Chapter 9 - THOMAS'S BOAT
Thomas Pierce died when his sailboat capsized in a storm.
No body was found for two days.
The report blamed weather and a loose hatch.
A retired marina mechanic remembered Victor working on the boat that week.
Victor claimed he was helping Thomas.
The mechanic saw him replace hatch hardware.
Investigators found a payment from Victor's account to the mechanic's assistant one day before the accident.
Then Brooks recovered Victor's old notebook.
Hatch.
Storm.
No witnesses.
Enough for a grand jury.
Eleanor requested to speak with Christopher.
"I did not kill your father."
"Did Victor?"
"I don't know."
"You knew Thomas planned to recognize him."
"Yes."
"Did you want that?"
"No."
Thomas's private letter to Victor had offered fifteen percent of his personal holdings.
Not equal control.
Victor hated the compromise.
A second unsent letter was sharper.
Victor,
Your pain does not give you the right to punish Christopher for choices adults made before he was born.
Pain becoming permission.
That was the Pierce disease.
Eleanor admitted she knew Victor planned to confront Thomas on the boat.
When Thomas died, she changed records, pressured witnesses, and protected Victor.
"I was trying to make up for losing him."
"You didn't lose him. You hid him."
Then Victor, from jail, filed a paternity ownership claim.
He also challenged Emma's entire trust.
His argument:
If Thomas's firstborn had been hidden, the succession structure was fraudulent.
"If the court agrees, Emma's thirty-four percent could be frozen for years."
Christopher expected panic.
Instead he looked at Emma eating crackers with her ankle in a boot.
"Can Uncle Victor take my company?" she asked.
"It's not your company."
"You always say my shares."
"They are yours."
"Can he have them so he stops being mean?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because giving someone what they want doesn't make them safe."
E.P. thinks Emma's trust is the threat. She does not know about the reserve.
"What reserve?"
A second trust.
Twelve percent.
Independent.
Created to protect Emma if the family attacked her primary inheritance.
Successor protector:
May you like
Daniel Price.
The lifeguard.
