Chapter 6 - Priscilla Had Found the First Missing MoneyRebecca did not confront Priscilla by phone.
She drove to her apartment.
Priscilla opened the door wearing sweatpants and no makeup.
“You found Eleanor.”
Not a question.
Rebecca stepped inside.
“How much did you know?”
Priscilla closed her eyes.
“Rebecca—”
“Three hundred thousand dollars.”
Silence.
“That’s what Dad wrote.”
Priscilla walked toward the kitchen.
Rebecca followed.
“Don’t walk away.”
“I’m getting water.”
“You can be thirsty after you answer.”
Priscilla turned.
“Fine.”
Her face changed.
“I found a transfer.”
“When?”
“Two years ago.”
Rebecca stared.
Before Harold died.
Before his illness worsened.
“From where?”
“Ethan’s trust.”
“To?”
“A company called North Coast Holdings.”
Rebecca’s stomach tightened.
Carrow Fiduciary Services had invested in North Coast.
“What did you do?”
“I asked Miles.”
“And?”
“He said it was a private-placement investment.”
“Did you believe him?”
“At first.”
“What changed?”
“I searched the company.”
Priscilla had taken business classes before dropping out of graduate school.
She understood enough to recognize a shell.
North Coast had no public office.
No meaningful website.
Registered agent connected to a company in Delaware.
She kept digging.
The $300,000 left Ethan’s trust.
North Coast transferred $265,000 to another entity.
That entity paid consulting fees to a firm partly owned by Miles’s brother-in-law.
Rebecca stared.
“You found this.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t tell me.”
Priscilla looked ashamed.
“I told Dad.”
“Why not me?”
“Because Miles already told me what would happen if I did.”
Rebecca laughed in disbelief.
“He threatened you.”
“Yes.”
“With what?”
Priscilla looked down.
“My relapse.”
Rebecca stopped.
Priscilla had relapsed once.
Seven years earlier.
Not publicly.
Three weeks.
Prescription medication after another surgery.
She entered treatment voluntarily.
Rebecca had known.
Harold had known.
Miles had known because he arranged a confidentiality agreement with the clinic after an employee threatened to sell information to a gossip site.
“What did he threaten?”
“He said if I accused him without proof, he’d show Dad records suggesting I had taken money from a family account during the relapse.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Then what records?”
“A transfer.”
Priscilla explained.
During treatment, Harold paid the clinic.
Because Priscilla’s insurance had temporarily lapsed, the payment passed through a family medical account to an account in Priscilla’s name before going to the facility.
Miles controlled the paperwork.
Years later, he showed her a ledger page making it look as though $84,000 had been transferred to Priscilla personally with no explanation.
“He said he could make it look like I stole from Dad.”
Rebecca felt sick.
“Would anyone believe that?”
“I had just found a suspicious transfer and accused the family lawyer while having a history of addiction.”
Priscilla’s eyes filled.
“I believed people would.”
“So you stayed quiet.”
“No.”
Rebecca waited.
“I went to Dad.”
That changed things.
“What did he say?”
“At first, he defended Miles.”
Of course.
“He said I misunderstood the investment.”
“Then?”
“I showed him the ownership records.”
Harold became angry.
Not at Miles initially.
At Priscilla.
Why had she been looking at Ethan’s trust?
Priscilla had access because Harold occasionally asked her to organize financial statements.
Rebecca never knew.
Another hidden family arrangement.
“Dad said he’d handle it.”
“Did he?”
“Eventually.”
“How?”
“He hired someone.”
“The forensic accountant Eleanor mentioned.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Priscilla shook her head.
“He refused to tell me.”
“Why?”
“He said the fewer people who knew, the better.”
Rebecca laughed bitterly.
“Our family really loved secrets.”
Priscilla’s face tightened.
“He was afraid.”
“That doesn’t make secrecy smart.”
“I know.”
Rebecca stared.
“When did Miles threaten you?”
“After Dad started asking questions.”
“How did Miles know you started it?”
“I don’t know.”
Rebecca did.
Harold probably confronted him too early.
“You met Miles six months after Dad died.”
Priscilla looked up sharply.
“He told you.”
“Yes.”
“Of course.”
“What happened?”
Priscilla sat.
“I asked about the second will.”
“Why wait six months?”
“Because Dad’s call terrified me.”
She explained.
The night before Harold died, he said:
If anything happens to the new will, Miles will tell everyone I wasn’t competent.
Priscilla asked what she should do.
Harold told her:
Wait.
The bank will contact you when it is safe.
“Eleven months.”
“Yes.”
“Why eleven?”
“I still don’t know.”
“Yet you went to Miles after six.”
“I panicked.”
Priscilla wiped her face.
“Every month that passed, I wondered if Dad had imagined the bank plan.”
“So you asked Miles.”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“That Dad had produced a fake will during a confused episode.”
Rebecca stared.
“He called Dad’s own document fake.”
“He said an outside lawyer exploited him.”
“Daniel Mercer.”
Priscilla looked surprised.
“You know Daniel?”
“Eleanor told us.”
Priscilla stood.
“Then find him.”
“We are.”
Rebecca watched her.
“One more thing.”
“What?”
“Did you sign anything connected to Ethan’s trust?”
Priscilla froze.
There it was.
Eleanor said Harold thought she had been used.
Rebecca waited.
Priscilla closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
Rebecca’s anger rose.
“What?”
“A consent.”
“For what?”
“I thought it was permission to obtain records.”
“What was it really?”
Priscilla’s voice dropped.
“A beneficiary-family acknowledgment.”
Rebecca stared.
“What did it acknowledge?”
“That certain private investments had been disclosed to family representatives.”
Rebecca felt cold.
“You signed a paper saying the family knew about the investments.”
“Yes.”
“So Miles could say the North Coast transaction wasn’t hidden.”
“Yes.”
“Why would you sign that after discovering the problem?”
“I signed it before.”
Silence.
Rebecca’s anger faltered.
“When?”
“Eight months before I found the missing money.”
Miles had obtained Priscilla’s signature on a broad consent without telling her what future transactions it might protect.
Not forged.
Not exactly.
Manipulated.
Rebecca sat.
“Do you have a copy?”
“No.”
“Miles does.”
“Of course.”
Priscilla stared at the floor.
“That’s why Dad said I had been used.”
Rebecca looked at her sister.
For the first time, she saw the full shape.
Priscilla had made mistakes.
Real ones.
She concealed information.
Panicked.
Trusted the wrong person.
But the signature used against her had been obtained before she knew what it meant.
Then Priscilla whispered:
“There’s something else.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“What?”
“The woman at the bank.”
“The fake employee?”
“I remembered her voice.”
Rebecca waited.
“She said my name.”
“That’s not surprising.”
“No.”
Priscilla looked frightened.
“She called me Pris.”
Rebecca stared.
Only family and close friends used that nickname.
“Do you know her?”
“I think so.”
“Who?”
Priscilla swallowed.
“Denise Rowe.”
Rebecca knew the name.
Harold’s longtime personal accountant.
May you like
The woman who had sat beside Miles at the funeral.
And the person who had prepared Ethan’s trust statements for almost ten years.
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