Chapter 2 - MY SIGNATURE
The signature looked perfect.
That frightened me more than if it had been sloppy.
Every curl matched the way I signed Claire Bennett on legal documents, from the narrow loop in the C to the slight upward hook at the end of the second t.
Dad held the page where I could see it.
“Transfer approved at 2:14 this afternoon.”
“At two fourteen, Damon was screaming at me in the kitchen.”
Damon gripped the kennel bars.
“You signed it last week.”
“I did not.”
Lacey placed her wine glass on the patio table.
“You sign things constantly, Claire.”
I stared at her.
“You’re wearing my robe.”
Her face tightened.
Dad stepped between us.
“Who received the money?”
I looked down the page.
The receiving account name was hidden behind a corporate code.
Dad already knew.
I could see it in his expression.
“Tell me.”
“Morgan Strategic Holdings.”
The patio went silent.
Morgan.
Lacey Morgan.
She stopped reaching for her wine.
Damon’s voice sharpened. “It’s a consulting company.”
“Owned by whom?” Dad asked.
Lacey folded her arms.
“Investment structures are private.”
Dad almost laughed.
“My daughter’s money isn’t.”
I pressed my hand to my stomach and forced myself to breathe slowly.
This wasn’t just an affair.
Damon had spent months telling me Lacey was a harmless friend from a networking group, even after I found one of her earrings beneath the passenger seat of his car.
I had stopped believing that explanation.
I had not imagined she was receiving money connected to me.
Dad pulled out his phone and called our family attorney, Grace Holloway.
He didn’t tell her everything.
He gave her one instruction.
“Freeze any transfer that has not cleared.”
Damon’s face changed.
Just slightly.
But I saw it.
Fear.
Dad saw it too.
“What haven’t you told us?” he asked.
Damon leaned against the kennel wall.
“You can’t imprison me.”
“No,” Dad said. “Which is why that door opens the moment Claire is safely inside and I know you aren’t going to put your hands on her again.”
Dad looked at me.
“Can you walk?”
I nodded.
Lacey started toward the glass doors.
“Where are you going?”
“To get dressed.”
Dad blocked the door.
“You’re going nowhere with documents, electronics, or anything belonging to Claire.”
She laughed.
“You don’t own me.”
“No. But I own this house.”
That surprised Damon.
It surprised me too.
Dad looked at me.
“Your grandmother’s trust bought the property. Damon never acquired title.”
Damon’s eyes hardened.
Dad opened his banking app.
A second transfer request had been queued.
This one was not for nine hundred thousand dollars.
It was for $4.8 million.
And the authorization document attached to it carried my signature beneath four words I had never seen before:
May you like
Emergency Asset Management Authorization.
📖 The first transfer connected Lacey to my money; the second document threatened to give Damon control over nearly everything I still owned. 👇
