Chapter 13 - The Paper Trail
By two in the morning, the hospital room had transformed into a war council.
Chloe had spread the contents of Claire’s dossier across the foot of the spare bed, cross-referencing bank routing slips against the certified incorporation records of Evelyn’s dummy LLCs. Garrett sat in the vinyl armchair in the far corner, head down, reading text messages that continued to flood his phone from his father and various extended relatives.
*Garrett, call your father immediately. Your mother has been held in the precinct annex for four hours. She is hyperventilating. What did Stella do?*
*Garrett, the country club called. The banquet deposit was cancelled by the bank for suspicious activity. What is happening?*
Garrett let the phone slide onto the armrest. He didn't answer a single one.
"Look at this," Chloe pointed with the tip of her pen to an intake affidavit dated August 14th of the previous year. "When Evelyn removed Gertrude from Oak Ridge, she didn't transfer her to another hospital. She listed an address in Pine Crest, a rural town near the state line. It's an unlicensed private boarding home run by an elderly woman named Martha Vance. Who is Martha?"
"Grandfather's sister," Claire answered, pouring a cup of water from the plastic bedside jug. "A great-aunt who has dementia herself. Evelyn parked Gertrude there with a rotating crew of low-cost, off-the-books caregivers to keep the monthly expense under twelve hundred dollars while pocketing the remaining eight thousand eight hundred from the trust administrator account."
"That is grand larceny and felony elder abuse," Chloe said, whistling under her breath. "If this gets filed with the county district attorney, Evelyn isn't just looking at civil sanctions. She’s looking at seven to ten years in state prison."
"And if she tries to challenge Maya’s birth certificate?" I asked, my voice tight as I looked down at my baby girl, who had just fallen into a deep, peaceful sleep against my chest. "Can she claim I was incapacitated? That Garrett didn't sign it?"
"Not a chance," Chloe smiled, that fierce, predatory attorney grin flashing across her face. "In this state, an unmarried or married mother has sole statutory authority to execute the birth worksheet during postpartum inpatient stay unless a court order dictates otherwise. Garrett's consent isn't legally required to establish the maternal declaration of name. Furthermore, you filed it before the infant was even assigned a medical record number in the neonatal database. The certificate is sealed, stamped, and queued for municipal issuance."
"Then the trust expires," Claire noted, looking at her watch. "In exactly thirty-seven hours. At Friday close of business. Evelyn’s entire three-million-dollar empire turns into ash."
"Stella," Garrett’s voice broke through the room, small and hollow.
I looked over at him. His eyes were red-rimmed, his polo shirt crumpled, looking like a man whose entire reality had been ripped open at the seams.
"What do you want from me?" he asked, his shoulders slumped in total defeat. "Tell me what I have to do. Just tell me."
May you like
I held his gaze for five full seconds before I answered. "First, you hand your phone to Chloe. Second, you sign an affidavit consenting to the name Maya Celeste Vance and disclaiming any legal interest in the Gertrude Agnes trust. And third... you decide right now whether you are a father, or whether you are still Evelyn Vance’s errand boy."
***
