Feared My FatherEvelyn led me through two locked doors into a private conference room.
She checked the blinds, disconnected the room's telephone, and placed my father's photograph on the table.
“Before we discuss anything else, I need to know exactly what happened last night.”
I told her about the cemetery, Silas, the metal box, and the gunshot. When I showed her the recording device, she sat down slowly.
“Camden spent the last six months of his life preparing for this.”
“You keep saying that. What was he preparing for?”
“An investigation into financial fraud at his company. He discovered that millions of dollars were being diverted through shell corporations. The transfers appeared to have been authorized by him, but the signatures weren't genuine.”
“That sounds like what sent me to prison.”
“It was.”
She opened a cabinet and removed a thick folder. Inside were printed bank statements, company memoranda, and photographs of documents bearing my father's signature.
“Your prosecution was unusually convenient,” she said. “The entire case rested on digital transaction records, testimony from the company's chief financial officer, and evidence supposedly recovered from your apartment.”
“None of it was real.”
“I know.”
The simple certainty in her voice unsettled me.
“Then why didn't you help me?”
Her expression hardened.
“I tried. I wasn't your defense attorney, and every time I requested the original financial records, someone intervened. The prosecution claimed they had been contaminated. Your appointed attorney advised you to plead guilty.”
“I refused.”
“I know that, too.”
She pulled out a newspaper clipping from the day of my sentencing.
Beneath the headline, a photograph showed me being led from the courthouse in handcuffs.
Behind the crowd stood Reagan and Carter.
My stepmother looked sorrowful, dabbing her eyes with a white handkerchief.
Carter was smiling.
Not broadly. Not enough for anyone to notice.
But now that I knew what I was looking at, I could see the satisfaction in his face.
Evelyn placed another document before me.
“Your father established something called the Meridian Trust. It holds controlling shares in Dennis Enterprises, along with several properties and investment accounts. If Camden's original will remains valid, those assets were supposed to transfer to you when you turned twenty-one.”
I frowned.
“I'm twenty-two.”
“Exactly.”
“Then why does Reagan own everything?”
“Because the will currently filed with the county names her as the sole beneficiary. Your father supposedly signed it eleven days before his death.”
“Supposedly?”
Evelyn tapped the signature.
“Camden's handwriting was consistent for forty years. This signature was traced. I had it examined privately, but I couldn't challenge the will without the original.”
“Where is it?”
“Your father never told me. He said you would find it when the time was right.”
I hated that answer. It sounded like something from a puzzle designed to torment the person who solved it.
“What's my mother's last gift?” I asked.
Evelyn went completely still.
“Your mother left Camden a music box. There was something hidden inside it, although I never learned what. Reagan searched for it after your father's death.”
“I saw that music box every Christmas when I was a kid. It disappeared after Mom died.”
“Then we have a problem. Reagan has controlled the house for a year. If the box was there, she may already have found it.”
A knock sounded at the office door.
Three sharp raps.
Evelyn hurried to the monitor beside her desk.
A man in a charcoal suit stood in the lobby holding a leather briefcase.
I recognized him immediately.
Richard Vale, Dennis Enterprises' former chief financial officer.
The man whose testimony had helped convict me.
He looked directly into the security camera and raised a finger to his lips.
Then he held up a photograph.
It showed my father sitting alive in a hospital bed.
The date printed in the corner was four days after his supposed funeral.
Evelyn stepped away from the monitor.
“No,” she whispered.
Vale took a folded note from his briefcase and pressed it against the glass door.
Evelyn read it through the camera.
Her face turned ashen.
“What does it say?” I demanded.
May you like
She slowly turned toward me.
“Your father didn't die when Reagan said he did.”
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