Chapter 9 - Ryan Had Been Looking for the Trust
Grace searched our company servers for references to Romano family assets.
She found twelve.
All accessed from Ryan’s account.
He had searched my maiden name.
My mother’s estate.
My father’s companies.
Trust registrations.
Property holdings.
The earliest search happened four months before he proposed.
I stared at the timestamp.
Four months before the engagement.
Ryan had always claimed he knew almost nothing about my father.
That was another lie.
Detective Mitchell uncovered more.
Ryan hired a private researcher seven years earlier.
The report described Dominic Romano as a “retired private investor with extensive legacy holdings.”
It mentioned rumors of a Romano family trust.
No amount was listed.
But Ryan knew something existed.
I suddenly remembered our second date.
Ryan asked why I used Carter professionally after marriage instead of Romano.
I thought he was making conversation.
He asked whether I had siblings.
Whether my father was alive.
Whether my mother left property behind.
Questions I interpreted as intimacy.
Maybe they had been due diligence.
I felt humiliated all over again.
My father saw it.
“Elena.”
“Don’t.”
I said.
“You didn’t know.”
“I should have.”
“No.”
He answered.
“People like Ryan survive because they are skilled at being believable.”
I looked at him.
“You sound experienced.”
“I am.”
That was the closest either of us came to discussing his old life.
Then Grace found another file.
A draft postnuptial agreement.
Ryan had never shown it to me.
The document stated that if I became medically unable to manage my assets, Ryan would temporarily administer separate marital investment property.
It would not have controlled my mother’s trust.
But Ryan apparently thought it might.
He had even scheduled an appointment with an estate specialist for the week after our anniversary.
Everything pointed toward the same timeline.
Ryan expected me to become unavailable.
Then he expected to control whatever he could reach.
Detective Mitchell entered my room that evening.
“We found Marcus Vale.”
The private contractor.
“Where?”
“Memphis.”
“Did he talk?”
“Eventually.”
My hands became cold.
“What did Ryan ask him to do?”
Mitchell sat down.
“He says Ryan paid him to create a vehicle malfunction.”
I stared at her.
“Brakes?”
“No.”
She said.
“Steering.”
The plan was supposed to happen the following Thursday.
Five days after our anniversary.
May you like
My fall down the staircase had not been planned.
It had interrupted a different plan already in motion.
