Chapter 13 - The Signature of a Sleeping Woman
I stared at the photograph until the letters blurred. The loops were right. The spacing was right. But Mom couldn't have signed anything that day. I had slept beside her hospital bed, holding her hand while machines breathed for her.
"They forged this one too," Adrienne said after examining the document. "And if an insurance payout followed, there will be a trail."
June traced the money to a former supplier run by Victor Salazar's cousin. No one person had taken millions in one dramatic theft. It had gone out in small, steady payments: storage fees, consulting fees, emergency freight, charges for services no one could prove had happened.
"They didn't need to steal Northstar all at once," June said. "They were draining it while we kept working."
I remembered Carlos telling me our margins were thin, that I needed to stop paying drivers overtime, that Mom had been soft on people. He had called me foolish every time I chose to protect the team.
Then June opened one more file: a private memo signed by Salazar, preparing to question my mental fitness after any criminal investigation. The memo was dated six months before the package appeared in my suitcase.
"They've been waiting for a reason," I whispered.
"Or creating one," Adrienne said.
That afternoon I gave investigators the old fire report and the insurance claim. They were careful about what they promised. An investigation wasn't a conviction. A signature wasn't proof of who held the pen. But the web of payments gave them something solid to follow.
At five, Nina received a call from our housekeeper, Tess Mercado. Tess had worked for us seven years and never once asked about company business.
Her voice shook through the speaker. "Please don't tell Mrs. Reyes I called. She knows you have help. She's packing in a hurry."
"Are you safe?" I asked.
"For now. But I found something in the trash after they left for lunch."
May you like
"What?"
"A paper with your name on it. And beneath your name, the words DEATH BENEFIT."
