Chapter 3 - A Marriage Signed Before the Wedding
I didn't sleep that night.
Not because Sophie cried.
She actually slept better than she had in days.
Dr. Ortiz had helped me settle into the guest suite, shown me where the baby supplies were, and reminded me to eat something before trying to rest.
I did everything she suggested.
I fed Sophie.
Changed her diaper.
Held her until her tiny fists relaxed.
Then I sat beside the crib and watched her breathe.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Margaret reaching for her.
And every time I opened them, I remembered the note inside my mother's necklace.
Ask Margaret about the second child.
At 3:17 a.m., someone knocked softly.
“Emily?”
It was Rebecca.
“Come in.”
She entered carrying two mugs.
“Chamomile,” she said.
“I figured coffee would be a terrible idea.”
I almost smiled.
“Do lawyers ever sleep?”
“Only when their clients stop discovering eighteen-year-old conspiracies after midnight.”
She sat across from me.
I looked at her.
“Why did you really come?”
Rebecca hesitated.
“Your father asked me to make sure you were all right.”
“And?”
“And I thought you might want answers without having to look at him while you ask.”
I studied her.
“You knew my mother?”
Rebecca nodded.
“My father was an attorney.”
“He represented Sophia for several years.”
“She used to bring you to his office.”
I frowned.
“I don't remember you.”
“I was seventeen.”
She smiled faintly.
“You once spilled orange juice on a legal brief and told my father the papers looked better that way.”
For the first time that day, I laughed.
It came out as something between a sob and a breath.
“Mom was furious.”
“She pretended to be.”
Rebecca's smile faded.
“She talked about you constantly.”
I looked toward the crib.
“Was she scared before she died?”
Rebecca took a moment.
“Yes.”
I swallowed.
“Did she know someone was going to hurt her?”
“I don't know.”
“But?”
“People don't usually hide messages inside jewelry unless they're worried that someone will search their belongings.”
I looked down at the pendant resting in my palm.
“What happened to Margaret's other child?”
Rebecca shook her head.
“We're still investigating.”
“Dad said the child was dead.”
“That's what he was told.”
“By Margaret?”
“Yes.”
I closed my fingers around the necklace.
“Then we shouldn't believe it.”
Rebecca nodded.
“No.”
I looked up.
“What about my marriage?”
She placed a folder on the coffee table.
“I was hoping you'd ask.”
Inside was a copy of my marriage certificate.
I recognized the information.
My full name.
Daniel's.
The county.
The courthouse seal.
But the date wasn't right.
“This says May fourteenth.”
Rebecca nodded.
“My wedding was May sixteenth.”
“Yes.”
I stared at the page.
“Could it be a clerical mistake?”
“Possibly.”
“But we've confirmed that the record was submitted electronically forty-eight hours before your ceremony.”
“By who?”
“The officiant listed on the certificate.”
I read the name.
Harold P. Voss.
My stomach dropped.
“That wasn't our minister.”
“Who officiated your wedding?”
“Pastor Daniel Mercer.”
Rebecca nodded.
“We spoke with him.”
I looked up.
“He says he never signed this.”
The room seemed to tilt.
“Then am I married?”
“Your legal marital status will need to be determined from the actual records and circumstances.”
She spoke carefully.
“The irregular certificate doesn't automatically answer that question.”
I stared at her.
“What does it mean?”
“It means someone may have filed a false official record.”
“Why?”
Rebecca opened a second document.
“Because the same day the certificate was filed, a separate company recorded a change to its ownership structure.”
She slid the page toward me.
At the top were the words:
BENNETT LEGACY HOLDINGS.
Below them appeared a new name.
EMILY BENNETT WHITMORE.
I felt a chill.
“What is this?”
“An amendment.”
“To what?”
“To the trust-related holding arrangement your mother created.”
I read the page slowly.
I understood almost nothing.
Then I saw Daniel's name.
Not as my husband.
As an authorized representative.
“Rebecca.”
“Yes?”
“Why would Daniel have authority over my mother's company?”
“That is one of the questions we're asking.”
I turned another page.
There were two signatures.
One supposedly mine.
One supposedly Daniel's.
I stared.
“My signature isn't even close.”
Rebecca leaned forward.
“What's different?”
“The E.”
She looked at me.
I pointed.
“I always start my signature with a large loop.”
“My mother taught me.”
“This E is straight.”
Rebecca studied it.
“That helps.”
“And the middle initial.”
I tapped the paper.
“My legal middle name is Sophia.”
“Bennett is my maiden surname.”
“The signature on this page uses B as though it's my middle initial.”
Rebecca looked up sharply.
“What?”
I showed her.
Emily B. Whitmore.
“I never sign that way.”
Rebecca immediately photographed the page.
“Your father mentioned the middle initial on the hotel document.”
“Yes.”
“But we hadn't realized the same error appeared here.”
I looked at her.
“Does that matter?”
“It might.”
She examined both documents.
Then her expression changed.
“Emily, both signatures appear to have been copied from the same model.”
“What model?”
“Possibly an old account opening form or an identification record.”
I remembered something.
A dinner at Margaret's house.
Two months before the wedding.
Margaret had asked me to fill out paperwork for a family membership at a private club.
I had laughed when she insisted on my full name.
She'd said the club was particular.
My heart started pounding.
“Rebecca.”
She looked up.
“I think I know where they got it.”
I told her about the dinner.
The cream-colored forms.
The fountain pen Margaret insisted I use.
The way Daniel had taken the forms away before dessert.
Rebecca made notes.
“Do you remember the club's name?”
“Briarwood.”
She stopped writing.
“What?”
“Briarwood Club.”
Her face went pale.
“Emily, are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca leaned back slowly.
“That's not a private dining club.”
“What is it?”
“It's an investment partnership that Charles Whitmore used to control.”
I stared at her.
“Why would Margaret ask me to join an investment partnership?”
Rebecca looked at the paperwork.
“Possibly because she needed a fresh signature and a believable reason to get it.”
My pulse hammered.
“And Daniel helped her.”
Rebecca didn't answer.
She didn't need to.
At 8:06 the next morning, Daniel called.
I stared at his name.
Rebecca was sitting beside me reviewing the paperwork.
“Do you want to answer?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“May I stay?”
I nodded.
I put the phone on speaker.
“Emily.”
His voice sounded exhausted.
I said nothing.
“Are you safe?”
I looked at Rebecca.
She raised an eyebrow.
“That's an interesting question coming from you,” I said.
Daniel exhaled.
“Look, yesterday got out of hand.”
“Your mother tried to throw Sophie and me out of the hotel.”
“I know.”
“You accused me of stealing money.”
“I was upset.”
“You offered me a check to disappear.”
“Emily, please.”
I waited.
His voice softened.
“I miss my daughter.”
My chest tightened.
“Then you should have thought about that before telling me to leave.”
“Can I see her?”
“Not today.”
“She's my child too.”
“Yes, Daniel.”
“And being her father comes with responsibilities.”
He was silent.
Then he said something that made my skin crawl.
“Your father is manipulating you.”
I looked down at the marriage certificate.
“Is he?”
“He's filling your head with nonsense about my mother.”
“What nonsense?”
“Old business disputes.”
“Forged documents.”
“Family secrets.”
I watched Rebecca write something in her notebook.
“Daniel.”
“What?”
“Who is Harold Voss?”
The silence was immediate.
For three seconds, I heard nothing.
Then a soft noise.
A chair moving.
“Where did you hear that name?”
“Answer me.”
“He's an attorney.”
“Was he at our wedding?”
“Emily—”
“Was he?”
“No.”
“Then why is he listed as the man who married us?”
Daniel didn't respond.
“Why was our marriage certificate filed two days early?”
“That's a clerical issue.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Then explain why a trust document was altered that same day.”
His breathing changed.
I could hear it.
“Who showed you that?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you don't understand what you're looking at.”
I looked toward Sophie.
She was awake now, waving her tiny arms beneath her blanket.
“Then help me understand.”
Daniel lowered his voice.
“Emily, I need you to listen carefully.”
I said nothing.
“Your father has been trying to ruin my mother for years.”
“And you marrying me was just a coincidence?”
“Don't twist this.”
“Did you love me?”
A long silence.
Then he whispered, “Of course I did.”
“Did?”
He didn't answer.
I felt something break.
“Why did you marry me, Daniel?”
“Emily—”
“Was it because you loved me?”
He breathed heavily.
“Or because your mother needed my signature?”
“Stop.”
“Was Sophie part of the plan?”
“Don't bring her into this.”
“You brought her into it when you called her unwanted.”
“That was Mom.”
“And you stood there.”
His voice suddenly turned hard.
“You think your father is some kind of hero?”
I froze.
“What does that mean?”
Daniel gave a bitter laugh.
“You haven't asked him the right question.”
“Then tell me what it is.”
“Ask him where he was the night your mother died.”
I looked at Rebecca.
Her face changed.
“Daniel, my father was in New York.”
“That's what he told you?”
“Yes.”
Daniel went silent.
Then he said, “Check the toll records.”
The call ended.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
Rebecca finally reached for her phone.
“I'm going to have someone pull the archived travel records.”
I looked down at the baby.
My daughter grabbed my finger.
Her grip was warm and impossibly small.
I had spent eighteen years believing that my father had been hundreds of miles away when my mother died.
Now I wasn't sure what to believe.
Then Rebecca's phone vibrated.
She read the message.
And the blood drained from her face.
“What?” I asked.
She looked at me.
“Your father wasn't in New York that night.”
I stopped breathing.
“Where was he?”
May you like
Rebecca swallowed.
“Forty minutes from Lake Briar.”
