Chapter 5 - The Account for Our Baby
My father died two years earlier.
He left each grandchild $100,000.
Because our daughter wasn't born yet, he'd structured my share so that a separate amount could be reserved for her once certain conditions were met.
Ethan knew how much that money meant to me.
Dad had grown up poor.
He wanted his grandchildren to start adulthood without student debt if possible.
I had signed paperwork related to the account during a difficult week in my pregnancy.
That memory bothered me.
I pulled every document.
One authorization didn't look right.
The signature looked like mine.
But the date was wrong.
I had been in Charlotte that day helping Natalie after surgery.
Ethan had stayed in Raleigh.
I called him.
“Did you sign my name?”
“No.”
“Did your mother?”
“Claire, stop.”
That wasn't an answer.
He arrived at Natalie's house twenty minutes later.
“You're turning paperwork mistakes into conspiracy theories.”
“Then explain the signature.”
He stared at it.
“I can't.”
I watched him closely.
For the first time, I believed him.
Not completely.
But enough to notice genuine confusion.
“Did you know money from that account went toward the lake property?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
“Then who did?”
His expression changed.
“My mother handled the closing paperwork.”
That was the first moment our loyalties shifted.
Not repaired.
Shifted.
Because Ethan finally understood the possibility I'd already reached.
He had helped Margaret misuse company funds.
But she might have used his participation to hide something larger from both of us.
Then he said:
“There was another account.”
“What account?”
“My dad's.”
I stared at him.
Ethan's father, Robert Bennett, had died seven years earlier.
Margaret had always said he'd left almost nothing.
According to Ethan, that wasn't true.
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Robert had left more than $600,000.
And Ethan had no idea where most of it had gone.
