Chapter 7 - Two Million Reasons
My fingers trembled as I stared at the paper. Victoria Sterling wasn’t a faceless corporate investor. She was the heiress to the Sterling Logistics fortune—and a woman who had attended our private firm dinners, who had smiled at me across crystal glassware, who had even held Lily in her arms at our firm’s summer gala.
*‘Bring the passports to the marina.’*
Julian hadn't just used our house to escape financial ruin; he and Victoria were orchestrating a total identity wipe, funded by the ashes of my life.
“Nora, we need to move,” Marcus whispered, glancing back toward the fire marshals. “A patrol unit just got word: Julian’s plane supposedly landed in Chicago twenty minutes ago. His lawyer just called the precinct.”
“His lawyer?” I snapped the lockbox shut and slid it into Marcus’s tactical bag.
“Julian’s corporate attorney, Bradley Vance—his cousin. He called the station claiming Julian received an emergency automated alert from your smart-home security system and is ‘distraught’ at O'Hare, booking the first flight back.”
“He’s building the alibi in real-time,” I said, rage burning through the shock. “He’s using his cousin to establish that he was out of state when the fire happened.”
“If his phone is pinging Chicago, he’s got an accomplice carrying his device,” Marcus said as we walked briskly back toward the police perimeter. “Or he used a duplicate SIM card.”
Before we reached the edge of the property, a sleek black sedan pulled up to the curb. A man in an expensive navy trench coat stepped out, holding an umbrella against the light drizzle that had begun to fall.
It was Nathan Cross, the senior claims adjuster for Northfield Mutual—our insurance company.
“Mrs. Vance?” Cross asked, his eyes scanning the smoking wreckage before settling on me with a look of practiced professional sympathy. “I’m Nathan Cross. Your husband’s office reached out to our catastrophic claims hotline forty minutes ago.”
“That was fast,” I said coldly.
“When an estate of this size suffers total structural failure, we activate immediately,” Cross said, adjusting his glasses. “Especially considering the policy modification executed twelve days ago.”
I crossed my arms to stop my shivering. “What modification, Mr. Cross?”
Cross pulled a tablet from his leather portfolio. “Mr. Vance added a four-million-dollar umbrella rider covering the physical structure, personal contents, and a specific double-indemnity accidental death clause naming Mr. Vance as the sole beneficiary in the event of spousal loss during an unoccupied property incident.”
Double indemnity. Four million dollars.
“And my signature is on that document?” I asked, my voice dangerously level.
“Electronically verified through your shared family email,” Cross said, turning the tablet toward me.
There it was. A crude digital forgery of my signature, authorized from an IP address originating from Julian’s private office router at 2:00 AM on a Tuesday while I was asleep upstairs.
“Mr. Cross,” I said, leaning in close enough that he could smell the ash on my jacket. “You might want to freeze that claim.”
Cross blinked. “Excuse me?”
May you like
“My husband didn't lose his home today,” I said, each word slicing like a razor. “He executed it. And if you pay out a single cent, you’ll be financing a murder investigation.”
***
