Chapter 8 - The Man Who Benefited From Everyone Losing
Dana became very interested in Gerald Knox.
Within forty-eight hours, she had uncovered three facts.
First, Gerald had served as Margaret’s personal attorney for twenty-two years.
Second, he had become trustee of Evan’s inheritance nine months before Evan’s father died.
Third, he had helped create Hale Residential Holdings LLC.
The company that owned my house.
“Conflict of interest?” I asked.
“Potentially.”
“Illegal?”
“Not automatically.”
I hated how often law lived inside those two words.
Not automatically.
Tessa sat beside me in Dana’s office.
She had brought the original will.
Dana studied it carefully.
“Where did you get this?”
“Dad gave me a copy.”
“When?”
“Two months before he died.”
“Did he seem afraid?”
Tessa hesitated.
“No.”
Then she corrected herself.
“Actually, yes.”
Dana looked up.
“What did he say?”
“He told me that if anything happened to him, I shouldn’t sign anything Mom gave me.”
I turned toward her.
“You never told me that.”
“I forgot.”
“How do you forget that?”
“I was sixteen.”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“My father died.”
“My mother barely let me breathe.”
“My brother told me not to start another fight.”
“I put everything in a box and tried not to think about it.”
Dana softened.
“What did he die from?”
“Heart attack.”
“Unexpected?”
“Yes.”
“Any dispute over the cause?”
“No.”
Dana nodded.
She did not chase a dramatic conspiracy that had no evidence.
Instead, she asked a better question.
“What did Margaret ask you to sign afterward?”
Tessa stared at her.
“A waiver.”
“What kind?”
“I don’t know.”
“I signed it.”
Dana leaned back.
“Find a copy.”
That night, Tessa logged into an old email account.
There it was.
WAIVER OF ACCOUNTING AND CONSENT TO DISTRIBUTION.
Tessa had signed away her right to demand a complete accounting of her father’s estate.
Evan had signed the same form.
Buried in the attachment was a list of expenses.
Legal fees.
Property maintenance.
Estate administration.
Consulting.
Over $680,000 had gone to companies associated with Gerald Knox.
Tessa stared at the screen.
“That can’t be right.”
Dana reviewed it the next morning.
“It may be explainable.”
“But?”
“But it deserves scrutiny.”
The custody case was beginning to connect to the estate.
The house connected to the business debt.
The business debt connected to Margaret.
Margaret connected to Gerald.
And Gerald had earned money every time the Hale family experienced a financial crisis.
I thought about that for a long time.
Then I asked Dana the question nobody else seemed willing to ask.
“What if Margaret isn’t Gerald’s client?”
Dana raised an eyebrow.
“What if they’re partners?”
Before she could answer, her assistant knocked and entered.
“You need to see this.”
She placed a tablet on the desk.
A local news website had published a story.
The headline read:
GRANDMOTHER SEEKS COURT PROTECTION AFTER VIOLENT BIRTHDAY OUTBURST.
Under the headline was a photograph of me.
Not from the birthday.
From that morning.
Standing outside my house holding Maisie.
The private investigator had sold the image.
May you like
And Margaret had officially taken our family war public.
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