Chapter 3 - THE WOMAN BEFORE ME

That sentence gave me strength.

I swung onto the porch awning and dropped into the hedges.

Pain shot through my ankle.

I didn’t stop.

Harold rushed toward me.

“Claire!”

I ran barefoot across the lawn.

Daniel came through the front door.

“Stop her!”

That was when I understood.

They weren’t embarrassed.

They were scared.

I reached my car.

My purse was still downstairs.

My keys were inside it.

Damn it.

Daniel was thirty feet away.

I ran toward the road.

A delivery van slowed.

I stepped into the street waving both arms.

The driver slammed his brakes.

“Lady, are you crazy?”

“Please.”

Daniel shouted behind me.

“Claire!”

I opened the passenger door.

“My husband is trying to hurt me.”

The driver looked at Daniel.

Then at my torn robe.

“Get in.”

We pulled away.

Daniel stopped in the middle of the road.

Margaret stood behind him.

Harold beside her.

Three people watching me escape.

Twenty minutes later, I was sitting in a coffee shop wearing a sweatshirt the driver had given me.

My phone had 31 missed calls.

Naomi called on number 32.

“What happened?”

“I think Daniel forged my prenup.”

There was a pause.

“Where are you?”

“Some café off Route 9.”

“Stay there.”

“Naomi, I found a marriage certificate.”

Another pause.

Longer.

“What kind of marriage certificate?”

“Daniel Bennett and Rebecca Lawson. Eight years ago.”

“Send it again.”

“I already did.”

“I need to verify something.”

“What?”

She hesitated.

“The Bennett family filed a petition six weeks ago involving your grandfather’s intellectual property trust.”

My throat closed.

“My grandfather’s what?”

“You told me your inheritance included mineral rights.”

“Partly.”

“It also includes licensing rights from his engineering patents.”

“I know.”

“Those rights are worth a lot more than Daniel ever told you he understood.”

“How much?”

“Potentially tens of millions.”

I stared through the window.

Daniel had always claimed money didn’t matter.

He said he loved that I drove an old Subaru.

He admired that I worked despite my trust.

He had even insisted on signing a prenup.

Now I understood why.

The prenup wasn’t protection.

It was access.

Naomi continued.

“There’s something else.”

“What?”

“I searched Rebecca Lawson.”

My hands went numb.

“Did you find her?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“She disappeared seven years ago.”

I stopped breathing.

“What does that mean?”

“It means no credit history. No employment. No address. Nothing.”

“Maybe she changed her name.”

“Maybe.”

Naomi’s voice lowered.

“But Claire… three years ago, someone filed paperwork declaring Rebecca Lawson legally dead.”

I gripped the phone.

“Who?”

May you like

THE MAID’S DAUGHTER

“GET OUT OF MY HOUSE,” HIS FIANCÉE TOLD THE MAID—THEN THE MAFIA BOSS LOOKED AT HER LITTLE GIRL“Get out of my house. And take that...

**MY HUSBAND CALLED ME A “BARREN LEECH”—HE DIDN’T KNOW MY MONEY WAS KEEP...

My husband threw his wedding ring at my feet and told security to remove the “barren leech” from the ballroom.He had no idea he wa...

MY DAUGHTER’S NOTE STOPPED MY WEDDING—AND EXPOSED MY BRIDE

MY DAUGHTER SLIPPED ME A NOTE BEFORE “I DO”—AND EXPOSED MY BRIDE’S PLANPART 1 — TEN MINUTES BEFORE THE VOWS“Daddy, if you marry he...

Naomi answered quietly.

“Daniel Bennett.”