Derek was still reading the property record when Carlos called again.
“The police are here.”
“I’m coming.”
“You might want to hurry.”
“Why?”
Carlos lowered his voice. “Whoever entered your office left something on your desk.”
Derek looked at the forged signature on the property document.
“What?”
“A folder.”
He drove to the auto shop through late-afternoon traffic without remembering a single intersection. The facts in his mind refused to arrange themselves into anything sensible.
His mother had stolen Olivia’s bank card.
She had repeatedly entered their apartment.
She had copied financial documents.
Someone had used Derek’s identity.
A loan had been attempted against property he did not know he owned.
And now his workplace had been entered.
Two police cruisers sat outside when he arrived.
Carlos waited near the entrance.
“You okay?” he asked.
“No.”
Carlos nodded. “Fair answer.”
“Did anybody touch the office?”
“No.”
“Security footage?”
“We have it.”
“Did you see who went in?”
“A man.”
Derek stopped.
“What did he look like?”
“Hat. Mask. Dark clothes.”
“Which entrance?”
“Back.”
“Did he search anywhere else?”
Carlos shook his head. “That’s the strange part. He went straight to your office.”
Derek’s stomach tightened.
A uniformed officer met them inside and asked several questions before allowing Derek near the room.
The office looked normal.
Computer untouched.
Tools untouched.
Cabinets closed.
Nothing obviously stolen.
A black folder sat precisely in the center of his desk.
DEREK HALE was printed across the front.
The officer photographed it before opening it.
Inside were copies of Derek’s driver’s license, Social Security information, tax returns, employment records and bank details.
His signature appeared repeatedly.
Then came documents Derek had never seen.
Loan applications.
Credit forms.
A refinancing request.
The officer handed Derek gloves.
Derek picked up the first application.
Everything about him was correct.
Employer.
Income.
Address.
The signature was wrong.
“I never signed this.”
The officer looked at him. “Do you know who submitted it?”
Derek scanned the page.
An intermediary company appeared near the bottom.
He did not recognize the name.
The next application used the same company.
And the next.
“Someone has been using my identity.”
“That’s something we’ll need to investigate.”
“My mother had copies of these records.”
The officer’s expression sharpened. “How do you know?”
Derek told him about the apartment footage.
The stolen card.
The hidden documents.
The officer listened without interrupting.
“Your wife documented this?”
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can you contact her?”
“Her phone goes to voicemail.”
“Do you believe she may be in danger?”
Derek thought about Rebecca’s warning.
He thought about Olivia leaving quietly instead of announcing where she was going.
“Yes.”
The officer’s posture changed.
“Why?”
Before Derek could answer, the front door opened.
Rebecca Collins entered.
Derek recognized her immediately.
She approached the officers first, showed identification and explained that she represented Olivia.
“You know where she is?” Derek asked.
“Yes.”
“Tell me.”
“No.”
“Rebecca.”
“She’s safe.”
Derek gave a short, humorless laugh. “That word is becoming meaningless.”
Rebecca looked at him carefully.
“Would you have believed her yesterday?”
He said nothing.
“Last week?”
His eyes dropped.
“Last month?”
“No.”
Rebecca nodded. “Then you understand why she isn’t ready to give you access to her.”
Derek looked toward the black folder.
“She knew this would happen?”
“She knew something was escalating.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“She did.”
“No. She told me my mother was taking things.”
“She told you Marjorie had access to financial information.”
Derek remained silent.
“She showed you suspicious charges.”
He remembered.
“She asked you to change passwords.”
He remembered that too.
“And you told her she was imagining a conspiracy.”
Derek closed his eyes.
“I was wrong.”
“Yes.”
There was no cruelty in Rebecca’s answer.
That made it worse.
She stepped toward the folder.
“There’s something else.”
She turned several pages.
Photographs appeared.
Derek frowned.
The first showed him leaving the auto shop.
Another showed him entering a restaurant.
Another showed his truck outside the apartment.
Another showed him at a grocery store.
“Who took these?”
“We don’t know yet.”
He flipped faster.
There were dozens.
Someone had been following him.
One photograph showed Derek crossing a parking lot while a man stood far behind him.
Derek leaned closer.
The man looked familiar.
Then he realized why.
“That’s him.”
Rebecca nodded.
“The man from the apartment video.”
“Yes.”
“But I’ve never met him.”
“We know.”
“Then why was he following me?”
“That’s what Olivia was trying to determine.”
Derek stared at the photograph.
“How long?”
“At least two months.”
The next image showed Olivia outside a bank arguing with Marjorie.
Derek recognized the date.
He had been at work.
That evening Marjorie had told him Olivia had humiliated her in public.
Derek had come home angry.
He had demanded that Olivia apologize.
Now he looked at the photograph and wondered what the argument had actually been about.
Rebecca produced a bank document.
“Your mother attempted to access an account associated with the property your father left.”
Derek looked at her sharply.
“You know about the house?”
“Olivia found the trust.”
“My mother told me the house was sold.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Why is my name on it?”
“Because your father placed an interest in trust for you.”
Derek felt the floor shift beneath him.
“Why didn’t I know?”
“That is one of the questions Olivia has been investigating.”
The officer beside them took notes.
Rebecca continued.
“Marjorie appears to have been trying to borrow against that property.”
“With my forged signature.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“We don’t know the full reason.”
Derek looked at the documents.
“What else?”
Rebecca hesitated.
Then she removed another form.
Life Insurance Beneficiary Change Request.
Derek read it.
His face went cold.
“What is this?”
“Someone attempted to change the beneficiary of your work policy.”
“To whom?”
He looked down.
Marjorie Hale.
His mother.
For several seconds nobody spoke.
Derek remembered bringing the insurance paperwork home.
He had left it on the dining table while Marjorie was visiting.
He had gone to shower.
When he returned, the papers had been neatly stacked.
He had thought nothing of it.
“She knew about the policy.”
Rebecca nodded.
“Because I left the papers in front of her.”
“Yes.”
Derek sat down.
He rubbed both hands over his face.
He had not forged anything.
He had not stolen Olivia’s card.
He had not submitted false applications.
But he had repeatedly given Marjorie access and repeatedly dismissed Olivia when she warned him.
He had opened every door his mother needed.
Rebecca closed the folder.
“Olivia wants to meet you tomorrow.”
Derek looked up immediately.
“Where?”
“I’ll send the location in the morning.”
“Why not now?”
“She wants you alone.”
“I’ll come alone.”
“And she doesn’t want you bringing any of these documents.”
“Fine.”
Rebecca turned away.
“Does she still love me?”
She stopped.
Derek regretted the question the moment it left his mouth.
Rebecca looked back.
“That isn’t the useful question.”
“What is?”
“Whether you can become someone she has a reason to trust.”
Then she left.
Derek remained in his office while officers continued examining the folder.
Carlos stood nearby without speaking.
Eventually Derek looked at the small model car on his shelf.
Olivia had given it to him when he became part-owner of the shop.
He remembered her laughing as she placed it on the desk, telling him every mechanic deserved one vehicle that never needed repairing.
His phone buzzed.
Olivia.
His heart jumped.
The message contained one sentence.
Tomorrow I’ll tell you what your mother did the night your father died.
Derek read it twice.
Thomas Hale had died eight years earlier.
Heart attack.
That was the story.
He typed.
What does Dad have to do with any of this?
No response.
Then another message arrived.
Ask her why the place where he died changed every time she told the story.
Derek stared at the words.
Memories surfaced reluctantly.
Marjorie saying Thomas had collapsed in the kitchen.
Another time, the garage.
Years later, during a conversation with relatives, she had said he became ill while driving.
Derek had noticed the inconsistencies without ever gathering them together.
His father was dead.
He had believed details no longer mattered.
Now they mattered.
He stood and reached for his jacket.
Carlos stepped in front of him.
“Where are you going?”
“To my mother’s.”
“Is that smart?”
“I need answers.”
“Your wife spent months collecting evidence instead of confronting her.”
Derek stopped.
Carlos rarely interfered in his personal life.
That made the warning harder to dismiss.
Before Derek could decide, his phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
“Mr. Hale?”
A man.
“Yes.”
“You don’t know me.”
Derek looked toward the black folder.
“Then why are you calling?”
“Because you need to stop asking questions.”
His pulse quickened.
“Were you in my office?”
The caller ignored him.
“Stop looking into your mother’s finances.”
“Who are you?”
“You’ve already seen more than you were supposed to.”
“Did my mother send you?”
A quiet laugh.
Then the man said something that made Derek’s blood turn cold.
“Your wife tried to protect you.”
Derek gripped the phone.
“What did you say?”
“She failed.”
The call ended.
A message arrived immediately.
A photograph loaded on the screen.
Olivia sat inside a parked car.
The picture had been taken from across the street.
Someone was watching her.
Beneath the image was a warning telling Olivia to stop investigating.
Derek called Rebecca.
No answer.
He called Olivia.
Voicemail.
Again.
Nothing.
He ran toward his truck.
The divorce papers no longer mattered.
The argument about the card no longer mattered.
Someone had followed Olivia.
Someone had followed Derek.
And someone had just demonstrated that they knew exactly where Olivia was.
His phone buzzed while he was starting the engine.
Another message.
This one came from Olivia.
I’m okay. Do not come looking for me. Go to the police.
Derek stared at it.
Then typed.
Someone sent me a picture of you.
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Returned.
Olivia finally replied.
I know.
Derek’s hands went cold.
How?
The answer took almost a minute.
Because they have been following me since I confronted your mother at the bank.
Derek called immediately.
This time Olivia answered.
Neither spoke at first.
He could hear her breathing.
“Where are you?” he asked.
“I’m safe.”
“Stop saying that. Somebody is watching you.”
“I know.”
“Then tell me where you are.”
“No.”
“Olivia, please.”
“If you come here, you could lead them directly to me.”
He closed his eyes.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Go back inside.”
“What?”
“Give the photograph and the number to the police.”
“Okay.”
“And Derek?”
“Yes?”
“Do not call your mother.”
His jaw tightened.
“Why?”
“Because if she realizes exactly how much we know, she may destroy what’s left.”
“What’s left of what?”
Silence.
Then Olivia said, “Your father’s records.”
Derek stopped breathing.
“What records?”
“I’ll show you tomorrow.”
“Tell me now.”
“I can’t explain this safely over the phone.”
“Did my mother do something to Dad?”
Olivia was quiet long enough to frighten him.
“I don’t know.”
“But you suspect something.”
“I found evidence that the official story is incomplete.”
“What evidence?”
“A recording.”
Derek leaned back against the seat.
“What recording?”
“One your father made.”
His eyes closed.
His father’s voice had existed only in memory for eight years.
“Olivia.”
“I have to go.”
“Wait.”
“Tomorrow.”
The call ended.
Across Phoenix, Olivia sat inside her car with the doors locked.
A dark SUV remained parked across the lot.
It had been there long enough that she had stopped pretending its presence might be coincidence.
Her phone lit again.
This message came from Marjorie.
Olivia read it without changing expression.
A second message followed.
The threat was clearer this time.
Olivia looked into the rearview mirror.
The SUV remained dark.
She reached beneath the driver’s seat and pulled out a small digital recorder.
For months she had collected statements, documents, photographs and video because she had learned that accusations disappeared whenever Marjorie could turn them into family drama.
Evidence did not disappear so easily.
Olivia pressed RECORD.
A red light appeared.
Then she started her engine.
The SUV’s headlights came on.
Olivia watched them in the mirror.
“Good,” she whispered.
If they wanted to follow her, she would choose the destination.
She pulled onto the street.
The SUV followed.
Olivia drove past the turn that would have taken her toward the place where she was staying.
She continued east.
At the next intersection, the SUV remained behind her.
At the one after that, it was still there.
She placed her phone in its cradle and activated hands-free calling.
“Phoenix Police,” she said when the line connected. “I need to report that I’m being followed, and I believe it’s connected to an active identity-fraud investigation.”
The dispatcher asked for her location.
Olivia gave it.
Then she added something she had not yet told Derek.
“I also have evidence connected to a death that occurred eight years ago.”
The dispatcher’s tone changed.
Olivia glanced at the SUV.
Her hands remained steady on the wheel.
“What kind of evidence?”
“A recording made by the deceased before he died.”
“And you believe the people following you know you have it?”
Olivia watched the headlights in her mirror.
“Yes.”
“How certain are you?”
“Certain enough that my mother-in-law has spent months trying to find it.”
Olivia turned toward the nearest police station.
The SUV followed.
She reached into her handbag at the next red light and touched a small flash drive hidden inside an inner pocket.
Thomas Hale’s voice was stored on it.
So were photographs of documents Marjorie had tried to destroy.
Olivia had kept that evidence from Rebecca.
From the police.
Even from Derek.
Not because she wanted leverage.
Because she had not yet known whom she could trust.
The light changed.
Olivia accelerated.
Behind her, the SUV did the same.
Ahead, the illuminated sign of the police station came into view.
Olivia tightened her hands on the steering wheel.
Tomorrow, Derek expected an explanation about stolen money, forged signatures and a house his father had secretly left him.
He had no idea that the recording Olivia carried began with Thomas Hale saying his wife’s name.
And then explaining why, if anything happened to him, Derek should never sign a financial document Marjorie put in front of him.
Click here to continue reading: PART 5: Olivia Reached the Police Station With Thomas Hale’s Recording, but the Voice on It Changed Derek’s Understanding of His Father
My Mother Called From a Grocery Store Furious About a Declined Card That Never Belonged to Her
Part 4 of 35
