Chapter 14 - THE SIGNATURE
Daniel refused to explain.
Rachel ended the meeting.
For forty-eight hours, nothing happened.
Then a courier arrived at my attorney’s office.
Inside the package was a notarized document dated almost a year earlier.
My signature appeared on the final page.
It authorized Daniel to act as limited financial representative for certain household transactions.
I stared at it.
“That’s not my signature.”
Rachel looked at me.
“It looks very close.”
“I never signed this.”
The notary listed on the document was real.
Rachel contacted her.
The answer made everything worse.
“Yes, I notarized a document for Jennifer Reynolds.”
I felt sick.
The notary remembered meeting a woman who presented identification in my name.
But it had not been me.
The meeting took place at a coffee shop twenty miles away while I was attending a conference.
Security footage from the cafe had long since been deleted.
The notary had only a photocopy of the identification presented.
My driver’s license.
Or what appeared to be my driver’s license.
Rachel stared at the photocopy.
“Was yours ever missing?”
“Not that I remember.”
Then I remembered something.
Seven months earlier, Daniel had offered to renew my vehicle registration online.
He asked me to leave my license on his desk.
It stayed there overnight.
The next morning, it was back in my wallet.
I had never thought about it again.
Rachel sent the document to a forensic examiner.
The signature was a high-quality simulation.
Not mine.
But convincing enough to cause trouble.
More importantly, the authorization had been used.
Daniel relied on it when transferring money between certain accounts.
He had created a paper trail designed to make my later accusations look like buyer’s remorse.
“He prepared for you to challenge him,” Rachel said.
I stared at the fake signature.
“He prepared before Chloe was pregnant.”
“Yes.”
That was the part that changed everything.
The affair was not the beginning.
Daniel’s financial planning had started earlier.
We went back through eighteen months of records.
Then twenty-four.
Then three years.
And found smaller irregularities.
Nothing dramatic.
A reimbursement redirected.
A tax refund deposited into a different account.
A consulting payment omitted.
A duplicate household expense.
Tiny amounts.
Small enough not to notice individually.
Together, they totaled nearly $22,000.
Daniel had not suddenly become dishonest because Chloe returned to his life.
He had been practicing.
The affair merely made him ambitious.
The forensic examiner confirmed the signature was not mine.
The notary identified Daniel from a photograph as the man who arranged the appointment.
She could not identify the woman.
But Rachel had another question.
Who had impersonated me?
We checked Daniel’s messages.
Nothing.
His emails.
Nothing obvious.
Then Chloe called.
Her voice trembled.
“I know who it was.”
I gripped the phone.
“Who?”
“Daniel’s sister.”
I stood so fast my chair hit the wall.
“Melissa?”
“Yes.”
“And Jennifer…”
May you like
Chloe began crying.
“She knew about almost everything.”
