Chapter 2 - THE BANK’S DIRTY LITTLE SECRET
I didn’t storm back inside. That was what Luca wanted—a screaming match, a public spectacle where he could paint me as the hysterical, unhinged sister who just flew in from overseas and started a fight.
Instead, I sat in my rental car parked down the block, my hands shaking against the steering wheel. The air conditioning hummed, but I felt freezing cold. I pulled out my phone and dialed Marcus, my corporate attorney and the only person I trusted back home.
"Jessi?" Marcus answered on the second ring, his voice sharp with professional alertness. "You said you weren't landing until next week."
"Plans changed. I’m sitting outside the house right now," I said, my voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "Marcus, I need you to run a title search on the property immediately. And I need a full account history for the mortgage and my personal savings account connected to the trust."
"Your trust? Nobody touches that without dual authorization—"
"Check it. Now."
While Marcus worked on the backend, I unzipped my carry-on bag and pulled out the stack of opened envelopes I had managed to slip into my coat pocket while Wendy was distracted by her mimosa. I sliced them open one by one.
The first was a notice of default. The second was a finalized property transfer deed, stamped and registered six months ago.
And right there, at the bottom of the signature line, was my name.
Except it wasn't my handwriting. The loops were too rigid, the pressure all wrong. Someone had painstakingly forged my signature on a quitclaim deed, transferring the house from my sole ownership into a joint deed shared by Luca and Wendy.
My phone buzzed. It was Marcus calling back, and he didn’t sound good.
"Jessi," Marcus said, skipping any polite greeting. "The house isn't yours anymore legally. It was signed over six months ago via a power of attorney executed overseas. Furthermore, your monthly $10,000 transfers haven't been going to your mother's care fund. They’ve been funneled into a corporate shell company named Apex Holdings."
"Apex Holdings?" I repeated, the name tasting like ash. "Who owns that?"
"Luca Vance. Your brother."
A cold, heavy calm washed over me. The grief and shock evaporated, replaced by a crystalline, predatory focus. Six years of working eighty-hour weeks in grueling overseas markets, building an empire from scratch so my mother could live like a queen—and my own brother had systematically sliced my throat while smiling in my face.
I looked up through the windshield at the house. The warm, glowing lights in the living room looked obscene.
May you like
If Luca thought he had stolen my life, my money, and my mother’s dignity, he was about to learn a terrifying lesson. I started the engine, put the car in drive, and rolled slowly down the street, dialing a second number.
"Detective Vance?" I asked when the line picked up. No relation to my brother, thankfully. "I need to report identity theft, grand larceny, and elder abuse. And I have the smoking gun."
