Chapter 13 - The Woman in My Office
Victoria Hale had worked for me for four years.
Efficient.
Quiet.
Reliable.
She booked flights.
Managed client meetings.
Prepared project contracts.
Sent Amy flowers after Frederick’s birth.
She also had access to my signature templates.
Property files.
Financial forms.
Calendar.
The exact time I left work yesterday.
I felt stupid.
Again.
But self-punishment is only useful if it changes behavior.
So I stopped guessing and checked records.
My company’s document system showed Victoria opened the Hawthorne Ridge property file nine months earlier.
Reason:
INSURANCE RENEWAL.
Plausible.
Then again eight months earlier.
The day before the forged quitclaim deed.
Reason:
MORTGAGE VERIFICATION.
We had no mortgage.
She downloaded my signature authorization page.
Then uploaded a PDF to an external email.
Recipient address hidden behind encryption.
Cybersecurity recovered the domain.
Vale Urban Partners.
Jonathan.
There it was.
Direct connection.
Then another access:
Amy’s employment and identity file.
Amy never worked for my company.
But when I added her to our health insurance after marriage, her ID and Social Security documents were stored in benefits administration.
Victoria accessed them eleven months ago.
Three days before the secret bank account in Amy’s name opened.
My stomach turned.
“Victoria gave them Amy’s identity.”
Lucas nodded.
“Looks likely.”
“And Teresa used the account.”
“Possibly without knowing where the source documents came from.”
Again:
Everyone holding one piece.
No one seeing whole structure.
I called my HR director and had Victoria’s system access suspended.
Too late.
She had resigned that morning.
No surprise.
Forwarding address:
None.
Company laptop:
Returned.
Phone:
Wiped.
But one unsent email remained in local drafts.
TO: JONATHAN VALE.
SUBJECT: CONNOR FOUND THE FILE.
Body:
MASON FAILED TO GET THE DEED OUT.
TERESA IS PANICKING.
AMY IS STARTING TO ASK QUESTIONS.
IF CONNOR GETS ELIZABETH’S BACKUP, YOU NEED TO MOVE MICHAEL BEFORE MONDAY.
Move Michael.
My hidden half-brother.
“Where is Michael?” I asked.
Lucas checked.
Arizona address inactive.
His attorney said he was in New York.
No exact location.
Then another draft.
FREDERICK IS SICK.
BIRTHDAY PARTY MAY BREAK EARLY.
CONNOR LEFT OFFICE AT 2:37.
My assistant had alerted Jonathan the minute I left.
That meant yesterday’s scene may not have been planned exactly.
Amy’s humiliation had already been happening.
But Mason’s attempt to remove the folder was triggered by my return.
Victoria told them I was coming.
They scrambled.
Mason tried to take evidence.
Teresa panicked.
The cake hit the floor.
Then one more line:
IF CONNOR SEES THE ONE-DOLLAR TRANSFER, USE THE PATERNITY FILE.
That explained timing.
Michael’s claim.
Jonathan’s public declaration.
Every layer activated when the previous one failed.
I looked at Mason.
He had stayed with us after the storage incident.
“You knew Victoria?”
“Your assistant?”
“Yes.”
“Barely.”
“Did Jonathan mention her?”
“No.”
He sounded truthful.
Then Amy called.
Her voice was different.
Not afraid.
Urgent.
“Connor, I need you home.”
“We’re not going to Hawthorne Ridge yet.”
“I am there.”
I stood.
“What?”
“I went with Daniel’s investigator.”
“Why?”
“Because I remembered something.”
“What?”
“The basement safe.”
My stomach tightened.
“What safe?”
“Your mom asked me about it two months ago.”
“We don’t have a basement safe.”
“Yes, we do.”
Apparently Dad had installed one behind a wall panel in the old workshop before I bought the house from the estate.
I never knew.
Amy found the panel because Teresa once asked whether I had changed the code.
Amy thought she meant the alarm.
Now she understood.
“What’s inside?”
“We opened it.”
“How?”
“Your birthday.”
Of course.
“What did you find?”
Amy went quiet.
Then:
“Letters.”
“From Dad?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
“A folder about Jonathan.”
My pulse jumped.
Then she said:
“And a photograph of you as a baby.”
I frowned.
“So?”
“You’re with William.”
“That’s not surprising.”
“And Jonathan.”
My chest tightened.
“Both?”
“Yes.”
“Anything written?”
Amy’s voice lowered.
“On the back.”
“What?”
“Two fathers. One son. Don’t let either man use him.”
My mother’s handwriting.
Teresa had known this conflict would come someday.
Then Amy said:
“There’s another envelope.”
“Who is it addressed to?”
She paused.
“Me.”
My body went cold.
Dad died four years before Amy and I met.
William Bradley had left a sealed envelope addressed to a woman he could not possibly have known.
May you like
Amy Bradley.
📖 Read why my father left a letter addressed to Amy years before we met—and what the first page said about the woman I would eventually marry in CHAPTER 14. 👇
