Chapter 11 - I WAS NEVER HER HUSBAND
My file contained copies of my life-insurance policy.
Property records for my construction company.
Medical documents I had never seen.
And a forged will leaving everything to Amanda.
Marcus read the dates.
“She started preparing this before you married her.”
I looked at the first insurance application.
Amanda had signed it three months after Claire’s funeral.
Two years before our wedding.
“She never loved me.”
Ethan’s voice was quiet.
“She needed access to the house.”
The truth hurt, but he was right.
Amanda had married me because Claire had hidden evidence somewhere inside our home.
She needed Ethan because he was Claire’s heir.
And she needed me dead because my company was worth millions.
Detective Reyes found another document.
A medical declaration claimed I had early-onset dementia.
It carried the signature of a doctor I had never met.
Brooke had helped create a pattern.
First, isolate the victim.
Then make the family believe the victim was unstable.
Then move the assets.
Then arrange an accident.
I looked at the last page.
A date had been written beneath the heading Final Stage.
Three weeks from now.
“What was supposed to happen in three weeks?” I asked.
Marcus found a construction-site photograph attached to the file.
A crane towered above one of my largest projects.
A red circle marked the operator’s cab.
“They were planning an accident.”
Ethan stared at the photograph.
“You were supposed to fall.”
Reyes received a message from federal agents.
Amanda had chartered a private plane from Miami.
But she was not flying to another country.
She was returning to Ohio.
“Why would she come back?” I asked.
Margaret answered.
“Because she still believes she can control Ethan.”
“She cannot.”
“You underestimate her.”
Margaret looked at my son.
“Amanda has spent seventeen years believing Claire stole her child.”
“In her mind, every terrible thing she did was justified.”
Ethan shook his head.
“She doesn’t care about me.”
“She cares about owning you.”
That night, federal agents moved us to a secure house.
Dylan was placed in protective custody.
Brooke agreed to cooperate in exchange for reduced charges.
She gave investigators the location of several hidden accounts.
But she refused to say where Amanda would go.
Near midnight, Ethan knocked on my bedroom door.
“I found something in Mom’s letter.”
He handed me the page.
A line of faded numbers had appeared along the bottom.
Heat from the bedside lamp had revealed invisible ink.
The numbers formed coordinates.
Marcus entered them into his phone.
The location was an abandoned church outside Columbus.
Margaret recognized it immediately.
“The Haven Foundation began there.”
Reyes called a tactical team.
Before she could finish, Ethan’s phone rang.
It was a number none of us recognized.
He answered on speaker.
Amanda whispered from the other end.
“Come to the church alone.”
“Why?”
“Because Claire is buried there.”
My blood ran cold.
Amanda continued.
May you like
“And the woman you buried nine years ago…”
“Was not Claire.”
