Chapter 6 - MARY’S LAST CARDWith the notebook secured, the state prosecutor immediately upgraded Beckett’s charges to First-Degree Premeditated Attempted Murder and Conspiracy to Commit Murder. Mary Vance was arrested at her luxury penthouse three hours later.
The media was wild. The story of the heiress who caught her husband and mother-in-law trying to murder her and steal her legacy was trending worldwide.
But Mary Vance wasn't finished.
While holding out in the women’s detention center, she invoked a terrifying legal maneuver. Through her lawyers, she released a sealed, video-taped legal deposition recorded by my late father just two weeks before he died.
Marcus called me into his office, looking more stressed than I had ever seen him.
“Clara, you need to see this before it leaks to the press.”
He played the video.
On the screen was my father, looking frail and pale in his leather armchair. His eyes were unfocused, his speech slurred.
“I, Arthur Vance... hereby state that my daughter, Clara, is mentally incapable of managing Vance Enterprises... In the event of my death, I transfer full voting control of the company to my son-in-law, Beckett Vance... who has promised to care for her...”
My jaw dropped. “He was drugged! You can see it in his eyes, Marcus! Look at his pupils!”
“I know that, and you know that,” Marcus said grimly. “But legally? This document was notarized by a state official. If this video is accepted as valid, Beckett’s defense team can argue that everything Beckett did—even the violence—was an attempt to restrain an out-of-control, mentally unfit CEO to protect the company.”
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“They’re going to use my father’s own voice to rob me from beyond the grave,” I whispered, gripping the edge of the desk so hard my knuckles turned white.
“Unless,” Marcus said, raising an eyebrow, “we find the notary who signed that paper.”
