Chapter 5 - THE MONEY I NEVER TOOK
Grace Miller Holdings existed for eleven months.
It had received exactly one major deposit.
Two hundred fifty thousand dollars from Cole Meridian.
Within forty-eight hours, the money split three ways.
One hundred thousand went to Hayes Consulting Group.
Victoria’s father’s company.
Seventy-five thousand went to Daniel Hayes’s law firm.
The remaining seventy-five thousand disappeared through cashier’s checks.
Nathan stared at the transaction report.
“They stole from me while making me think Grace took it.”
Charles looked physically ill.
“I approved the transfer.”
“Yes,” Nathan said. “You did.”
Rebecca stopped him before anger swallowed the interview.
“Charles, who gave you the signed release?”
“Victoria.”
“Did you witness Grace sign?”
“No.”
“Did anyone?”
“Daniel notarized it.”
Daniel Hayes had been an active New York attorney at the time.
That made the forgery more serious, not more valid.
Rebecca obtained a comparison sample from my old lease and tax filings.
A forensic document examiner found multiple signs that the release signature had been traced.
Not enough alone.
Then he found something better.
The notary block claimed I signed the agreement in Manhattan on September ninth.
I had been in Vermont that entire week.
Lily’s birth records were not relevant yet.
But my former employer still had time sheets and travel receipts from an event job in Burlington.
Three hundred miles away.
The impossible date gave Rebecca leverage.
Nathan asked me what I remembered from that period.
“Being sick.”
“Pregnancy?”
“Yes.”
“You were working events while pregnant?”
“I was trying to pay rent.”
His face tightened.
I knew that look.
Guilt turning into money.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Don’t offer to reimburse my life.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were.”
He exhaled.
“Probably.”
I almost smiled.
The DNA result had changed Nathan overnight in one way I did not trust yet.
He wanted to repair four years in four days.
Impossible.
I told him so.
He listened.
That mattered.
Then Rebecca’s investigator found the first cashier’s check.
It had been deposited at a private investigation agency called Fulton Risk Services.
Nathan frowned.
“Why would Victoria hire an investigator?”
I already knew the answer before the records arrived.
The file subject was me.
Grace Miller.
Surveillance began three weeks after my pregnancy email.
It continued through Lily’s birth.
My address.
My employers.
The hospital where I delivered.
Photographs of me carrying Lily home.
I had to stop reading.
Nathan walked out of the room and punched nothing.
That was how I knew he was truly angry.
He had enough self-control not to break the nearest object.
When he returned, he said, “She knew Lily existed.”
Rebecca nodded.
“At minimum, someone paying Fulton did.”
Then the report revealed the information twist.
Fulton had recommended ending surveillance after Lily turned six months old.
Victoria declined.
Her email said:
Continue until paternity exposure is permanently neutralized.
Not disputed.
Not clarified.
Neutralized.
The language felt chilling after hearing her scream that I had to die.
And one invoice showed surveillance had restarted only six weeks earlier.
The exact week I was hired into Nathan’s home.
May you like
Victoria had been watching us before the hockey stick ever touched my shoulder.
📖 Surveillance records proved Victoria monitored Grace through Lily’s birth and restarted the operation when Grace entered Nathan’s home, making the attack look planned rather than impulsive. 👇
