Chapter 5 - The Voice on the Tape
Finding a cassette player took almost two hours.
Thomas remembered an old stereo stored in the garage.
Derek wanted to throw the tape away.
Natalie threatened to call the police if he touched it again.
Claire sat on the sofa staring at nothing.
Margaret locked herself in the downstairs bathroom.
Eventually Thomas found the player.
They gathered in the living room.
Natalie inserted the cassette.
Pressed play.
Static.
Then a woman's voice.
Young.
Nervous.
Evelyn.
"If something happens to me, I want this recorded."
Natalie stopped breathing.
Thomas covered his face.
Evelyn continued.
"My name is Evelyn Marie Hale. Today is October sixteenth, nineteen ninety-seven."
A car horn sounded faintly in the background.
"I am recording this because Franklin Voss called me again."
Margaret emerged from the hallway.
"Turn it off."
Natalie ignored her.
Evelyn's voice shook.
"He said if I sign permanent guardianship, everything goes away. He says the Brooks family will pay me twenty thousand dollars and I can start over."
Natalie looked at Margaret.
Margaret stared at the carpet.
"I told him Natalie is my daughter. She isn't for sale."
Derek slowly sat.
The tape continued.
"Thomas came yesterday. He apologized. I believe him when he says he loves her. I think Margaret believes she loves her too, but Margaret doesn't love people. She loves possession."
Margaret rushed toward the stereo.
Natalie stepped in front of it.
"Move."
"No."
"Move!"
"No."
Thomas said quietly:
"Let it play."
Evelyn's voice returned.
"There's something Margaret doesn't know I found."
Static swallowed several seconds.
Then:
"Rose left the property to Natalie."
Natalie frowned.
Rose.
Her grandmother?
Evelyn continued.
"Not Margaret. Not Thomas. Natalie."
Everyone looked toward Natalie.
"I found the original testament. Rose knew Margaret had been moving money from the Hale settlement. She changed everything before she died."
Margaret whispered:
"Liar."
The tape continued.
"I have the copy. I gave one to Rebecca."
Natalie remembered the obituary.
Rebecca Hale.
Evelyn's sister.
"I am driving tomorrow morning to meet the state investigator. If anything happens before then, look at Worthington. Look under Margaret's name. Look at the transfers."
The tape clicked.
Then came the most disturbing part.
A man's voice entered the recording.
Farther away.
Unclear.
"You shouldn't be doing this."
Evelyn replied:
"I knew you'd follow me."
The man said something unintelligible.
Then Evelyn whispered:
"If Margaret sent you, tell her I'm not scared anymore."
The recording ended.
Natalie stared at the player.
"Who was the man?"
Thomas shook his head.
"I don't know."
Margaret laughed bitterly.
"This proves nothing."
"It proves Evelyn thought you were stealing from a settlement."
"She was paranoid."
"What settlement?"
Margaret looked toward the window.
"Old family money."
"Whose?"
"The Hale side."
Natalie felt the pieces rearranging themselves.
"My biological family."
Margaret said nothing.
Daniel arrived an hour later.
Natalie played the tape for him.
By the end, he looked grim.
"The probate restriction makes more sense now."
"Explain."
"If Rose Hale created a settlement or trust naming you as beneficiary, Worthington Avenue may have been purchased or maintained using protected funds."
"The house?"
"Potentially."
Margaret interrupted.
"My husband bought this house."
Thomas looked at her.
"No."
Everyone turned.
Thomas removed his glasses.
"Rose helped us."
Margaret stared at him.
"You promised."
Thomas looked exhausted.
"Rose gave us ninety thousand toward the purchase because Natalie would live here."
Daniel asked:
"Was it a gift?"
Thomas shook his head.
"A trust advance."
Natalie felt suddenly unable to sit still.
"Then the house was partly mine when I was a child."
"Yes."
"And Mom later borrowed against it."
Thomas lowered his head.
"Yes."
"And I spent my adult life paying debts against property funded by money that already belonged to me?"
Nobody answered.
Natalie laughed once.
It sounded almost like a sob.
Derek stood.
"Wait. If that's true, what happens to us?"
Natalie looked at him.
Derek realized immediately what he had asked.
Not what happened to Natalie.
What happened to him.
Natalie turned away.
Daniel gathered the documents from the metal box.
"We need to secure these."
Margaret became frantic.
"No."
"They may be evidence."
"They are private family records."
"They concern potentially fraudulent transfers."
Margaret looked at Natalie.
"You cannot do this."
Natalie felt years of obedience burn away.
"Watch me."
Daniel placed the cassette in an evidence sleeve.
Then his phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
His expression became strange.
"What?"
He looked at Natalie.
"The court approved our request."
"For the sealed probate file?"
"Partially."
"And?"
Daniel swallowed.
"There was a trust."
Natalie's fingers went numb.
"How much?"
"At formation?"
"Yes."
Daniel looked at Margaret.
"Approximately 1.8 million dollars."
Derek made a sound of disbelief.
Claire whispered:
"Where is it?"
Daniel looked back at Natalie.
"That's the problem."
"What problem?"
May you like
"According to the final accounting, it was almost completely depleted by the time Natalie turned eighteen."
Margaret walked out of the room.
