Chapter 4 - Uncovering the Past
The deputies led Sarah and me into the house I had grown up in. Walking through the front door felt surreal. Only four days had passed since I was thrown out, yet the place already felt foreign, contaminated by Monica's presence.
Monica stood in the corner of the living room, her arms crossed tight against her chest, glaring at me with pure venom. Dylan was nowhere to be seen—likely hiding upstairs in the master bedroom he had tried so hard to steal.
"Search wherever you want," Monica spat out. "There's nothing here. Dylan was joking last night. It was a prank! Can't you take a joke, Claire?"
"Extortion isn't a joke, Mrs. Bennett," Sarah Vance interjected calmly, pulling on a pair of white cotton gloves. "Where is the attic access?"
Richard pointed toward the hallway ceiling without making eye contact with me. "In the closet."
Deputy Miller pulled down the folding ladder, and Sarah climbed up, with me right behind her. The attic was hot, smelling of old insulation and cardboard. Dust motes danced in the dim light of a single hanging bulb.
In the far corner sat the old cedar trunk Dylan had mentioned. It wasn't locked.
I knelt down and lifted the heavy lid. Inside, stacked neatly beneath old winter blankets, were several leather-bound journals. But beneath those journals lay a thick stack of manila folders tied with string.
I reached for the journals first. They were my mother’s, filled with her elegant handwriting. I held them close to my chest, relief washing over me.
"Claire, look at this," Sarah murmured, pointing to the manila folders beneath the blankets.
I pulled out the top folder. Marked in red ink was a label: Bennett Construction & Property Management - Tax Audits 2021-2024.
Richard owned a small independent contracting business. For years, he had claimed he was barely breaking even, which was why he had constantly asked me to cover the house's mortgage and property taxes.
I opened the folder. Inside were double-entry ledgers, cash receipt books, and offshore bank transfer confirmations under Monica’s maiden name—Monica Miller.
"This isn't my mother's," I whispered, skim-reading the figures.
Over the past three years, while I was transferring $1,500 every month to help Richard pay the mortgage, Richard and Monica had been funneling over $80,000 a year from his business into a private account held in the Cayman Islands.
They weren't poor. They hadn't needed my help at all. They had used my grief and my sense of filial duty to pay off their overhead while they quietly built a hidden fortune right under my nose.
"This is systematic tax fraud and financial coercion," Sarah said, her professional demeanor instantly hardening. "They lied about their financial hardship to force you into paying their debts while hiding assets from the court."
We brought the journals and the financial folders downstairs.
When Richard saw the manila folders in Sarah’s hands, his face turned the color of ash. He took a step backward, catching himself against the dining table.
"Where did you get those?" Richard choked out. "Those are private business records!"
"They were stored alongside estate property in an unlocked attic," Sarah replied calmly. "And considering your client claims he lacks the liquidity to pay my client her rightful equity, these documents will be extremely relevant during our financial discovery process in court."
Monica snapped. She lunged forward, reaching for the folders. "Give those back! You have no right to touch our private belongings! Get out of my house!"
Deputy Miller stepped smoothly between Monica and Sarah, putting a firm hand on his belt. "Ma'am, step back immediately. Do not interfere with court-ordered evidence collection."
"Richard, do something!" Monica screamed, her voice cracking into a shrill screech. "She’s ruining us! Do something!"
Richard couldn't move. He stared at me, his eyes wide with a mix of shock, fear, and shame.
"Claire..." Richard stammered, his voice trembling. "Please. We can work this out. We're family."
I looked at the man who had allowed his wife to throw me into the street over a bedroom, the man who had let me pay his bills while hiding tens of thousands of dollars in secret accounts.
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"We were family, Richard," I said, my voice ice cold. "Now, we are opposing parties in litigation."
I walked out the front door into the bright morning sunshine, holding my mother's journals safely in my arms, while Monica’s hysterical screams echoed down the driveway behind us.
