Chapter 6 - What Vanessa Wanted BackDavid grabbed Mark by the front of his sweater.
“What did my mother take?”
Mark did not resist.
“I don’t know exactly.”
“That’s not good enough.”
“She told me Margaret had something.”
“Vanessa told you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“This afternoon.”
David released him.
His mind flashed back to Margaret’s bedroom.
The handbag.
The bank statements.
The photograph.
The hotel receipt.
“Was it the financial paperwork?”
Mark shook his head.
“I don’t think so.”
“What else?”
“I don’t know.”
David stared at him.
“Then why are you here?”
Mark’s answer came after a long pause.
“Because Vanessa called me before the police took her phone.”
“And?”
“She was terrified.”
“Good.”
“Not about getting arrested.”
That caught David’s attention.
“What was she afraid of?”
“She kept saying, ‘Margaret has it.’”
David’s anger gave way to unease.
“Has what?”
“She wouldn’t say.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“You’ve been sleeping with my wife and helping her hide money.”
“I never said I helped her hide money.”
“You recognized E.M. Holdings.”
Mark wiped blood from his lip again.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I set it up.”
David went silent.
Mark exhaled.
“Not for what you think.”
“That phrase should be illegal.”
“It was supposed to hold money temporarily.”
“Whose money?”
“Vanessa’s.”
“Forty-one thousand dollars from my mother’s bank account is Vanessa’s money?”
“I didn’t know where she was getting it.”
David laughed bitterly.
“You’re a financial adviser.”
“I know.”
“So either you’re incompetent or you’re lying.”
Mark looked ashamed.
“Probably both.”
David wanted to hit him again.
Instead, he said, “Leave.”
“I’m trying to help you.”
“You slept with my wife.”
“Yes.”
“You opened a company with her.”
“Yes.”
“You accepted money that came from my mother.”
“I didn’t know that part.”
“And now you expect me to trust you?”
“No.”
Mark’s answer surprised him.
“I expect you not to trust me. But I need you to believe one thing.”
“What?”
“Vanessa has been planning something for months.”
David felt his stomach tighten.
“What?”
“I thought she was planning to leave you.”
The sentence hurt more than David expected.
“She told me she wanted enough money to start over.”
“With you?”
Mark looked away.
“At first.”
David smiled coldly.
“Romantic.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Of course not.”
“She started changing.”
“How?”
“She became obsessed with Margaret’s money.”
David said nothing.
Mark continued.
“She asked me questions about trusts. Guardianship. Property transfers.”
“And you didn’t think that was suspicious?”
“I did.”
“When?”
“Too late.”
“How late?”
Mark looked at him.
“Last week she asked me how quickly assets could be moved if someone was declared mentally incompetent.”
David’s skin prickled.
“What did you tell her?”
“That I wanted nothing to do with it.”
“Yet you’re still sleeping with her.”
“No.”
David frowned.
“I ended it three weeks ago.”
The hotel receipt had been six weeks earlier.
Possible.
“Why?”
“She scared me.”
David stared.
“What did she do?”
“She laughed.”
“At what?”
“At the idea of your mother fighting back.”
Mark’s voice lowered.
“She said Margaret had no idea how easy it was to make an old woman look confused.”
David felt sick.
“She said all you needed was enough incidents. Forgotten food. Missed appointments. Contradictory stories. A doctor willing to write the right words.”
David remembered the spoiled food beneath the bed.
“How much of that did Vanessa create?”
“I don’t know.”
The answer was terrifying.
Mark stepped closer.
“David, check everything.”
“Everything?”
“Medication schedules. Appointment records. Bank statements. Messages.”
David’s thoughts raced.
Margaret had seemed more forgetful recently.
Once she missed a family lunch.
Another time she called David asking why he had not visited after he had supposedly promised to come.
Vanessa had explained each incident.
Your mother is getting older.
David had believed her.
“What was Vanessa trying to get?”
“Control.”
“Of the trust?”
“Yes.”
“Can she?”
“Not directly.”
“So why do any of this?”
Mark hesitated.
“There may be another way.”
“What way?”
“If Margaret was declared incompetent and a guardian gained enough authority, that person could influence where she lived, what she signed, how certain distributions were handled.”
“Influence isn’t ownership.”
“No.”
Mark looked uncomfortable.
“But Vanessa believed she could get access.”
“How?”
“She said she had someone.”
“Someone who?”
“I don’t know.”
David almost shouted.
“How can you not know anything?”
“Because I started avoiding her.”
Then Mark’s phone buzzed.
He looked down.
His face changed.
David noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Show me.”
Mark hesitated.
David held out his hand.
“Show me.”
Mark unlocked the phone.
A message had arrived from an unknown number.
You talked to him?
David read it twice.
“Who is that?”
Mark shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Another message appeared.
Don’t be stupid.
David looked at Mark.
“Are you being threatened?”
“I don’t know.”
A third message appeared.
She gets out at midnight.
David’s chest tightened.
Vanessa.
Mark looked toward the house.
“You need to find whatever Margaret took before Vanessa does.”
David turned toward the front door.
He found Margaret awake in the sunroom.
“Mom.”
She looked up.
“What?”
“Did you take anything else from Vanessa?”
Her expression changed.
David saw it immediately.
“Mom.”
Margaret stood.
“What did she say?”
“Who?”
“Vanessa.”
“She said you had something.”
Margaret’s hands began trembling.
David moved closer.
“What do you have?”
Margaret looked toward the stairs.
Then she whispered, “Not here.”
“Why?”
“She might hear us.”
“She’s not here.”
Margaret stared at him.
“You don’t understand.”
“What don’t I understand?”
May you like
Margaret’s voice dropped even lower.
“Vanessa has been listening inside this house.”
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