Chapter 2 - THE ACCOUNT THEY THOUGHT I WOULD NEVER FIND
Claire Donovan sat across from my hospital bed with the blue folder between us.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
The room was quiet except for the soft beeping of the monitor beside me and the occasional footsteps passing outside the door.
I had spent four days trying to understand how quickly my entire life had changed.
Four days ago, I had been a daughter.
A woman who still answered her parents' calls.
A woman who had spent years making excuses for them.
Now I was lying in a hospital bed with three fractured ribs, a concussion, bruises covering half my body, and a growing realization that the people who raised me had planned something far more complicated than a single violent attack.
Claire opened the folder again.
"Let's start with the trust," she said.
I nodded.
"My grandparents created it thirty-two years ago."
"Yes."
"My father always told me it was mostly for retirement planning."
"That isn't what the documents say."
She slid a photocopy toward me.
It was a page from the original trust agreement.
I recognized my grandfather's signature immediately.
He had always signed his name with a dramatic flourish.
Beneath his signature was a paragraph I had never seen before.
Claire tapped it.
"Your grandparents named your father as a trustee."
"I knew that."
"They also named you as a beneficiary."
"I knew that too."
She turned another page.
"But they placed a restriction on the trustee."
I frowned.
"What kind?"
"He couldn't use trust assets for his personal benefit."
I stared at the page.
"That's obvious."
"Normally, yes."
She turned another page.
"This isn't."
My eyes moved down the document.
There was a list of accounts.
Several names.
Several numbers.
And then one company appeared repeatedly.
Croft Development Holdings.
My stomach tightened.
"That's my father's company."
"I know."
"Why is it listed here?"
"That's what we're going to find out."
I reached for the next document.
It was a bank statement.
Claire had highlighted several transactions.
The first was for $85,000.
The second was $140,000.
The third was $62,500.
Then $210,000.
Then another $75,000.
The payments had been made over several years.
All from an account connected to the trust.
All sent to companies I had never heard of.
I looked at Claire.
"Who owns these companies?"
"Three are registered to your father."
My chest tightened.
"And the others?"
She paused.
"Two are connected to your mother."
I stared at the page.
"Beatrice doesn't own businesses."
"Apparently she does."
The words felt unreal.
My mother had spent years telling me she hated business.
She said my father's work was stressful and that she wanted nothing to do with it.
But the documents said something different.
Claire pulled out another sheet.
"This company was created six years ago."
I read the name.
Northstar Consulting LLC.
"Who owns it?"
"Your mother."
I looked at her.
"What does it do?"
"That's the problem."
Claire leaned forward.
"According to the registration documents, it provides consulting services to Croft Development Holdings."
I laughed softly.
Not because anything was funny.
Because sometimes your brain doesn't know what else to do.
"My mother consults for my father's company?"
"Apparently."
"How much?"
Claire showed me the invoices.
My mother had received payments ranging from $12,000 to $28,000 every few months.
I looked at the dates.
Some of those payments occurred while my father was telling me he couldn't afford to help me with college.
Some occurred while my mother was telling me that money was tight.
And one occurred three days before my grandfather died.
I felt something inside me go cold.
"Why would they hide this?"
Claire didn't answer immediately.
Instead, she removed another document from the folder.
"This is the piece I think you need to understand."
It was a beneficiary designation.
I read the name.
Then read it again.
My father.
Douglas Croft.
I looked at Claire.
"What is this?"
"Life insurance."
"For whom?"
She pointed to the policyholder.
My name was there.
Savannah Croft.
I stopped breathing for a second.
"What?"
Claire's expression was serious.
"There is a life insurance policy on you."
I stared at the document.
"Who purchased it?"
"Your father."
"When?"
"Three years ago."
My hands began to shake.
"How much?"
Claire hesitated.
"One million dollars."
The room suddenly felt smaller.
I looked at the ceiling.
One million dollars.
My father had purchased a million-dollar life insurance policy on his own daughter.
I had never known.
"Can he do that?"
"Under certain circumstances, yes, with the required consent and insurable interest."
"Did I sign this?"
Claire looked at me.
"No."
My heart began pounding.
"Then how?"
"That's one of the things we need to investigate."
She placed another document on the bed.
There was a signature at the bottom.
Savannah Croft.
Except it wasn't my signature.
I knew my signature.
I had signed contracts.
Tax forms.
Apartment leases.
Medical paperwork.
This wasn't mine.
Someone had copied it.
My mouth went dry.
"Forgery?"
"We don't know yet."
Claire closed the folder.
"But I have another concern."
"What?"
She looked directly at me.
"Your father may have known you were investigating the trust long before you confronted him."
I remembered the way his face had changed when I placed the blue folder on his desk.
The fear.
The anger.
The sudden violence.
"You think he knew?"
"I think someone knew."
"How?"
"Because the transfers stopped."
I looked down.
"What?"
"Look at the dates."
She pointed.
The largest transfers occurred regularly for years.
Then they stopped six weeks ago.
Six weeks ago.
That was exactly when I had started reviewing the trust.
"They knew."
Claire nodded.
"Someone realized you were looking."
I closed my eyes.
My parents hadn't panicked because I had accused them.
They had panicked because I had found something.
"Claire."
"Yes?"
"What happens now?"
She gathered the documents carefully.
"Now you don't contact your parents."
"I wasn't planning to."
"You don't call them."
"I won't."
"You don't meet them."
"I won't."
"And you don't tell anyone what is inside this folder."
I looked at her.
"Why?"
"Because if they don't know what evidence we have, they may show us what they're afraid of."
Those words stayed with me.
The following afternoon, Detective Miller returned.
She brought another officer with her.
They asked Claire to remain in the room.
Detective Miller placed a small evidence bag on the table.
Inside was a phone.
My phone.
I stared at it.
"Where did you find that?"
"Your parents turned it over."
I almost smiled.
"They gave it to you?"
"They claim you left it at their house."
I looked at Claire.
"They took it."
Detective Miller nodded.
"We suspect that."
She handed me a form.
"We also obtained a warrant for additional evidence."
My pulse increased.
"What did you find?"
"We can't discuss everything yet."
"Then why are you telling me?"
"Because there was something on your mother's phone."
I froze.
"What?"
Detective Miller opened her notebook.
"Your mother appears to have recorded part of the incident."
My heart stopped.
"I knew she recorded me."
"You remembered that?"
"Yes."
"Do you remember what she said?"
I nodded.
"She laughed."
Detective Miller looked down.
"We recovered a video file."
Claire leaned forward.
"Is it intact?"
"Mostly."
My throat tightened.
"Can I see it?"
Detective Miller looked at Claire.
Then back at me.
"Not tonight."
I understood.
It was evidence.
But I also understood something else.
My mother had thought recording me would help them.
She had believed the phone would prove her version of events.
She had never imagined the recording might prove mine.
Before leaving, Detective Miller stopped at the door.
"There's one more thing."
I looked at her.
"The man who found you behind the supermarket gave us a statement."
"Walter?"
"Yes."
"He didn't know me."
"No."
"Then why does he matter?"
"Because he saw something before the ambulance arrived."
My heart began beating faster.
"What?"
Detective Miller looked at me.
"He saw a dark SUV leaving the service road."
"Did he see who was driving?"
"No."
"But he remembered the license plate."
The room became completely silent.
I looked at Claire.
She looked back at me.
For the first time since waking up, I felt something other than fear.
Hope.
Because my parents had spent years believing they could control the story.
They had money.
Connections.
A carefully prepared explanation.
But stories have a way of falling apart when too many pieces refuse to fit.
And now we had the first piece.
A vehicle.
A recording.
A forged signature.
A million-dollar policy.
And a trust that had been bleeding money for years.
Claire gathered the folder.
"We're going to find out who did this, Savannah."
I looked toward the window.
Outside, snow had begun falling over Saint Paul.
Quietly.
Softly.
Almost peacefully.
But somewhere across the city, my parents were probably sitting together, believing the worst was behind them.
They were wrong.
May you like
Because Detective Miller had just obtained the license plate.
And the vehicle belonged to a company my father had sworn he had never done business with.
