Chapter 14 - The Settlement from Twenty Years Ago
Edwin agreed to meet at Veronica's office with his own lawyer present.
He arrived looking older than the man who had toasted my wedding.
He did not apologize.
He did not ask after Mauro.
He placed a folder on the table and said, "I want this finished before I die."
The folder contained a settlement agreement between the old partnership, Edwin, and Victor Kessler.
It showed a payment in exchange for releasing claims and surrendering certain business interests.
Nothing about the payment itself was unusual.
What mattered was the accompanying correspondence.
My grandfather's letters said he was willing to pay to protect customers from a costly fight, not because Edwin's accusations were valid.
Edwin insisted the payment proved otherwise.
Veronica asked why he had kept the letters hidden.
"Patricia wanted revenge," he said.
"She wouldn't listen to anything that contradicted her."
"And you?" I asked.
He looked at me.
"I liked having someone else to blame."
It was the first honest thing I had ever heard him say.
Edwin admitted that he and Patricia had discussed Mauro meeting me before the fundraiser.
He claimed the original plan was to rebuild a business connection, not arrange a marriage.
He also admitted Patricia later pushed Mauro to seek access to the trust and company.
"Did Mauro know?"
"He knew some of it. Not all."
I felt an exhausted anger rise in me.
Everyone had known some part of the truth.
Everyone had used ignorance as an excuse to keep the rest buried.
Edwin then described the brass key.
He said Patricia had believed it opened a safe containing a document that could overturn my grandfather's will.
"She made Mauro search for it," he said.
"Did he find it?"
"I don't know."
Veronica showed him a photograph of the empty velvet pouch.
His expression changed.
"Then she's still looking."
"Looking for what?" I asked.
"A letter your grandfather wrote to my wife before he died."
I stiffened.
"What letter?"
"I never read it," Edwin admitted.
"But Patricia believed it contained an admission."
After Edwin left, Arthur Bellamy called with a breakthrough.
The private records facility had located its access history.
Someone had presented the brass key three days before Mauro left for Colorado.
The attempted visitor did not pass identity verification.
But the facility had preserved a security photograph.
Veronica opened the image on her computer.
The visitor was not Mauro.
It was Jamie.
And she was standing beside a woman I had never seen before, holding an identification card bearing my name.
The woman in the photograph had dark hair and the same approximate height as mine.
From a distance, she might have passed for me.
At the counter, however, the facility clerk had questioned the identification and declined access.
The records director followed the facility's established procedures and documented the encounter.
We gave the relevant evidence to investigators and the lawyers handling the disputes.
The discovery that someone had attempted to impersonate me made the earlier forged signatures feel even more alarming.
It also raised a practical question.
How many other places had this woman visited using my name?
Daniel reviewed the records lawfully available to the company.
He found an unusual vendor application submitted under my identity.
It had been rejected.
A separate request to alter a corporate account's contact information had also been flagged.
The attempts were connected by a phone number used by a temporary staffing agency.
We passed the information to the appropriate authorities.
I did not contact the woman myself.
I wanted her located safely and questioned properly, not frightened into disappearing.
At a conference with counsel, Jamie denied knowing the woman.
When shown the security photograph, she said she had merely driven a friend downtown.
"Then why was your friend using Rebecca's name?" Veronica asked.
Jamie stared at the table.
"You'd have to ask her."
Her lawyer ended the interview.
That afternoon, Mauro called through his attorney and requested a conversation about his disclosure.
I agreed to a supervised meeting.
He looked thinner than he had in court.
"My mother told Jamie the key could fix everything," he said.
"Fix what?"
"The trust problem."
"There is no trust problem. There is a family that keeps trying to take what isn't theirs."
He flinched.
"Adrian convinced her there was a document she could use to pressure you."
"Why didn't you stop them?"
"Because I owed Adrian money."
He told us the debts were far larger than he had admitted.
Some had been rolled into consulting agreements.
Others involved guarantees he had signed without understanding the terms.
"I thought if Blackridge bought your company, I'd be able to pay everyone," he said.
"By costing hundreds of people their jobs?"
His silence answered me.
Before leaving, he asked whether I still wore my wedding ring.
"No," I said.
He nodded as though he deserved the pain.
Then he added, "You should know something about Jamie."
"What?"
"She's not working for Mom anymore."
"Who is she working for?"
"Adrian."
That night, a message arrived from an unknown number.
It contained only a photograph of my grandfather's sealed letter.
May you like
Under it were the words: Come alone if you want the original.
