Chapter 8
The message was not sent from the county jail.
Detectives traced it to a prepaid phone near Mom’s neighborhood.
Jason had arranged for someone else to deliver the threat.
But only a few people knew about the corporate seal.
Mom.
Daniel.
Lena.
And whoever had stolen it.
I called Lena first.
She answered immediately.
“The studio was broken into last night,” she said.
“Are you hurt?”
“No. They waited until I left.”
“What did they take?”
“Your father’s desk.”
“The entire desk?”
“The drawers were forced open. The corporate seal was hidden beneath the bottom one.”
My father had separated the certificate from the seal.
Jason had found both within hours.
He knew Dad’s habits too well.
“Did the cameras record anything?”
“One person in a hood. Same height as a woman.”
“Vanessa?”
“I couldn’t see the face.”
Rachel arranged for police to collect the video.
Then she examined the photograph Jason’s accomplice had sent.
“The certificate has not been endorsed yet.”
“What does that mean?”
“They still need your signature or a convincing forgery.”
“They have forged it before.”
“Not on this. Your father added a requirement for two witnesses and a recorded board vote.”
“Can they fake those too?”
“They can try.”
Mom joined us at the company’s temporary office.
She looked stronger, but betrayal had aged her in days.
“We should make a public statement,” she said.
Rachel disagreed.
“Jason wants us reacting emotionally.”
“He threatened my granddaughter.”
“He threatened to tell Emma something about George.”
Mom looked away.
I noticed.
“What did Dad do?”
“Nothing that excuses Jason.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Mom walked to the window.
“Your father paid Jason to leave you.”
I felt as if the room shifted.
“When?”
“Before your wedding.”
“How much?”
“Fifty thousand dollars.”
“Why?”
“He had discovered the theft and the secret marriage record. He told Jason to disappear.”
“And Jason took the money?”
“Yes.”
“But he married me anyway.”
“He returned it two days before the wedding. He claimed the marriage record belonged to another Jason Mitchell and convinced your father the theft was a misunderstanding.”
“How?”
“Vanessa produced false documents.”
Of course she had.
“What else?”
Mom’s eyes filled.
“Your father threatened to cut you off if you married him.”
“He never said that to me.”
“Because I stopped him.”
“You?”
“I told him he would lose his daughter.”
The truth hurt, but not in the way Jason intended.
Dad had made mistakes.
Mom had made mistakes.
They had tried to control danger by hiding it.
Jason wanted me to turn their failures into an excuse for his cruelty.
I would not give him that.
“If Emma learns this,” I said, “I’ll explain it honestly.”
Mom studied me.
“You’re not angry?”
“I’m furious. But Dad didn’t kidnap her. Jason did.”
Rachel’s phone rang.
Detective Pike had news.
The mechanic from Dad’s crash had arrived early.
He identified Grant Ellis as the man who paid him to change the report.
Grant had been released pending further investigation, but detectives found him at a hotel.
He denied everything.
Then they showed him the mechanic’s statement and Daniel’s recording.
Grant asked for a lawyer.
Two hours later, he asked for a deal.
He claimed Jason ordered him to damage Dad’s car.
Vanessa arranged the payment.
Martin Shaw supplied the false evidence.
Grant insisted he only meant to frighten Dad and delay the meeting.
He said he cut the brake line slightly, expecting a warning light to appear before the brakes failed.
It was a coward’s version of confession.
He admitted the act but denied the consequence.
The district attorney reopened Dad’s death as a homicide investigation.
Jason learned about Grant’s statement before we did.
At noon, the jail recorded a call between Jason and Vanessa.
She had accepted it without realizing investigators were monitoring them.
“You said Grant would stay quiet,” Jason told her.
“You said Daniel would never turn on us.”
“Fix it.”
“I have spent fifteen years fixing your mistakes.”
“My mistakes?”
“Yes, Jason. You lost the money. You let Sarah find the envelope. You hit her in front of a camera.”
“She made me angry.”
“She always made you feel small.”
A pause followed.
Then Jason asked, “Do you have the certificate?”
“Yes.”
“And the seal?”
“Yes.”
“Get Sarah’s signature.”
“She won’t sign.”
“Then use Emma.”
My blood ran cold when Detective Pike played the recording.
Vanessa responded after a long silence.
“No.”
Jason sounded stunned.
“What?”
“I said no.”
“You were at the airport.”
“And because of that, the state bar is investigating me.”
“You don’t get to leave now.”
“Watch me.”
Jason lowered his voice.
“If I fall, I tell them who planned George’s accident.”
Vanessa’s answer came quietly.
“You would destroy yourself too.”
“I’d rather destroy us both than watch Sarah win.”
The call ended.
Pike stopped the recording.
“Vanessa now has a reason to cooperate.”
“She also has the certificate,” I said.
“We’re seeking a search warrant.”
“For her home?”
“Her home, office, car, and Red Oak properties.”
“What if she runs?”
“We’ve requested that her passport be flagged.”
Rachel looked at me.
“Jason may have pushed her too far.”
I thought of Vanessa on my couch.
Her arrogance.
Her cold voice at Willow Crest.
Her hand gripping Emma’s shoulder.
“She isn’t a victim.”
“No,” Rachel said. “But guilty people can still betray each other.”
That evening, Vanessa called me.
Not Rachel.
Not the police.
Me.
“I want to trade,” she said.
“The certificate for immunity?”
“For a conversation.”
“I don’t want a conversation with you.”
“You’ll want this one.”
“Then call my attorney.”
“Your attorney will bring police.”
“Good.”
Vanessa sighed.
“Jason lied to both of us.”
“I’m aware.”
“No. You know half of it.”
“What half am I missing?”
“Emma.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“What about her?”
“She isn’t where you think she is.”
I looked toward the conference room where Emma sat with Mom.
“I can see her.”
“Can you?”
Vanessa hung up.
I ran into the conference room.
Emma was there.
Safe.
Confused by my panic.
I hugged her.
Then I understood Vanessa’s meaning.
Not Emma’s location.
Her identity.
I called Vanessa back.
“What are you saying?”
“Meet me at the house.”
“No.”
“Then you never learn why Jason married you.”
“You had an affair with him for years. I don’t trust you.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“Why would you tell me anything?”
“Because he chose you when it mattered.”
Her bitterness was real.
“When did he choose me?”
“When Emma was born.”
The line went dead again.
Mom had heard everything.
She lowered herself into a chair.
“What does she mean?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
But her face said otherwise.
“Mom.”
She began crying.
“After Emma was born, Jason asked your father for a DNA test.”
My breath stopped.
“Why?”
“He claimed Emma might not be his.”
“That’s impossible.”
“I know.”
“Why would he say that?”
“He wanted control of your inheritance. Your father’s trust transferred additional shares to you when you had a child.”
I remembered signing papers in the hospital.
Jason had placed them in front of me while I was exhausted.
“What did the DNA test show?”
Mom looked terrified.
“Your father never told me.”
I called the pediatric clinic that had treated Emma as a newborn.
The records office found no DNA test.
Rachel searched Dad’s files.
Nothing.
Then Daniel arrived carrying an old envelope.
“I heard Vanessa’s call,” he said.
Mom stared at him.
“How?”
“Detective Pike told me.”
He placed the envelope on the table.
“Dad gave me this after Emma was born. He told me never to open it unless Jason questioned her identity again.”
“Why would he trust you?”
“Back then, I hadn’t betrayed anyone yet.”
The envelope contained laboratory results.
I read the first page.
Jason was Emma’s biological father.
There was no doubt.
The second page contained another comparison.
I did not understand until Rachel pointed at the names.
The sample listed as “maternal reference” did not belong to me.
It belonged to Vanessa Reed.
I looked at Daniel.
“This says Vanessa is Emma’s mother.”
“No,” Rachel said carefully. “It says the sample they submitted as yours was Vanessa’s.”
“Why?”
Daniel removed one final document.
A fertility-clinic consent form.
My name appeared on it.
So did Vanessa’s.
Jason had signed as the husband.
The date was eight months before I became pregnant.
My hands shook violently.
I remembered fertility treatment.
I remembered Jason handling the paperwork.
I remembered a doctor telling me we would use my own embryo.
Vanessa’s voice echoed in my head.
He chose you when it mattered.
Rachel read the form twice.
“It appears an embryo created using Jason and Vanessa’s genetic material was implanted in you.”
Mom covered her mouth.
I could not breathe.
Emma entered the room before anyone could stop her.
She looked at the papers.
Then at my face.
“Mom?”
I pulled her into my arms.
No laboratory form could change the child I had carried.
The baby whose heartbeat I heard.
The little girl I had fed, held, protected, and loved for nine years.
But Vanessa had known.
Jason had known.
They had built my motherhood on another lie.
My phone rang again.
Vanessa.
This time Emma saw her name.
“Why does she keep calling?”
I answered.
Vanessa spoke immediately.
“Now you understand.”
“What do you want?”
“My daughter.”
Emma heard her.
Her face went pale.
I held her tighter.
“She is not your daughter.”
“She has my blood.”
“She has my whole life.”
May you like
Vanessa’s voice turned cold.
“Bring the original DNA report to the house. Come alone, or tomorrow every news station in Texas learns that Sarah Mitchell stole another woman’s child.”
