“Dad, call the police.”
“I already did.”
He pressed a button on his phone.
A woman answered almost immediately.
“Mr. Cole?”
“They found the red folder,” Dad said. “Grant took it.”
“I know,” the woman replied. “My deputies are already moving toward the house.”
I looked at Dad.
“Who is that?”
“Sheriff Mercer.”
The name was familiar. Denise, my old nursing-school friend, had the same last name, although the sheriff was her aunt.
“She knows about the forged power of attorney,” Dad said.
A police radio crackled through the speaker.
“Two suspects leaving the residence. Silver SUV heading east.”
Sheriff Mercer gave an order.
“Stop them before they reach the highway.”
Dad stared at the dead laptop screen.
His hands were shaking.
I had never seen him shake like that.
Not when he lost his job.
Not when doctors found a tumor in his kidney.
Not even when Mom died.
I thought about the red folder.
“What happened the night Mom died?”
Dad looked away.
“You heard what Grant said.”
“He said they had to destroy something before I found out.”
“I don’t know what he meant.”
“You know more than you’re telling me.”
Dad lowered himself into a chair.
For a long time, he said nothing.
Then he closed his eyes.
“The story you were told about that night wasn't true.”
My throat tightened.
“What story?”
“The one Vanessa gave you.”
I remembered it immediately.
Dad had supposedly been away helping Harold repair storm damage at a fishing cabin.
Mom had been home alone.
Vanessa had supposedly arrived minutes before the ambulance.
Mom had suffered a sudden heart attack.
That was what I had believed for three years.
Dad rubbed his hands together.
“I wasn't at the cabin.”
“Where were you?”
“At St. Matthew’s Hospital.”
I stared at him.
“Why?”
“Harold had chest pains. I drove him there and stayed with him.”
“Then why did Vanessa say you were at the cabin?”
“Harold didn't want anyone to know about the hospital. He was embarrassed.”
“That explains Harold. It doesn't explain Vanessa.”
Dad looked down.
“No. It doesn't.”
The sheriff called again.
The SUV had been stopped.
A deputy reported that Vanessa and Grant were refusing to cooperate.
Then another voice came over the radio.
“We found the red folder.”
Grant shouted in the background.
“You can’t take that! It belongs to me!”
Vanessa screamed at him.
“You knew exactly what it was!”
A deputy reported additional items in the vehicle.
Jewelry.
Financial records.
Prescription bottles.
Approximately nine thousand dollars in cash.
Dad stood.
“The prescription bottles. Whose name?”
There was a pause.
Then the answer came.
“Eleanor Cole.”
Mom.
Dad gripped the table.
“That’s impossible.”
“Why?”
“Her medication disappeared the night she died. Vanessa told me the paramedics took it.”
Sheriff Mercer’s voice became firm.
“Mr. Cole, I need you and Natalie back in town. Don't contact either suspect.”
We left within twenty minutes.
The drive took most of the day.
Dad barely spoke.
Halfway there, he finally said something that made my hands tighten around the steering wheel.
“The paramedic told me your mother was probably conscious for at least thirty minutes after she collapsed.”
I stared at the road.
“Vanessa said Mom died immediately.”
“I know.”
“Did anyone investigate?”
“There wasn't much reason to. Eleanor had a heart condition. The doctor signed the death certificate. Vanessa said she had arrived moments before the ambulance.”
“But now you don't believe her.”
Dad's voice broke.
“I don't know what I believe.”
We reached the sheriff’s office that night.
Vanessa and Grant were being questioned separately.
The red folder sat inside a clear evidence bag on a conference-room table.
Beside it were Mom’s prescription bottles, jewelry, financial records, the forged power of attorney, and the unsigned will Grant had taken from Dad’s safe.
Sheriff Mercer entered carrying a stack of papers.
“This folder may be much more important than the theft.”
She opened the first document.
It was a private investigator’s report dated six days before Mom died.
The investigator’s name was Michael Turner.
Dad stared at the page.
“I don’t know him.”
Sheriff Mercer placed photographs on the table.
Vanessa meeting a man outside Dad’s bank.
Grant using Mom’s credit card.
Copies of checks.
Cash withdrawals.
Account numbers.
At the bottom of one page was a handwritten note in Mom’s blue ink.
They have taken $61,400. I am confronting them tonight.
Dad covered his mouth.
“She knew.”
Sheriff Mercer handed me another page.
It was a letter from Mom.
If anything happens to me, do not accept Vanessa’s explanation. Give this folder to Natalie.
My eyes blurred.
“She wrote that for me.”
“There’s more.”
The sheriff removed a small flash drive.
“The label says there is an audio recording from the night your mother died.”
Dad stared at it.
“Have you listened?”
“No. We waited.”
She connected it to the computer.
A single file appeared.
The date matched the night Mom died.
Sheriff Mercer pressed play.
At first, there was only the faint hum of a refrigerator.
Then Mom’s voice came through.
“I know about the money.”
Vanessa answered.
“You went through my things?”
“You stole from your father and me.”
“We borrowed it.”
“Sixty-one thousand dollars isn't borrowing.”
Grant entered the conversation.
“Keep your voice down.”
Mom sounded frightened but determined.
“I called a lawyer. I'm giving everything to Natalie.”
A chair scraped across the floor.
Vanessa’s voice sharpened.
“You always choose her.”
“Natalie never stole from me.”
Grant cursed.
Mom said, “I want both of you out of my house.”
Then there was a crash.
Dad stood so abruptly his chair moved backward.
Mom gasped.
“What did you give me?”
No one in the room moved.
Her breathing became heavy.
Vanessa whispered, “She found the bottles.”
Grant answered, “Then get them away from her.”
Mom called for help.
She sounded confused.
Terrified.
Then something struck the floor.
Dad turned white.
Mom begged them to call an ambulance.
Vanessa cried.
“We didn't mean for this to happen.”
Grant's voice stayed cold.
“Where is the original?”
Mom didn't answer.
He asked again.
“Where did you put the evidence?”
Finally Mom whispered:
“Natalie has it.”
My heart stopped.
Grant answered, “She doesn't even know what it is.”
“She will.”
Vanessa asked, “Should I call 911?”
“No,” Grant said. “Not until she tells us where Natalie put it.”
For twenty-three minutes, Mom begged them to get help.
They didn't.
By the time the emergency call was placed, Mom had stopped breathing.
Dad lowered his head.
A sob escaped him.
I couldn't move.
I could barely breathe.
Then I remembered something.
“One week before Mom died,” I said slowly, “she mailed me a blue music box.”
Dad looked up.
“I thought it was just an old keepsake.”
“Where is it?”
“At my house.”
My house was still eleven hours away.
I grabbed my phone.
Before I could call my neighbor, a security alert appeared.
MOTION DETECTED — BACK DOOR.
I opened the live camera.
A man entered my house using a key.
He wore a dark coat and carried an empty bag.
When he turned toward the camera, Dad stopped breathing.
“That’s impossible.”
I looked closer.
It was Harold.
Dad’s closest friend.
The man who had supposedly warned us about Vanessa.
The man who had carried Mom’s casket.
Harold walked straight toward my bedroom.
He lifted his phone.
“I’m inside,” he said.
A voice answered through the call.
Harold nodded.
“Tell Grant not to panic. I'll destroy the original before Natalie gets home.”
Click Here to continue read next: PART4: Harold Entered My Home Looking for the Music Box, but What He Found Inside It Exposed the Secret My Mother Had Hidden From Everyone
My Sister Announced Our Father’s Death Before Sunrise, but the Man She Buried Was Sitting Across From Me Planning Something She Never Expected
Part 3 of 16
