Chapter 3 - THE DEATH CERTIFICATE
Victoria called her attorney before returning to the dining room.
Daniel Mercer had handled the Vale family’s business affairs for eleven years, but Victoria deliberately avoided the main family firm. She asked Daniel to come to the restaurant alone and told him not to notify Richard.
He arrived forty minutes later.
Victoria showed him Sophia’s photograph.
Daniel’s expression changed.
“Where did you get this?”
“Her daughter.”
He looked up.
“What daughter?”
Victoria repeated everything Rosa told her.
Daniel listened without interrupting. When she finished, he asked for Sophia’s original death certificate and probate file.
Victoria could access both through the family office.
That was the advantage of being Richard Vale’s eldest daughter. People assumed her requests were legitimate because her surname still appeared at the top of most family entities.
It was also the first time Victoria understood how easily access could become complicity.
The death certificate listed catastrophic injuries following a motor vehicle collision.
The certifying physician was Dr. Leonard Cross.
Victoria remembered him vaguely from the hospital. Richard said Cross had done everything possible to save Sophia.
Daniel reviewed the document.
“Was there an autopsy?”
“No. My father said the hospital confirmed everything.”
“Did you see the body?”
Victoria shook her head.
“Did anyone outside the hospital and your father?”
“I don’t know.”
Daniel turned to the probate documents.
Sophia’s estate had been administered under the assumption she died unmarried and without children. Victoria and Sophia were beneficiaries of a substantial trust created by their mother, Eleanor Vale.
When Sophia died, her beneficial interest passed under the trust’s contingent provisions.
Victoria received part.
Richard retained management authority over the rest.
Victoria had accepted that arrangement because grief made financial documents seem vulgar. She remembered signing papers after the memorial and asking Richard to handle everything.
Now she saw the words differently.
NO LIVING ISSUE.
Sophia had no living child, according to the document.
But Lily was seven.
And Sophia supposedly died eight years ago.
Victoria asked Daniel whether the dates were possible.
“Yes,” he said. “If Sophia was pregnant before the accident, or became pregnant after surviving it.”
Victoria thought about the child’s face.
Rosa had told her Sophia survived.
She had not told her who Lily’s father was.
That question suddenly mattered.
Then Daniel found the first major contradiction.
The hospital listed on the death certificate had no corresponding death entry in its archived patient-discharge summary.
The record showed Sophia transferred.
Not deceased.
The destination field had been restricted.
Daniel leaned back.
“Someone created a death certificate that conflicts with the hospital’s underlying record.”
Victoria stared at him.
“Who?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He pointed to the probate file.
“But your father used that certificate to settle her inheritance.”
The financial consequence came into focus.
The lie did not merely separate two sisters.
It changed the ownership of their mother’s assets.
Victoria had inherited money and property that should never have passed to her if Sophia remained alive.
The room went quiet.
For the first time, Victoria felt the weight of the life she built after her sister’s funeral.
Her restaurant.
Her investment portfolio.
The apartment overlooking the river.
Some of it came from her own work.
Some of it came from the estate of a woman who had been alive all along.
Then Daniel turned another page.
A trust-management authorization bore Victoria’s signature.
It allowed Richard to administer Sophia’s contingent assets after her death.
Victoria recognized the signature.
She had signed it.
May you like
That meant the conspiracy had not been built entirely on forged paperwork.
Part of it had been built using her genuine grief.
