Chapter 21 - What Lily Inherited
I stood in my kitchen for almost an hour before playing the recording.
Agent Cole waited quietly.
Finally, I inserted the drive.
My father’s voice filled the room.
“If you are hearing this, something has gone wrong.”
My chest tightened.
He continued.
“Vance Biomedical was never intended to belong to David.”
I looked at Cole.
My father spoke slowly.
“The company was created from Mercer family capital.”
“David was given executive authority because Maya trusted him.”
“But ownership remained protected.”
I already knew some of that.
Then came the part I did not know.
“When Lily was born, I transferred twenty percent of my beneficial interest into a generation-skipping trust.”
My hand flew to my mouth.
Lily had owned far more than anyone realized.
My father continued.
“Maya controls the trust while Lily is a minor.”
“If Lily dies before reaching twenty-five, her beneficial interest returns entirely to Maya.”
I closed my eyes.
That meant David’s attempt to steal Lily’s trust had been even larger than we understood.
Then my father’s voice changed.
“There is one exception.”
I opened my eyes.
“If Lily has a surviving biological sibling, the interest transfers equally to that child.”
I stared at the speaker.
My heart began pounding.
Lily had no sibling.
I had suffered a miscarriage three years after her birth.
David and I never tried again.
Agent Cole looked uncomfortable.
“There’s more.”
The recording continued.
My father said.
“David came to me seven months ago.”
Seven months before my father died.
“He asked whether the trust would recognize a child born outside the marriage.”
My entire body went numb.
I looked at Agent Cole.
“What does that mean?”
He handed me another document.
A sealed laboratory order.
The name on top belonged to David.
The second name belonged to a woman I had never heard of.
The child listed beneath them was eight years old.
One year older than Lily would have been.
I could barely read the line.
PATERNITY PROBABILITY: 99.99 PERCENT.
David had another child.
A child who existed before Lily was born.
A child he had hidden for eight years.
Agent Cole spoke carefully.
“We located the mother yesterday.”
“Who is she?”
“She lives in Wisconsin.”
“Does David know?”
“We believe so.”
My hands shook.
“Does the child know?”
“No.”
I looked toward the seven white roses outside.
For an entire year, I believed David’s last secret had died with our marriage.
I was wrong.
Lily’s inheritance had not simply returned to me.
If my father’s trust was valid, part of it might legally belong to David’s hidden child.
A child who had done nothing wrong.
A child who had no idea her father was in federal prison.
A child who had no idea Lily had ever existed.
Then Agent Cole handed me a photograph.
A little girl stood beside a red bicycle.
Brown hair.
Blue eyes.
And around her neck was a tiny silver pendant.
I recognized it immediately.
It was half of a matching set my father had commissioned when Lily was born.
Lily had owned the other half.
I looked at Agent Cole.
“How did she get that necklace?”
He shook his head.
“We were hoping you could tell us.”
I could not.
But someone could.
The woman standing behind the girl in the photograph.
I recognized her now.
She had attended my father’s funeral.
She had stood at the very back of the church.
And when our eyes met that day, she had started crying.
At the time, I thought she was grieving my father.
Now I understood she had been looking at David.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Agent Cole nodded for me to answer.
“Hello?”
A woman whispered.
“Maya?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Rebecca.”
I looked down at the photograph.
She began crying.
“I think our daughters were sisters.”
My heart stopped.
Then she said the words that opened a door I never knew existed.
May you like
“And there’s something David never told either of us about the night your father died.”
TOBE CONTINUED
