Chapter 8 - What Nathan Knew
The opening beneath the red scarf revealed a storm tunnel running under the abandoned construction site.
Ruiz refused to let Sophie enter until a tactical team searched the first section. The tunnel led toward the lake, then split into two passages.
One had collapsed.
The other contained fresh footprints and droplets of blood.
Nathan’s blood type was later confirmed from a sample left near the entrance.
The police found the chair shown in the video two hundred yards underground.
Nathan was gone.
On the floor lay a folder bearing Sophie’s name.
Inside were copies of her tax returns, passport records, bank statements, and employment history.
Some files dated back more than fifteen years.
Someone had monitored her finances throughout the estrangement.
The folder also contained photographs.
Sophie leaving her Boston office.
Sophie eating with friends.
Sophie visiting a doctor.
Sophie signing the cabin purchase contract.
The final photograph showed her asleep inside the cabin on her first night.
It had been taken through the bedroom window.
Diane began sobbing when she saw it.
Sophie felt no tears.
Fear had become too precise for panic.
Someone had followed her for years, not because they missed her, but because her life represented a deadline attached to millions of dollars.
At the bottom of the folder, she found a handwritten list.
Possible disqualification grounds:
Financial misconduct.
Mental incapacity.
Coercion of trustees.
Fraudulent transfer.
Criminal indictment.
Death.
The final word had been underlined.
Officer Patel photographed the page.
“Nathan wrote this?”
Sophie examined the handwriting.
“It resembles his, but it could be copied.”
Diane touched the edge of the folder.
“He always made lists like this.”
“You saw him planning ways to disqualify me?”
“No. I saw similar handwriting in his office.”
Sophie looked toward the dark tunnel.
“Then why would someone kidnap him and leave evidence against him?”
Ruiz answered.
“Because either the kidnapper wants us to know the truth, or wants us to believe a specific version of it.”
The tactical team searched until dawn.
The tunnel ended at a locked maintenance building on the opposite side of the lake. Its rear door stood open. Tire tracks led to the highway.
Nathan’s captor had escaped.
At seven in the morning, police received a call from Claire.
Nathan had appeared at her house.
He was injured, disoriented, and carrying a blue metal box.
When officers arrived, Nathan was sitting on Claire’s kitchen floor with blood covering his shirt. The blue box rested beside him.
He insisted Evelyn had abducted him.
He claimed she intended to kill Sophie and seize the trust.
Inside the box, police found original trust documents bearing Thomas Bennett’s signature.
They also found a flash drive containing dozens of recorded conversations.
One recording captured Nathan speaking with Walter Shaw.
“You will file the correction,” Nathan said.
Walter replied, “There is nothing to correct.”
“There will be after the family company submits its claim.”
“You’re attempting to manufacture ownership.”
“I’m restoring what belongs to us.”
Another recording captured Claire.
“I went through the cellar like you asked. The room was empty.”
Nathan answered, “Then Evelyn got there first.”
“I want the money you promised.”
“You’ll get it when Sophie is removed.”
The recordings appeared to prove Nathan’s guilt.
Too clearly.
Sophie listened twice.
“The audio has been edited,” she said.
Ruiz looked at her.
“How can you tell?”
“Nathan says family company, but the background sound cuts between the words. Someone combined separate conversations.”
“Could the entire recording be fabricated?”
“Possibly, but parts may be genuine.”
Nathan was transported to the hospital under guard.
He demanded to speak with Sophie.
She refused until afternoon.
When she finally entered his room, his left arm was secured to the bed rail. Cuts marked his face. One eye had swollen nearly shut.
He laughed when he saw her.
“You finally got what you wanted.”
“What did I want?”
“To see me destroyed.”
“You came to my house with forged ownership papers.”
“I came because Mother said you had taken the cabin.”
“I bought it.”
“With trust money.”
“No.”
Nathan studied her.
“You really don’t know.”
“Know what?”
“Where your down payment came from.”
“My savings and the sale of my apartment.”
“Your apartment was purchased partly with money transferred through a scholarship fund.”
Sophie remembered the grant that helped her attend graduate school. It had come from a private foundation whose donors were anonymous.
“The scholarship was from the trust?”
Nathan smiled.
“Every success you think you earned was financed by the family.”
“I earned the degree.”
“With money Dad stole for you.”
Sophie refused to accept his framing.
“Why did you exclude me?”
“Because Dad believed you knew too much.”
“I knew nothing.”
“You visited Evelyn.”
“She was supposedly dead.”
“Not when you were seventeen.”
Sophie stared at him.
“That’s impossible.”
“You took a bus to Montreal. You returned two days later and refused to explain where you had been.”
The memory surfaced slowly.
At seventeen, Sophie had received a letter containing a train ticket and a hotel address. The sender claimed to represent a scholarship organization. Sophie traveled without telling Diane because the letter instructed her to maintain confidentiality.
At the hotel, a woman interviewed her for three hours.
She wore large glasses and kept her hair covered.
Sophie had never seen her again.
“The scholarship interviewer,” Sophie whispered.
Nathan nodded.
“Evelyn.”
“Did Dad know?”
“He found the train ticket.”
“And that is why he helped me open the old bank account.”
Nathan’s expression changed.
“What?”
“The account connected to the fake transfer. Dad took me to the bank one week after Montreal.”
Nathan looked genuinely confused.
Sophie leaned closer.
“You didn’t create that transfer document.”
“No.”
“Who did?”
“I thought you did.”
“To frame myself?”
“To make it look like Dad gave you money before the trust deadline.”
“The form did not exist when he died.”
Nathan’s jaw tightened.
“Then Evelyn made it.”
“Why?”
“To turn us against each other.”
“You managed that without help.”
Nathan looked toward the guarded door.
“You think I planned all of this. I did file the ownership claim.”
“With a forged signature.”
“Yes.”
The admission came without shame.
“I believed the cabin belonged to the trust and you had purchased it secretly using trust funds. Walter refused to explain the older records. Claire searched the underground room, but it was already empty.”
“Who tied Walter to the chair?”
“Not me.”
“Your rope was in the SUV.”
“My vehicle disappeared for six hours the night before we came to the cabin.”
“You never reported it stolen.”
“Because it returned.”
“With damage.”
“I assumed Claire hit something.”
“Why arrive with suitcases?”
“Mother said the cabin contained the original management archive. We intended to occupy the property before Evelyn could claim it.”
“You expected me to surrender my home.”
“I expected you to understand that thirty-eight million dollars mattered more than your feelings.”
Sophie stood.
“That sentence explains the last ten years better than anything else.”
Nathan pulled against the handcuff.
“Listen to me. Evelyn abducted me. She showed me documents proving the trust is worth far more than thirty-eight million.”
“How much?”
“Nearly two hundred million.”
Sophie stopped.
“She also showed me a current beneficiary list.”
“I’m the beneficiary.”
“You’re one of them.”
“Who else?”
Nathan smiled despite his injuries.
“That’s the part Mother never told you.”
Sophie looked toward the door, where Diane waited beyond the glass.
Nathan lowered his voice.
“The trust was created for Thomas Bennett’s children.”
“There are three of us.”
“No.”
May you like
His smile disappeared.
“There are four.”
