Chapter 7 - Beatrice's PriceBeatrice would only speak with her lawyer present.
Margaret didn't care.
Detective Ruiz did.
The interview began at 3:18 a.m.
Beatrice looked different without the mansion around her.
Smaller.
Older.
Less certain.
Margaret sat behind the observation glass.
She did not want Beatrice seeing her.
Not yet.
Ruiz asked,
“Where is Claire?”
Beatrice stared at the table.
“Grant has a private medical transport company.”
“We know he used one.”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“He owns part of it.”
“Name?”
“Pacific Continuity Services.”
Ruiz searched.
Registered to a Nevada holding company.
Owner obscured.
“Where would they take Claire?”
“An airfield.”
Margaret's heart jumped.
“Which?”
“San Bernardino.”
“Why?”
“Private jet.”
“Destination?”
“Cabo, maybe.”
Ruiz stared.
“Maybe?”
“Grant changed plans constantly.”
“What happens before sunrise?”
“Once Claire leaves the country, he files emergency documents saying she absconded while medically unstable.”
Margaret understood.
A missing mother abroad.
Children under Beatrice's guardianship.
Margaret declared cognitively impaired.
Perfect.
Police alerted airports and border authorities immediately.
Then Ruiz asked,
“Why help us now?”
Beatrice laughed bitterly.
“Because Grant abandoned me.”
“Not because you hurt children?”
Beatrice's face changed.
“I didn't mean to hurt Theo.”
Ruiz said nothing.
“He attacked me.”
“Witnesses disagree.”
“He tried to take the key.”
“And you pinned him down.”
“I lost control.”
“You told him his mother wasn't there.”
Beatrice looked away.
Ruiz continued.
“You repeatedly told the children Margaret had dementia.”
Silence.
“You assisted in Claire's involuntary commitment.”
Silence.
“You participated in forged guardianship paperwork.”
Beatrice finally snapped,
“I KNOW!”
The room went quiet.
Beatrice covered her face.
Then whispered,
“I know.”
Ruiz waited.
Beatrice continued.
“Grant told me Claire was stealing.”
Margaret stared through the glass.
Of course.
Grant had given Beatrice a justification too.
“He said she was draining Nathan's estate and planning to cut me off completely.”
“Were you entitled to Nathan's estate?”
Beatrice flinched.
“He was my brother.”
“That is not what I asked.”
“No.”
“Did Nathan leave you money?”
“A hundred thousand.”
Margaret knew.
A generous amount.
Beatrice heard it as insult beside forty-two million for the children.
“He gave children forty million.”
“His children.”
Beatrice's eyes flashed.
“He knew I was drowning.”
“From investments you made.”
“He could have fixed it.”
Ruiz leaned forward.
“So you helped Grant steal from his children because Nathan refused to pay your debts.”
Beatrice cried.
“I told myself it was temporary.”
“How does forty-two million become temporary?”
“I thought Grant would move the shares, close the merger, then put the trust back.”
Ruiz stared.
“You believed that?”
“No.”
Beatrice's honesty arrived too late.
“But I needed to.”
That was better.
She knew.
She chose the story because it gave permission.
Beatrice described the progression.
First, grant access codes.
Then copy Claire's signatures.
Then report Claire's “episodes.”
Then help Latham create medical documentation.
At every stage, Grant said the next step would solve the previous one.
Instead, every crime created a reason for another.
“When did the children become part of it?”
“After Claire refused to sign.”
“Why Switzerland?”
“Grant has business counsel there.”
“Were you planning to take Theo and Nora?”
“Yes.”
Margaret's hands curled.
“Against their will?”
Beatrice cried.
“I thought once we were away—”
Ruiz cut her off.
“No.”
Beatrice stopped.
“Answer.”
“Yes.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
Then Ruiz asked about Margaret.
The dementia file.
Beatrice admitted collecting harmless moments.
Margaret forgetting a lunch reservation.
Calling Nora by Claire's name once.
Asking the same question twice during Nathan's funeral week.
She sent those anecdotes to a medical consultant.
No actual diagnosis.
The petition made it sound clinical.
“How were you going to get Margaret declared incompetent?”
“Grant said a judge only needed temporary concern.”
Not true.
But perhaps enough for emergency chaos.
Ruiz asked,
“What is Grant's endgame?”
Beatrice looked directly toward the observation glass.
As if she knew Margaret stood there.
“The merger.”
Avery Biomedical's pending merger would raise its valuation substantially.
Grant had secretly bought derivative positions through Mercer Strategic.
If he could force a trust share sale at the pre-announcement value, his entities could acquire exposure before the market jump.
He stood to make over eighty million.
Not forty-two.
The children's trust was only the lever.
“Where is Claire now?”
Beatrice finally answered.
“Redlands Municipal Airfield.”
Police moved.
Ruiz stood.
Beatrice called after her.
“Wait.”
“What?”
“Grant has someone else.”
“Who?”
Beatrice hesitated.
“Nora.”
Margaret nearly broke through the glass.
Ruiz froze.
“Nora is upstairs at the mansion.”
Beatrice shook her head.
“Not the child.”
“Then what?”
“NORA is the code name.”
“For?”
Beatrice looked terrified.
“The second trust.”
Margaret stopped breathing.
“What second trust?”
Beatrice whispered,
“Nathan created another one before he died.”
“For whom?”
“I don't know.”
“But Grant does?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“Bigger.”
Ruiz's face tightened.
“Bigger than forty-two million?”
Beatrice nodded.
“And Claire found out.”
Margaret felt the pieces rearrange.
Grant hadn't committed all this merely for the children's trust.
That was only visible money.
The real target remained hidden.
“Where are the documents?”
Beatrice looked down.
“In the bag.”
Margaret stared.
Police had searched it.
Then Beatrice said,
“Inside the lining.”
Detectives retrieved the tan leather work bag.
Cut open the interior seam.
A second flash drive fell out.
Label:
NORA.
They inserted it.
One encrypted folder.
A text file appeared without password.
NATHAN AVERY LEGACY TRUST
Estimated assets:
$118 million.
Margaret stared.
Beneficiary information encrypted.
Then another line appeared.
Activation condition: upon documented incapacity or death of Claire Avery.
The room went silent.
Grant didn't merely need Claire discredited.
If he could make her legally incapacitated—
May you like
the second trust activated.
And whatever was inside it was worth almost three times the children's inheritance.
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