Chapter 10 - THE MISSING SIXTY THOUSAND
The document was a bank statement from Everett’s estate.
Sixty thousand dollars had been transferred eight months after his death.
Recipient:
HOLLOW BROOK HOLDINGS LLC.
I had never heard of it.
Neither had Claire.
By evening, Bridget had searched the Vermont corporate registry.
Hollow Brook Holdings belonged to Mason, Deline’s husband.
The address matched their lake cabin.
I showed Callum after Renley went to bed.
He sat at the kitchen table and stared at the transfer.
“I didn’t know about this.”
“Your mother?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who had authority over the estate account?”
“Mom.”
“And?”
Callum closed his eyes.
“And me for certain transactions.”
“Did you authorize this one?”
“No.”
“Can you prove it?”
“I think so.”
He disappeared into the basement.
Twenty minutes later, he returned with his old laptop.
He searched archived emails.
At 11:02 p.m., he found one from his mother.
Subject:
CABIN MATTER RESOLVED.
The message was short.
Deline and Mason have worked things out with the contractor.
Please do not bring this up again.
Love, Mom.
Attached was a PDF.
Callum opened it.
A transfer authorization.
His electronic approval appeared beside his mother’s.
He stared at the screen.
“I never approved this.”
I felt no satisfaction.
Only exhaustion.
“Could someone access your account?”
“My mother knew the password.”
“Why?”
“She sometimes needed me to approve estate expenses when I was working.”
“You gave her your password?”
“Yes.”
“And she gave everything to Deline.”
He did not answer.
The pattern had become almost mechanical.
A boundary existed.
Deline wanted past it.
Someone moved it.
Callum received the consequences later.
I took a photograph of the screen.
“Send this to yourself, Claire, and me.”
He looked at me.
“You believe me?”
“I believe you may not have made this transfer.”
Hope appeared in his face.
I stopped it immediately.
“That does not repair what you did make possible.”
The hope disappeared.
“I know.”
The next afternoon, Claire contacted the attorney who had handled Everett’s estate.
His name was Franklin Webb.
He agreed to speak with her.
What he told her altered the entire case.
Everett’s trust amendment had not disappeared.
Franklin had filed it.
Legally, Deline’s advances should have been deducted.
The family had been operating for years as though the amendment did not exist.
Which meant somebody had not simply manipulated informal family expectations.
Somebody had distributed estate money against written instructions.
May you like
And Franklin still had the original accounting.
---
