Chapter 3: What the Flash Drive Remembered
I didn't plug the flash drive in that night.
I put all three drives and the letter into the cedar music box — the trinket, the thing they had laughed at — and I walked out of the house with it under my arm.
I locked the front door behind me.
I drove home in the dark without the radio on.
My phone buzzed twice more before I reached my apartment.
Both from Chloe.
I didn't read them.
I needed to think before I moved.
That was the first rule of forensic work: never touch evidence when your hands are still shaking.
By morning, my hands had stopped.
I had a secure laptop at home, issued by my employer, with encrypted drive access and no cloud sync.
I used it only for sensitive case work.
I plugged in the flash drive labeled RAYMOND first.
It opened to a single folder.
Inside were forty-one files.
Scanned documents, mostly.
PDFs.
A few audio files at the bottom.
I opened the first PDF.
It was a retainer agreement — Raymond Vance, Attorney at Law, engaged by my father, dated nine years ago.
Two years after Grandfather's first stroke.
The stroke that had, according to my father, left Grandfather "confused and easily overwhelmed."
I opened the second file.
It was an amendment to my grandfather's will.
Signed, witnessed, notarized.
Dated fourteen months after the retainer.
The amendment removed a clause I had never seen in the version read yesterday — a clause that left the house, the accounts, and the investment portfolio jointly to all four grandchildren.
All four.
I had a cousin.
My father's sister's son.
Thomas.
He lived in Oregon and hadn't been invited to the funeral.
I had assumed that was a family distance thing.
I had assumed a lot of things.
I opened the third file.
It was a letter from Raymond Vance to my father.
Personal stationery, not firm letterhead.
*"As discussed, the amended instrument has been replaced in the file with the prior version.
The original amendment has been destroyed.
T.
Aldrich has not been notified and, given the family situation, is unlikely to pursue inquiry.
I trust this concludes our arrangement."*
I read it twice.
Then I opened the audio files.
There were three.
I put on headphones.
The first was a phone call.
My grandfather's voice — slower than I remembered, rougher, but unmistakably his — and Raymond Vance's.
"I want to change it back," Grandfather said.
"I never should have let them pressure me."
"Mr.
Aldrich, the amendment is already filed."
"Then un-file it.
You work for me, Raymond.
Not my son."
A pause.
"I'll look into what's possible," Vance said.
He never did.
The next two audio files were from the same period.
In the second, my grandfather asked again.
In the third, he was told the paperwork had been lost in a filing error and would take time to reconstruct.
There was no fourth file.
I took off the headphones and sat very still.
Raymond Vance had not simply read a will yesterday.
He had written one.
He had buried another.
He had told an old man that his own instructions had been lost — and then waited for that old man to run out of time.
I opened my work laptop next to the personal one and pulled up the state bar directory.
Raymond Vance.
Licensed 1991.
Specialty: estate planning and trust administration.
No disciplinary record.
Not yet.
I started a new document and began listing what I had: the retainer agreement, the suppressed amendment, the letter confirming destruction of the original, three audio recordings of my grandfather being stalled and misled, eleven years of forged bank transfers, and a will read in public yesterday that every person in that room had accepted as final.
My phone buzzed again.
This time it was my father's number.
I let it ring.
When the voicemail notification appeared, I pressed play.
"Genevieve." His voice was careful.
Measured.
The voice he used when he wanted something.
"I know this has been a hard few days.
We all grieve differently.
I just want to make sure you're okay — and that you didn't accidentally take anything from the house that might belong to the estate.
Give me a call when you get a chance."
*Accidentally.*
I saved the voicemail, noted the timestamp, and added it to the document.
Then I picked up my phone and called the one person I trusted completely at work.
She answered on the second ring.
"Grace," I said.
"I need to meet with you tomorrow.
Not at the office."
A short pause.
Grace had worked financial crjmes investigations for eleven years.
She knew what that sentence meant.
"How bad?" she said.
I looked at the list on my screen.
"My own family," I said.
"And the attorney who just probated my grandfather's will."
Another pause.
Longer.
"I'll clear my morning," she said.
"Send me nothing until we're face to face."
"I know."
"Genevieve." Her voice dropped slightly.
"Are you safe right now?"
I thought about Chloe's text.
*Dad wants to know if you took anything.*
May you like
"For now," I said.
"But they're already asking questions."
