Chapter 7: The Other Document
I showed Diane the text the next morning.
She read it twice.
"Do you have any idea who sent it?"
"No."
"Don't respond.
I'll have Patricia's office look at the number." She set my phone on the desk.
"But we need to talk about what it means."
"It means there's a will."
"It means someone wants you to know there's a will.
That's different." She folded her hands.
"Whose will?
Your mother's?
Yours?
A grandparent?"
My grandmother had died four years ago.
She had left a modest estate — a small savings account, some jewelry, the house she had lived in for forty years.
My mother had handled everything as executor.
I had never seen the final accounting.
I had never asked.
"My grandmother's estate," I said.
"My mother was the executor."
Diane picked up her pen.
"Was there a will?"
"Yes.
My grandmother told me once that she wanted everything split equally between her children.
My mother and my uncle, Dennis."
"Is Dennis still alive?"
"Yes.
He lives in Arizona.
We're not close.
He and my mother stopped speaking years ago.
She always said it was because of something he did, something he said at a family gathering.
I never knew the details."
Diane wrote his name down.
"I'd like you to contact him."
"He'll think I'm calling to take her side."
"Tell him you're not." She looked up.
"Renee, if your mother mishandled your grandmother's estate — if Dennis was cut out, if assets were redirected — that is a separate fraud case.
And it tells us this is not the first time she has done this."
I called Dennis that evening from my car, parked in front of my house with the engine running.
He picked up after four rings, wary.
"Renee."
"Dennis.
I know we haven't spoken in a long time.
I'm not calling about Mom, not in the way you might think." I paused.
"I'm calling because I need to ask you something about Grandma's estate."
A long silence.
"What do you want to know?"
"Did you receive your share?"
Another silence.
Longer this time.
"No," he said.
"I didn't."
I closed my eyes.
"She told me Grandma changed the will," he said.
"Six months before she died.
She said Grandma decided to leave everything to her because I had caused so much pain to the family.
She had a document.
It looked official." His voice was flat and tired.
"I was grieving.
I didn't fight it.
I should have."
"Dennis.
I think the document was forged."
The silence that followed was different from the others.
It was the silence of someone recalculating years of their life.
"How do you know?" he finally said.
"Because she just tried to do the same thing to me."
He exhaled slowly.
"What do you need from me?"
"Whatever you have.
Any paperwork she sent you.
Any emails.
Anything." I pressed my hand against the steering wheel.
"I have an attorney and a contact at the DA's office.
This is already moving.
But your piece of it matters."
"I have everything," he said.
"I kept everything.
I didn't know why at the time.
I just — I couldn't throw it away."
"Can you send it to my attorney?"
"Tonight," he said.
"Renee." A pause.
"I'm sorry I didn't reach out sooner.
I thought — I thought you believed her.
About me."
"I didn't know what to believe," I said honestly.
"I do now."
After I hung up, I sat in the car for a long time.
The porch light was on.
Through the front window I could see the blue flicker of the television — Kayla watching something, Bree probably already asleep.
My mother had done this before.
To her own brother.
To her own mother's memory.
I had been next.
My daughters would have been after me.
My phone buzzed.
Diane.
*Dennis's documents arrived.
May you like
I've been through the first three.
Renee — the notary stamp on the will amendment is Raymond Collier's.*
