PART 3: THE DAUGHTER THEY TRIED TO ERASE
“Jenna, I know where Rebecca lives.”
Elaine’s voice was strangely calm, but I could hear something dangerous beneath her words.
I stood beside Victor’s hospital bed, gripping the telephone so tightly my fingers ached.
“What do you want, Elaine?”
She laughed softly.
“Oh, sweetheart. Don’t pretend you don’t understand. You’ve been digging through things that don’t concern you.”
Victor reached for my hand.
His expression had changed completely.
The man who had faced cancer, betrayal, and abandonment without showing fear was suddenly trembling.
“Don’t tell her anything,” he whispered.
I placed the call on speaker.
“Rebecca has nothing to do with what happened to Victor,” I said.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Elaine replied. “That girl is the reason everything happened.”
My stomach tightened.
“What are you talking about?”
Elaine hesitated.
Then she said something I would never forget.
“Ask your precious father-in-law what happened in 1998. Ask him why Rebecca disappeared. And ask him whose name was on the paperwork.”
The call ended.
I turned toward Victor.
He stared at the photograph resting on his blanket.
For several seconds, he couldn’t speak.
Then tears filled his eyes.
“I thought I’d lost her forever.”
I pulled a chair closer.
“Victor, please tell me the truth.”
He took a shaky breath.
“Rebecca is my daughter from my first marriage. Her mother, Susan, died when Rebecca was fourteen. Two years later, I married Elaine.”
I waited.
“At first, Elaine treated Rebecca like her own child. But after Brady was born, everything changed.”
Victor looked toward the window.
“Elaine started telling me Rebecca was stealing money, lying, getting into trouble. I was stationed overseas frequently. Every time I returned, there was another terrible story.”
“What happened to Rebecca?”
“One afternoon, Elaine called and told me Rebecca had run away. She said the police had been notified and Rebecca refused to come home.”
His voice broke.
“I searched for years, Jenna. I hired investigators. I sent letters to every address I could find. Eventually, Elaine convinced me Rebecca didn’t want to be found.”
My heart sank.
“But she was lying?”
Victor nodded.
“Fifteen years ago, I received a letter from Rebecca. She was alive. She had a family. And she told me Elaine had forced her out of the house and threatened to destroy her life if she contacted me.”
I stared at him.
“Why didn’t you bring her home?”
“By then, she was grown. She wanted nothing to do with the family. I respected her decision, but I never stopped trying to repair what happened.”
He wiped his eyes.
“I established the trust to protect what I’d earned. Rebecca was named as a major beneficiary. I wanted her to know she hadn’t been forgotten.”
Suddenly, everything made sense.
Elaine hadn’t simply wanted Victor’s money.
She wanted to make sure Rebecca never received her inheritance.
And Brady had apparently been helping her.
Before I could ask another question, my phone rang.
It was Detective Reynolds.
“Sergeant Flores, I need you to come to the station. We recovered something important.”
“About Victor’s medication?”
“Partly. But there’s another development.”
His voice lowered.
“We’ve located financial records that suggest Elaine and Brady have been moving money for months.”
Twenty minutes later, I was sitting across from him in a small interview room.
He placed several documents on the table.
With Victor’s permission, investigators had obtained records from an account Elaine had managed.
The statements showed repeated withdrawals.
Eight thousand dollars.
Twelve thousand.
Twenty-five thousand.
And then one transfer that made my blood turn cold.
$187,000.
“What is this?” I whispered.
“Money transferred from Victor’s joint savings account into a company registered under Brady’s name.”
I stared at the paperwork.
My husband had told me his consulting business was struggling.
He’d borrowed money from me repeatedly.
He’d even convinced me to use part of my inheritance to help pay our household expenses.
All while secretly moving his dying father’s savings into his own company.
“There’s more,” Detective Reynolds said.
He slid another document toward me.
It was an application for a life insurance policy.
Victor’s name appeared at the top.
Elaine was listed as the beneficiary.
The coverage amount was $750,000.
But the date disturbed me most.
The application had been submitted just weeks before Victor’s medications began appearing suspicious.
“Are you saying they planned this?” I asked.
“We’re investigating whether documents were falsified and whether anyone deliberately interfered with his treatment. We don’t have every answer yet.”
I leaned back, feeling sick.
For eleven years, I’d served in the Army.
I’d faced dangerous situations overseas.
I’d learned to recognize threats.
But somehow, I’d married a man capable of betraying his own father.
When I returned to the hospital, Margaret Collins was waiting beside Victor.
And she wasn’t alone.
A woman in her early forties stood near the window.
She had dark brown hair, tired eyes, and a small silver cross hanging around her neck.
The moment Victor saw me, he smiled.
“Jenna, this is Rebecca.”
I froze.
Rebecca turned toward me.
Her eyes filled with tears.
“You’re the one who saved my father?”
I nodded.
She crossed the room and hugged me tightly.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “I’ve spent so many years believing he didn’t want me.”
Victor began crying.
“No, sweetheart. Never.”
Rebecca knelt beside his bed.
“I kept every birthday card you sent after we found each other again,” she said. “Even when I couldn’t bring myself to answer.”
He touched her cheek.
“I never stopped loving you.”
For a moment, the room felt peaceful.
A father and daughter were finally beginning to heal wounds that had lasted nearly three decades.
But then Rebecca reached into her purse.
“I didn’t come here only because Margaret called me,” she said.
Her voice trembled.
“Three weeks ago, Elaine visited my house.”
Victor’s smile disappeared.
“What?”
Rebecca nodded.
“She told me you were dying. She offered me fifty thousand dollars to sign away any claim I might have to your estate.”
Margaret straightened.
“Did you sign anything?”
“No.”
Rebecca swallowed.
“When I refused, Elaine said my children would regret it.”
A terrible silence settled over the room.
“Your children?” I asked.
Rebecca nodded.
“Two daughters. Emily is sixteen. Sophie is eleven.”
Victor closed his eyes.
I could see his hands shaking.
Elaine hadn’t simply threatened Rebecca.
She’d threatened Victor’s grandchildren.
And suddenly, I understood why Rebecca had stayed away for so long.
She’d been protecting her family.
Margaret immediately advised her to preserve every message, voicemail, and document Elaine had sent.
Then Rebecca said something unexpected.
“I have something else.”
She opened her purse and removed a small digital recorder.
“After Elaine threatened me the first time, I recorded our next conversation. I was frightened she would lie about what happened.”
She looked at Victor.
“Dad, I think you need to hear it.”
Margaret asked her to keep the original recording secure and arrange for investigators to review it.
But Rebecca remembered one sentence clearly.
She repeated it in a trembling voice.
“Elaine told me, ‘Your father won’t be around much longer. Brady and I have already taken care of everything.’”
Victor looked utterly devastated.
I took his hand.
“Victor, they’re not getting away with this.”
He nodded slowly.
But before anyone could answer, a nurse knocked on the door.
“Mrs. Flores? There’s a gentleman downstairs asking for you.”
“Who?”
“He says he’s your husband.”
My stomach dropped.
Brady.
I hadn’t seen him since before Thanksgiving.
I told the nurse I wouldn’t meet him alone.
Margaret agreed to accompany me.
When we reached the hospital lobby, Brady was pacing near the entrance.
His expensive jacket was wrinkled.
His eyes were bloodshot.
And the moment he saw me, he rushed forward.
“Jenna, you have to stop this!”
I stepped back.
“Stop what?”
“The investigation! Mom says they’re accusing her of stealing Dad’s medication!”
“Did she steal it?”
He stared at me.
“That’s not the point!”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“Your father almost died!”
Brady lowered his voice.
“Jenna, listen carefully. You don’t understand what’s happening.”
“Then explain it.”
He glanced around nervously.
And then he said something that made Margaret reach for her phone.
“My mother wasn’t supposed to leave Dad alone that long. The plan was only to make him weak enough to sign the papers.”
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“The plan?”
Brady realized what he’d said.
His expression changed.
“No. That’s not what I meant.”
But I wasn’t moving.
“What papers, Brady?”
He grabbed my arm.
Margaret immediately stepped forward.
“Take your hand off her.”
Brady released me.
His breathing became uneven.
Then he whispered, “Mom has another copy of Dad’s will. If he dies before Monday, everything changes.”
I stared at him.
“Monday?”
He nodded.
“That’s when the paperwork is supposed to be filed.”
Margaret’s expression went cold.
“Brady, what paperwork?”
He looked toward the hospital doors.
And for the first time, I saw genuine terror in his eyes.
“The documents Mom made me sign.”
Before we could ask another question, his phone rang.
He glanced at the screen.
MOM.
He answered.
I heard Elaine screaming on the other end.
Then Brady turned toward me, his face completely white.
“Jenna,” he whispered, “Mom just went to Rebecca’s house.”
My heart stopped.
Rebecca’s two daughters were home.
And Elaine knew exactly where they lived.
I grabbed my phone and called Detective Reynolds.
But before he could answer, Rebecca came running out of the hospital elevator.
She was crying so hard she could barely speak.
“Jenna! My daughter Emily just called!”
I caught her by the shoulders.
“What happened?”
Rebecca held up her trembling phone.
On the screen was a message from Emily.
“Mom, Grandma Elaine is here. She says Grandpa Victor sent her. But she’s making Sophie pack a bag.”
Rebecca looked at me in horror.
Then another message arrived.
This time, it contained only five words.
“Mom, she locked the door.”
And at that moment, I realized something terrifying.
Elaine wasn’t finished trying to steal Victor’s fortune.
She was willing to use his grandchildren to get it…….
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 4…
